Get Modernising Portugal

It is a developed country with an advanced economy. A member of the United Nations, the European Union, the Schengen Area and the Council of Europe (CoE), Portugal was also one of the founding members of NATO, the eurozone, the OECD, and the Community of Portuguese Language Countries.

"Modern Portuguese" developed from the early 16th century to the present. During the Renaissance, scholars and writers borrowed many words from Classical Latin (learned words borrowed from Latin also came from Renaissance Latin) and ancient Greek, which increased the complexity of the Portuguese lexicon.

Portugal was founded in 1143, year of the Zamora's Treaty signing. The treaty, agreed upon by D. Afonso Henriques, the first King of Portugal, and Alphonse the VII of León and Castile, recognized Portugal as an independent kingdom.

Portugal is one of the most affordable countries in Western Europe, with food available at affordable prices, cheap options for accommodation, and reasonable costs for transport. It's not surprising, then, that so many American expats are making this beautiful country their home.

The Portuguese people's heritage largely derives from the proto-Celtic/proto-Italic Indo-European (Lusitanians, Conii) and Celtic peoples (Gallaecians, Turduli and Celtici), who were later Romanized after the conquest of the region by the ancient Romans.

Starting in the early 1960s, Portugal entered in a period of robust economic growth and structural modernisation, owing to a liberalisation of the economy. As an expression of such economic opening, in 1960 the country was one of the EFTA founding member states.

October 5, 1143 Portugal / Founded