page_title: Porto Formoso
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Porto Formoso / History
caption_attribution_description: Português: Igreja Nossa Senhora da Graça, Porto Formoso, Ribeira Grande, ilha de São Miguel, Açores
context_page_description: Porto Formoso is a civil parish in the municipality of Ribeira Grande in the Portuguese archipelago of the Azores. The population in 2011 was 1,265, in an area of 12.79 km².
context_section_description: The establishment of this civil parish remotes to the early part of the 16th century, as first recorded by Pedro Vaz Pacheco. On 2 June 1509, he ordered the construction of a Chapel of Bom Jesus, to serve his descendants. By the end of that century, the chapel had its own clergy, passing into a vicarage in 1568.
  Gaspar Frutuoso (in Saudades da Terra), refers to the parish in these terms: "it makes a beautiful bay, and in the centre the locality of Porto Formoso, named for the things that exist there, it is clean and the best one in the north...".
  The parochial church's patron is Nossa Senhora da Graça (Our Lady of Grace), and existed by the time that Pedro Vaz Pacheco ordered the erection of the Chapel of Bom Jesus (which included a crucifix and chanel to the Virgin) as a burial tomb for his descendants. The church was renovated throughout the centuries, becoming the simple facade of basalt rock and three interior naves.
  In the civil parish, in the old roadway that connected Ribeira Grande to Furnas, is an obelisk (Obelisco da Ladeira da Velha) which was erected during the Liberal Wars (1829–34) to mark a long-forgotten engagement in the conflict, known as the Battle of Ladeira da Velha.
caption: The ornate facada and staircase of the parochial Church of Nossa Senhora da Graça
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