Welcome to Scribbles from Portugal!

BIOGRAPHY:  Robert Knight was born in December 1933 at Portsmouth, England.      After service as a Flying Officer with the R.A.F. and NATO, he founded the well reputed George Knight and Partners estate agency in the Hampstead district of N.W. London. In 1987 he decided to immigrate to Portugal and commenced business as a distributor of watersports equipment and opened the very successful Clube Náutico de Zezere.   In 2002 he made a second change in lifestyle by retiring from business and has devoted his remaining years to writing essays, poems and commentaries more than two hundred of which have been published by Academia.edu and in Portuguese journals such as The Portugal News, The Resident, O Templário and SOL.    Most of these are shown in the archives listed below.

He has dual Portuguese/British nationality and for the past twenty years has used the name of Roberto Cavaleiro for both professional and social purposes.   He lives quietly in a converted farm building near Tomar.

A Strong Portugal Fund

Critics of a repetitive government policy which allows foreign private equity funds to gobble up the best of Portugal`s strategic assets in energy, mining, housing and IT will be interested to hear of an alternative which has just been launched by Canada`s 47th prime minister, Mark Carney, whose experience includes being governor of the Banks of Canada (2008-2010) and England (2013-2020).

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Mercosur

In April 2026. the first left wing president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, declared that his country would apply for full Membership of the Mercosur trade community.

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A Portuguese Dream for Midsummer´s Night

As related in my essay “Portuguese Magic – In Ancient Times” (TPN – 20-02-2026) the night of the Summer Solstice on 21 June is renowned for being the zenith of supernatural activity in Portugal.    In particular, the anthropomorphic Mouras Encantadas are to be seen near their imprisonment in dolmen, grottos and sacred waters. It is only then that they can be released from the spells which bind them as guardians.

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Portuguese Magic Part 3

In year 711 the Umayyad Caliphate sent a vanguard of 7,000 Muslim troops across the strait of Gibraltar to establish a bridgehead for the invasion and subjection of the fractured Visigoth kingdoms of Iberia.   After receiving a reinforcement of 5,000 Berber light cavalry, the way was opened by victory at the battle of Guadalete.

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Sines : Energy - The Way Ahead

Data assembled by the European Union and released by the environmental watchdog ZERO on 29th May shows that the top ten industrial entities of Portugal emitted nearly nine million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) last year.  

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Sines : Energy - The Way Ahead

Data assembled by the European Union and released by the environmental watchdog ZERO on 29th May shows that the top ten industrial entities of Portugal emitted nearly nine million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) last year.  

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