City Detail

Sobral is a municipality in the state of Ceará, Brazil. Sobral is the fifth largest municipality of Ceará, after Fortaleza. Its economy is based on agriculture, services and some manufacturing industries. The city has two public universities: Universidade Federal do Ceará) and Universidade Estadual do Vale do Acaraú. It also has private universities, such as Faculdade Luciano Feijão, Unopar, and UNINTA − a theological institute. The city is the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sobral. The city is known for being the place where the astronomical observation of a solar eclipse on May 29, 1919, by a team of British scientists led by Sir Frank Watson Dyson was offered as the first proof of Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity, which had been published in 1916. The town's Museu do Eclipse ("Museum of the Eclipse") celebrates this event. There is a monument in Patrocínio Square marking the location of this solar eclipse.