In spite of the geographical proximity and the political and cultural relations between Portu­gal and Spain, Spanish has not enjoyed, from the eighteenth century onwards, from particular relevance in Portugal. We can, on the contrary, observe that it suffered from some animosity, aggravated by the general belief in the Portuguese society that it was not necessary to study Spanish. We, thus, intend to outline, in this article, the path of Spanish teaching during the last twenty years of the 20th

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... century in the University of Coimbra, one of the first Portuguese uni­versities to recognize the importance of a formal study of Spanish at university level and to introduce the Bachelor´s Degree in Línguas e Literaturas Modernas – variante de estudos Portugueses e Espanhóis in its curricular offer, which constituted a decisive step towards the spreading of the Spanish language in Portugal during the time.