Museu dos Fósforos (Matchbox Museum), Tomar
Tomar has a couple of interesting museums if you are visiting the town to see its main attraction, the superb Convento de Cristo.
Portugal's oldest synagogue is preserved at the Museu Luso-Hebraico Abraão Zacuto in the narrow streets of the old town and also worth a visit is the Museu dos Fósforos (Matchbox Museum), located in a beautiful courtyard of the former Convento de São Francisco near Tomar Station.
The Museu dos Fósforos claims to have Europe's largest collection of match boxes with over 40,000 of them from 127 countries from all over the world, exhibited in seven rooms.
The match boxes were collected by local citizen, Aquiles Mota Lima, who donated them to Tomar in 1980. While traveling to England to witness the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953, Aquiles met an English woman who was collecting match boxes. He promised to send her match boxes he found and began to collect two of each match box, one for her and one for himself. This was the beginning of the collection that would continue for the next 27 years.
The collection includes a giant box 40 cm long, matches that light under water, puzzles made of several boxes, round boxes, hexagonal, silver and embroidered boxes, "windproof" matches from Bryant & May, even matches made with incense.
Access - Getting There
Museu dos Fósforos
Av. General Bernardo Faria
2300-535 Tomar
Hours: 10 am-5 pm
Museums in Portugal
© Portugal Visitor
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