This point sits inside Quinta da Regaleira, a palace and park near Sintra built for a man who collected secrets.
Last reviewed 4 October 2026 · A three-minute read · 100 BC–1998
The short answer
Quinta da Regaleira is a Gothic Revival palace and park near Sintra, built between 1904 and 1910 by Italian stage designer Luigi Manini for the collector António Augusto Carvalho Monteiro. Laced with Masonic symbolism and a 27-metre Initiation Well, it is now a museum run by Sintra's town council, open to visitors since 1998.
Situada em pleno Centro Histórico de Sintra, classificado Património Mundial pela UNESCO, a Quinta da Regaleira é um lugar com espírito próprio. Edificado nos primórdios do Século XX, ao sabor do ideário romântico, este fascinante conjunto — 2009 · Vitor Oliveira from Torres Vedras, PORTUGAL · CC B
1892 to 1910
A millionaire met his architect by chance on a train
Quinta da Regaleira is a Gothic Revival palace and park, now run as a museum near the center of Sintra. The estate takes its name from an earlier owner, the Viscountess of Regaleira, who sold it in 1892 to António Augusto Carvalho Monteiro, a wealthy collector known as "Monteiro the Millionaire." Carvalho Monteiro had made his fortune in Brazil and wanted a place to display his passions: rare books, natural science, and the symbolism of secret societies.
At first Carvalho Monteiro planned a French-style house. Then, by chance, he met Luigi Manini on a train. Manini was an Italian stage designer already at work on a hotel in Bussaco. Carvalho Monteiro hired him instead, and together they reimagined the whole estate.
Construction began in 1904 and was mostly finished by 1910. Manini built the palace, a chapel, a greenhouse, gates, and miles of hidden waterways to feed pools and grottoes across the grounds. The two men were both Freemasons, and the park fills with symbols tied to alchemy, the Knights Templar, and the Rosicrucians. A deep spiral staircase called the Initiation Well became the estate's strangest feature.
Carvalho Monteiro barely got to enjoy his finished creation. In 1910, the Portuguese monarchy collapsed, and he was forced into exile. He died in 1914, far from the estate he had spent a fortune building.
1911 to 1942
The estate became a hospital, then a family home
The Portuguese government bought the estate soon after Carvalho Monteiro fled, and in 1912 it took the name Quinta da Regaleira, after an earlier owner, the Viscountess of Regaleira. Carvalho Monteiro never returned and died in exile in 1914.
The estate found stranger uses after that. In the 1930s, it served as a military hospital during the Spanish Civil War, its grottoes and symbolic gardens standing in for sickbeds. By 1942, the place had passed to a new owner, Waldemar d'Orey, who moved in with his large family. He hired architects to strip out some of Manini's decoration and make the palace livable as a home rather than a stage set.
1960 to 1997
A Japanese corporation locked the decaying estate away
The d'Orey family's tenure did not last. By 1960, the estate stood empty and began to decay. Its grottoes filled with weeds and its waterways ran dry. In 1987, the Japanese Aoki Corporation bought the property, but kept it locked away from the public for the next ten years, a palace nobody could visit.
Sintra's town council finally bought the neglected estate in 1997 and began restoring it. The gardens, tunnels, and the Initiation Well reopened to the public in June 1998. That August, Portugal's Ministry of Culture named Quinta da Regaleira a property of public interest. UNESCO had already folded it into the Cultural Landscape of Sintra, a World Heritage Site, in 1995.
1998 to now
Tunnels still draw visitors down to the Initiation Well
Quinta da Regaleira now draws visitors chiefly for its underground world. Tunnels link several grottoes beneath the park, including the Virgin's Cave and Leda's Cave, which sits under the Regaleira Tower. The tunnels all connect to the Initiation Well, a 27-meter shaft lined with a spiral staircase and nine flights of stairs.
The well's symbolism points toward Freemasonry, and both Carvalho Monteiro and Manini belonged to Masonic lodges. Some guides go further and claim the land once belonged to the Knights Templar, supposedly granted by Portugal's first king, Afonso Henriques. Others point out the Templars were dissolved in the 14th century, centuries before Carvalho Monteiro bought the estate, and never set foot here. What is certain is that he filled the grounds with Templar crosses, pentagrams, and alchemical symbols, whatever their older source.
Stories about the estate's occult reputation still circulate. Some guides claim the occultist Aleister Crowley visited Sintra, though no detail ties him to this specific ground. In 1998, the director Roman Polanski shot scenes of his film The Ninth Gate, starring Johnny Depp, among the grottoes and towers, adding a modern layer to the estate's reputation for mystery.
Quinta da Regaleira stands today as a museum and park, its palace open to visitors and its tunnels still drawing people underground to look for Carvalho Monteiro's secrets. Seteais Palace, once home to a Dutch diamond merchant, sits a few hundred feet away, now run as a luxury hotel.
Visitors still walk the spiral staircase down into the Initiation Well, the strangest room Carvalho Monteiro ever built.
Read the ground you are standing on
Every person, building and event in this story opens into its own dig in the app — and Strata will dig the ground under your feet instead, wherever that is, in about a minute, with every source shown.
Sourced records, high and medium confidence. Era background is marked as such.
Ancient
100 BC to 410 AD
The Villa romana de Abóbodas, a Roman villa occupied from around 100 BC to 410 AD, lies about 3.9 km away, the oldest dated structure found in this stretch of ground.
Excavations under the Edifício das Padarias near Sintra's main square turned up Roman-period remains, evidence that people were living on this hillside long before the medieval castle rose above it.
The 1755 earthquake struck this whole area hard, killing much of the village's population and wrecking buildings for miles around, including near where these streets now meet.
In 1840 Ermelinda Allen, daughter of a Porto trader, bought the estate, and King Carlos I later made her the Viscountess of Regaleira, giving the Quinta its name.
António Augusto Carvalho Monteiro, nicknamed Monteiro dos Milhões, bought this estate in 1892 and had Italian architect Luigi Manini build the palace you are standing beside between 1904 and 1910.
After fleeing Portugal when the monarchy fell in 1910, Carvalho Monteiro sold the estate to the government and died in exile in Brazil in 1914, having had little time to enjoy the palace he built.
In 1930 the estate was pressed into use as a military hospital during the Spanish Civil War, a grim interlude between its romantic design and its later abandonment.
The estate fell into disrepair after 1960 and in 1987 the Japanese Aoki Corporation bought it, keeping it closed to the public for ten years before Sintra's town council acquired it in 1997.
In 1995 UNESCO recognized the surrounding hills, including this estate, as a World Heritage Site, and the Portuguese state separately declared the Quinta a property of public interest in 1998.
What was here before Quinta da Regaleira was built?
The ground took its name from the Viscountess of Regaleira, an earlier owner, before António Augusto Carvalho Monteiro bought the estate in 1892 and had the Gothic Revival palace and park built between 1904 and 1910.
Who built Quinta da Regaleira?
António Augusto Carvalho Monteiro, a wealthy collector nicknamed Monteiro the Millionaire, commissioned the estate, and Italian stage designer Luigi Manini, whom he met by chance on a train, built the palace, chapel, greenhouse and grottoes between 1904 and 1910.
What happened to Carvalho Monteiro after he built the estate?
The Portuguese monarchy collapsed in 1910, forcing Carvalho Monteiro into exile, and he died in 1914 without returning to enjoy the palace he had spent a fortune building.
What is the Initiation Well at Quinta da Regaleira?
It is a 27-metre shaft lined with a spiral staircase and nine flights of stairs, linked by tunnels to grottoes including the Virgin's Cave and Leda's Cave, and carrying symbolism tied to Freemasonry.
Is Quinta da Regaleira open to the public?
Yes. Sintra's town council bought the neglected estate in 1997 and reopened its gardens, tunnels and the Initiation Well to the public in June 1998, after it had stood empty from 1960 and been held closed for a decade by the Japanese Aoki Corporation.
Has Quinta da Regaleira appeared in film?
Roman Polanski shot scenes of his 1999 film The Ninth Gate, starring Johnny Depp, among the grottoes and towers of the estate in 1998.
