At least 14,000 hectares (34,594 acres) have burned to a crisp in parts of the southern region of Andalusia since fires broke out there two days ago.
``It has been the largest fire for the last 10 years in Andalusia,'' said Ana Fernandez from Plan Infoca, the region's task force against forest fires.
In Portugal, fires started Sunday in numbers and intensity that recalled last summer when five percent of the country was smoking before rains arrived in late August.
In the Algarve tourist and beach region along the Atlantic Ocean west of the Gibraltar strait, several blazes joined to form a wall of flames about 70 kilometers (44 miles) wide.
Hundreds of firefighters from both countries worked round-the-clock to control the blazes, battled from the sky, too, by planes dropping tons of water and fire suppressants.
Hundreds of hectares (thousands of acres) of eucalyptus and cork tree forests and several houses were destroyed in Portugal, and several hundred people evacuated from their homes.
More than 33,000 hectares (81,500 acres) of forest and agricultural land has been lost to fires between January and July, the government said in a statement.
On Wednesday the mayor of Almodovar, Antonio Sebastiao, told the state news agency Lusa he was going to request that the area be considered a disaster zone.
Last year, fires in Portugal destroyed 424,000 hectares (1 million acres), killed 18 people and damaged 2,500 buildings.
In Spain, some 400 firefighters worked through the night while 30 planes and helicopters tried to extinguish the flames, a spokeswoman from the Seville city government said Thursday.
About 355 people were evacuated from their homes from Seville area, mostly from the town of Madrono.
In the neighboring region of Huelva, close to 1,000 people were evacuated to other towns, a spokesman for Huelva city government said, and about 125 received medical treatment for smoke inhalation.
The forest fires killed two people in Huelva on Tuesday.
Temperatures remained high at close to 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) which is common for Spain during the summer months.
``Weather-wise we are most likely to have problems related to forest fires throughout the whole summer,'' said Rosa Prades, a spokeswoman from the Madrid city government.
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