The 23 April 23 1909 Benavente (Portugal) M 6.3 Earthquake

Lisbon is forever linked to the history of seismology through the eponymous 1755 earthquake. But a less-known series of moderate to strong earthquakes, some with intraplate origin, has caused major destruction in the Lower Tagus Valley (LTV) region around the Portuguese capital throughout historical times. Although references to earthquakes can be found in coeval documents dating from the 14th century, the earliest descriptions of damage distribution with reasonable detail concern the 1531 Lisbon earthquake (Justo and Salwa 1998), with estimated moment magnitude of 6.9 (Vilanova and Fonseca 2007). In 1858, the town of Setubal, 30 km...