Seven years after the disastrous Battle of Alcácer Quibir, where King Sebastian and the nobleman Dom João disappeared, the latter's wife Dona Madalena de Vilhena finally gives up hope that he'll return and marries the knight Dom Manuel de Sousa Coutinho, with whom she has a daughter, who is afflicted by a fatal illness. Now only the tutor Telmo Pais retains the hope that the lost husband is alive, a premonition that may be confirmed after two decades, with the arrival of a mysterious pilgrim...

After losing her father in the sea, Rosa is lodged in the house of the lighthouse keeper João Vidal. António Gaspar, also a lighthouse keeper, loves Rosa. His jealousy of João Vidal will provoke the death of Rosa, an act that the mother of António will help to cover up.

Based on the novel of the same name, by Júlio Dantas, this is the first Portuguese all-talking sound film, dramatization of the story of the Fado singer Maria Severa Onofriana, known as A Severa.