Portugal’s traditional childhood games may come from antiquity, from former colonies or from trading posts in far-flung places such as China and India.
Portimão Museum is hosting a new exhibition of games and toys, under the heading ‘Traditional Games - Remembering and Learning to Play,’ open from the evening of July 1st.
The exhibition has a basis in the in depth research carried out by Constança Lago Brás, an ethnologist and holder of a doctorate in Social and Human Sciences.
Twenty years of fieldwork, with the collaboration of colleagues and students at the School of Education of the University of the Algarve and many contributors all have helped the exhibition take shape.
Parallels are clear between traditional Portuguese games and those from other European countries but it’s the links to the Far East, "where the Portuguese presence has established a strong historical connection," that perhaps is the most fascinating.
The exhibition "evokes memories, some already lost, but others that still exist through games that continue to be played.”
The visitor will have the opportunity to take look at the origins of traditional games, divided between the so-called hand games, body games and toys.
They are games that "marked the childhood of many generations” and have been handed down for centuries.
Thge permanent exhibition will be open, and covers:
Origin and destiny of a community
Industrial life and the challenge of the sea
From under of the waters
http://www.museudeportimao.pt/en/menu/46/main-exhibition.aspx
