Lisbon (disambiguation)
Lisbon is the capital city of Portugal.
History of Lisbon
Signs of a recovering economy emerged slowly under the Portuguese economic renewal policy. The city grew gradually to 250,000 inhabitants who settled in all geographical directions, occupying the new neighbourhoods of Estrella and Rato, while its new industrial centre concentrated around the recent water supply brought by the aqueduct to the water tower of Alcântara. Many factories arose in the area, including the royal ceramic factory and the silk factory of Amoreiras, where mulberry trees were grown to provide leaves to feed the larvae of the silkworms used by the local silk factories. The Prime Minister tried continually to stimulate the rise of middle class, which he saw as essential to the country's development and progress. The first cafes owned by Italians were founded in the city around this time: some survive today such as "Martinho da Arcada" (1782) in the Palace Square and the "Nicola" in Rossio Square, whose Liberal owner, among others, illuminated the façade after each Progressive political victory. The richest burghers acquired the habit of holding social soirées, with the unprecedented participation of women, while among the conservative nobility women held their traditional place and did not participate. In this manner a self-conscious bourgeois middle class rose again from the people of Lisbon, composed of both New Christians and Old Christians; these were the source of the national Liberal and Republican political movements, their presence manifested by the publication of several new newspapers in the capital.