Praça da Batalha, Porto

Battle is the unexpected inheritance in this square’s name. Local tradition traces “Batalha” to a 10th-century fight between Al-Mansur Ibn Abi Aamir’s Moorish forces and Porto’s inhabitants, ending in the city’s defeat and destruction. Whatever that tradition preserves, this is a historic public square in Porto, largely given over to pedestrians since the 1980s.

From a settled spot on the sidewalk, take in the buildings that make this feel like a compact account of the city’s public life. Batalha Palace is a late-18th-century Porto town palace, its main front poised between Baroque and Neoclassical design. During the 1832 Siege of Porto, its owners left and the building served several uses, including as a blood hospital; today it houses a post office.

The statue of King Pedro V was put up here as the square was reshaped in 1861, then inaugurated in 1866. Culture has deep roots here too: the Royal Theatre of São João opened on this site in 1794, and its present building replaced the earlier theatre after a 1908 fire. Cinema Batalha adds a different chapter, a Portuguese Art Deco landmark from 1947. Cafés, hotels, monuments, theatre and cinema explain why this square has remained a meeting point long after its days as a major traffic junction.