Culture of Póvoa de Varzim

Póvoa de Varzim, in Portugal is an ethno-cultural entity stemming from its working classes and with influences arriving from the maritime route from the Baltic Sea to the Mediterranean. The most charismatic of its communities, formerly overwhelmingly dominant, is the fisher community. It has significant similarities with those of the Danish fjords and it is one of Portugal's oldest ports. Póvoa de Varzim has distinct cultural traits and a strong local identity.

The expression Ala-Arriba! means "Go upwards" and it represents the co-operation between the inhabitants while docking a boat in the beach, and it is also seen as the motto of Póvoa de Varzim. The docudrama film Ala-Arriba!, by José Leitão de Barros, popularized this unique Portuguese fishing community within the country during the 1940s and Povoan maritime culture was used by Salazar regime as a stereotype for all Portuguese. Several fishing communities in Portugal, Brazil and Portuguese-speaking Africa were influenced or started by Povoan fishermen.

Póvoa de Varzim is an ethno-cultural entity. Until the beginning of the 20th century, the communities of Póvoa de Varzim were marked by endogamy, exclusiveness and local identity features with several centuries.

Due to endogamy and a caste system, the fisher community of Póvoa de Varzim kept particular ethnic features. Povoan fishermen, supported by 19th century scientific theories, believed they were a separate race, named "Raça Poveira" (Povoan Race). Anthropological and cultural data indicate the colonization of Nordic fishermen during the period of the coast's resettling. Since the 19th century, the visible ethnic differences when comparing with the surrounding people, led to different theories over the origin of the population: Suebi, Prussians, Teutons, Normans and even Phoenicians. In the book The Races of Europe (1939), Povoans were considered to be slightly blonder than average, with wide faces of unknown origin and robust cheeks. In a research published in O Poveiro (1908), using 19th century scientific methodology, the anthropologist Fonseca Cardoso considered that an anthropological element, most noticeably the aquiline nose, was of semitic-Phoenician origin. He considered that Povoans were the result of a mixture of Phoenicians, Teutons, and mostly, Normans.

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