Igreja de São Jorge dos Ilhéus

The Igreja de São Jorge dos Ilhéus, built in 1556, is the oldest church in the region and one of the oldest in Brazil. It stands near the waterfront in the historic centre, a simple colonial structure without the ornamentation of later baroque churches but with a quiet gravity that comes from age. The attached Museum of Sacred Art holds colonial religious objects, some salvaged from even earlier chapels that no longer exist.

The building has been restored several times and what you see today is largely 18th and 19th-century fabric on the original foundations. It is still an active parish church, so visitors are welcome but should behave accordingly.

things to do sight architecture
A story
The church was built in 1556, making it older than most European settlements in southern Brazil. When the Jesuits arrived in Ilhéus a few years after its founding, they found a settlement already large enough to need a stone church — the sugar trade was already underway and the first Portuguese families were establishing themselves on the Bahian coast.