The sacred villancico, in Portugal as in Spain, became widely disseminated in the 17th and 18th centuries not only through its intensive cultivation in major musical centres, such as the monastery of Santa Cruz in Coimbra, but also through an as yet little-studied but interesting phenomenon of dissemination. This resulted from the regular printing of libretti by printers in Lisbon, Coimbra and Evora up until the third decade of the 18th century, by which time the villancico no longer formed part of Portuguese musical life.
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The important presence of the villancico in 17th- century musical practice is also testified by the more than two thousand titles listed in the catalogue of the music library of João IV (1604–56), an invaluable source for understanding the music of this period.
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