MilitaryArchitecture.com Newsletter July 2011

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M ILITARY A RCHITECTURE NEWSLETTER

ARX 8

JULY 2011

IS OUT !

ARX 8 is largely dedicated to the ongoing restoration works on Malta’s unique fortifications.

List of contents: Malta restores her fortifications — A Fortifications Interpretation Centre in Valletta — Bracing Mdina’s falling ramparts — A Cubete Artillero at Mdina? — 18th century Caponier unearthed in Birgu fortifications — Restoration of St Anthony Battery at Ras il-Qala, Gozo — The Templar Fortress of Tartous, Syria — A Chapel on the Ramparts — St Thomas Bay Tower and Battery, M’Scala — Madliena Tower - Malta’s’ Martello Tower’ — The Fortress of Elvas, Portugal — Review of News Items /Commentaries 2010-11

Statistics over the past 12 months:

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1295 Articles and growing

P ODCAST : A L A V AUBAN French Military Architecture in Hospitaller Malta. By Dr Stephen C. Spiteri Ph.D. and Arch. Hermann Bonnici M.Sc. Automated Narration. Click on the image to download.

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From the web contd

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M ILITARY A RCHITECTURE

P AGE 2

V AUBAN ’ S I NFLUENCE On the occasion of the third

anniversary of the World Heritage nomination of Vauban’s fortifications,

IN THE

W ORLD

around the world discussed the impact of Vauban’s methods in different regions of the world as well as the influence on his contemporary engineers, and the ways in which the treaties on fortification spread out his ideas.

The seminar was well held in the Citadel of Arras, one of the many fortresses designed and built by Sebastien le Prestre de Vauban and was well attended with partipants from various continents.

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the Vauban Network and the Arras Urban Area have together organized an International Study Day concerning Vauban’s influence throughout the world. The international seminar, entitled VAUBAN’S INFLUENCE TROUGHOUT THE WORLD was held at the citadel of Arras on 7th July 2011. Various historians of military architecture from

A C OMMEMORATIVE M ASONRY A RCH

On the 40th Anniversary of

FOR

F INSBURY C IRCUS P ARK

the Armed Forces of Malta (AFM), 3 Regiment erected a Masonry Arch to commemorate this event. The arch was manufactured by AFM Sappers of the 2nd (Engineer) Regiment in 1979 with the intention to assemble it at Finsbury Circus Park in London, United Kingdom, however this project failed to materialise owing to the financial constraints at the time. For the

AFM’s 40th Anniversary, it was deemed opportune to erect this arch so as to give tribute to all past Maltese sappers who served since 1800 to date, under both the British Administration and the subsequent Maltese Government.

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NEWSLETTER

O N THE M ILITARY A RCHITECTURE G IBRALTAR AND M ALTA —PART I

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OF THE

100- TON G UN B ATTERIES

OF

The 100-ton Armstrong coastal guns of Gibraltar and Malta have always generated considerable interest among students of fortification and coastal artillery. What has been less forthcoming, perhaps, is a study of the architectural features and the issues involved in the design, layout, and construction of the fortified works which were built to house and protect these singular leviathans. What were, for example, the design criteria that influenced the planimetric layout of the batteries and their component parts, and how did the use of concrete and other materials influence overall design and construction ? How did these and other architectural issues affect the batteries’ performance as a defensive works?

What were the batteries’ true ‘powers of resistance’ when faced with direct bombardment or landward assault? This article (spread over two parts) sets out to examine and draw attention to such issues generally ignored elsewhere. It does not, however, pretend to answer all the questions raised at this stage, since many of concepts and matters discussed here need to be studied further.

It is the present author’s intention to publish the product of such research on the subject in a forthcoming publication on British military architecture in the Mediterranean, a new work that seeks to follow in the footsteps of Prof. Quentin Hughes’ seminal study entitled Britain in the Mediterranean and the Defence of her Naval Stations, published in Liverpool in 1981. Detailed sectional elevations and plans, together with brief historical descriptions of the Cambridge and Rinella batteries, reproduced from their respective record plans, were published by the present author in his British Military Architecture in Malta, printed in 1996, and can be consulted in that publication. The scope of the present contribution is to provide additional new material together with 3D computer models that allow readers to better appreciate the shape, form, and structure of the 100-ton gun batteries.

Although the 100-ton guns were the central feature of these singular batteries ‒ and indeed, these structures were designed and built around the very guns themselves ‒ their protective perimeters (found only in the two works erected at Malta) did not depend on the central gun for their defence. As rightly remarked by Maj. O’Callaghan and Capt.

Clarke in 1886, the 100-ton gun was hardly the weapon to be ‘called upon to defend its own glacis.’ In defensive terms, therefore, the elements of the batteries’ fortified enclosures – i.e., the revetments, the parapets, the ditches, the caponiers and the musketry galleries – functioned independently of the main weapon which they were built to house.

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M ILITARY A RCHITECTURE

P AGE 4

FORT GEORGE Fort George is a bastioned' defence built on an isolated promontory

jutting in to the Moray Firth, just a short bus ride from Inverness Town Centre.

The Fort is one of a chain of fortifications in and around the Great Glen, intended to subjugate the Highlands of Scotland. Surrounded on three sides by water, the Eastern defences were built to resist land attack.

Fort George was planned after the Jacobite Rising of 1745 to 1746 to provide a secure base for British forces in the event of another uprising in the Highlands of Scotland.

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FORT SUCHET Situated in the eastern

part of the AlpesMaritimes département, the village of Sospel lies to the south of the green valley of la Bévera, on the edge of the Mercantour park and the valley of les Merveilles, 15 km from Menton and the Mediterranean.

tions in the region that constitutes the last bastion ahead of the road to Nice that prevents any potential invader coming from the col de Tende pass.

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Fort Suchet, also known as du Barbonnet, is one of a group of fortifica-

T RENČÍN C ASTLE The castle was built over

a settlement site that had existed from the Bronze Age through times of Celts and Germanic tribes to the Slavic settlement. In the times of the origins of the Ugrian state a royal castle had developed out of the older Great Moravia hill-fortroost.

The oldest stone construction of the castle is the pre-Romanesque rotunda, which dates back to Great Moravia period. At the end of 11th century a stone tower was erected (donjon,bergfrid).

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NEWSLETTER

I MPACT

OF

P AGE 5

C RUSADE R C ASTLES

UPON

W ESTERN C ASTLE S

IN THE MI DDLE

AGE S

During the Middle Ages, the period from roughly AD 1000-1450, the structure of castles changed greatly from wooden motte and bailey to stone keeps and defenses within stone city walls. The reason for the change was largely influenced by the crusades as Europeans went to the Holy Lands to conquer.

back a new way of designing and fortifying their castles in England, Wales and France. Without the influence of the crusades, what we think of as true middle age castles would not exist.

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In addition to conquering, these kings brought

T RELLEBO RG D URING A Study of a Coastal Area in South-West Scania, Sweden. During the 1980s a great deal of archaeological interest was focused on medieval towns. Several excavations uncovered not just remains of medieval towns but also traces of much older settlements.

Along the south coast of Sweden, the Trelleborg area occupies a special

THE

I RON A GE

position since the discovery – in connection with excavations in the medieval town – of a large coastal settlement site from the Vendel Period and Viking Age, as well as aViking Age fortress. It has only been possible to excavate limited parts of the site, which covered a considerable part of the medieval town.

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A RMSTRONG B ARBE T TE B ATTE RIES Tangier is one of the few remaining places where batteries of Rifled Muzzle Loaders may be seen.

They remain to this day essentially as their owners left them, shells still lying around and largely ignored by the local people.

Historical Background

In 1471 the Portuguese seized Tangier as part of their efforts to control the Straits of Gibraltar and the Moroccan littoral.

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OF

T ANGIE R

M ILITARY A RCHITECTURE

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S YSTE MS E LV AS

AN D

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OF

B ULW ARKE D F ORTI FICATI ON

ADOPTE D IN

This current work - prefaced by Dr. Ray Bondin - is the result of thorough technical research of the systems and schools of bulwarked fortifications adopted in Elvas (17th-19th centuries). The author brings to light the essential heritage values which he uses to justify the nomination of this city to World Heritage (UNESCO) Book is in Portugeuse and English.

Click on the image for further details.

V AUBAN

AND THE

F RENCH M ILITARY U NDER L OUIS XIV

An Illustrated History of Fortifications and Strategies A man of inventiveness, versatility and reformist ideas, Marshal Sebastien Le Preste de Vauban built a formidable ring of fortresses to protect Franc's national frontiers. More than just a fortification designer, Vauban was also a gifted economist, author, and political strategist. This book tells the complete story of Vauban's exceptional career, placing him within the framework of Louis XIV's reign and revealing his lasting influences in France and other nations. With the aid of numerous detailed drawings, 17th century bastioned fortification, artillery, and seige warfare are described in detail. Vauban's fortifications that are still standing today are particularly highlighted.

T HE A RT

OF

M EDIEVAL U RBANISM

Parthenay in Romanesque Aquitaine.

The Art of Medieval Urbanis examines the role of monumental sculpture and architecture in the medieval cityscape, offering a pathbreaking interpretation of the relationships among art, architecture, and the history of urbanism. In the first study of its kind, Robert Maxwell shifts attention away from the great Gothic cities of the later Middle Ages to focus on the urban context of art making in the earlier Romanesque era.

Maxwell concentrates on Parthenay, a flourishing town in eleventhand twelfth-century Aquitaine. Exploring Parthenay's exceptionally well-preserved structures, the author charts two centuries of urban development in southwestern France.

NEWSLETTER

P AGE 7

ICOMOS ICOMOS works for the conservation and protection of cultural heritage places. It is the only global non-government organisation of this kind, which is dedicated to promoting the application of theory, methodology, and scientific techniques to the conservation of the architectural and archaeological heritage. Its work is based on the principles enshrined in the 1964 International

Charter on the Conservation and Restoration of Monuments and Sites (the Venice Charter).

ICOMOS is a network of experts that benefits from the interdisciplinary exchange of its members, among which are architects, historians, archaeologists, art historians, geographers, anthropologists, engineers and town planners.

Go To Site

G UÉDELO N In the heart of Puisaye, in Yonne, Burgundy, a team of fifty people have taken on an extraordinary feat: to build a castle using the very same techniques and materials used in the Middle Ages. The materials needed for the construction of the castle - wood, stone, earth, sand and clay - are all to be found here, in this abandoned

quarry. Before the gaze of thousands of visitors, all the trades associated with castle-building quarrymen, stonemasons, woodcutters, carpenters, blacksmiths, tile makers, basket makers, rope makers, carters and their horses - are working together to complete the castle.

Go To Site

N ORTH A MERICAN F ORTS A Catalogue and Gazetteer of Forts and Fortresses, Frontier Posts, Camps, Stockades, Blockhouses, Garrisons, Arsenals, and Seacoast Batteries in the United States and Canada and Associated Territories Including Select Listings for Mexico, Cuba, and Central America

Website contains extensive database of fortifications and links.

Go To Site

P AGE 8

M ILITARY A RCHITECTURE

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NEWSLETTER

C ROSSWORD -

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A NSWERS IN NEXT NEWSLETTER

M ILITARY A RCHITECTURE

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U NIVERSITY U NCOVERS L ATE B RONZE A GE F ORTRESS The University of Cincinnati's most recent research in Cyprus re-

veals the remnants of a Late Bronze Age (1500750 B.C.) fortress that may have functioned to protect an important urban economic center in the ancient world.

A recent find by a University of Cincinnati archeologist suggests an ancient Cypriot city was well protected from outside threats.

Gisela Walberg, professor of classics, will be presented at the annual workshop of the Cyprus American Archaeological Research Center in Nicosia, Cyprus, on June 25, 2011.

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That research, by UC's

O PHEL C ITY W ALL The Ophel City Wall site

SITE INAUGURATED

– a complex of buildings uncovered along the route of the fortifications from the First Temple period (tenth-sixth centuries BCE), and the display of the earliest written document ever uncovered in Jerusalem – was inaugurated in a festive ceremony Tuesday.

located in the Walls Around Jerusalem National Park, and the exhibit in the Davidson Center are made possible through a generous donation by Daniel Mintz and Meredith Berkman.

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The opening of the site,

T HE MYSTERY OF THE ZAR FORTS OF P RETORIA As a direct result of the

abortive Jameson Raid of 1896, the Volksraad of the Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek realised that they would have to make far better arrangements for the defence of the Transvaal and, in particular, Pretoria. The raiders had penetrated to within nineteen kilometres of

Johannesburg.

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NEWSLETTER

E XCAVATIO NS

P AGE 11

AT

A projected 5-year programme of excavation and landscape survey focussed on the hillfort at Burrough Hill began in June 2010.

The aim of the work is to reassess the nature and role of this prominent monument in the light of recent research in the region and nationally, and at the same time to provide excavation training for undergraduate students. The

B URROUGH H ILL

work is being undertaken by University of Leicester School of Archaeology & Ancient History, and is jointly directed by members of the academic staff and staff from University of Leicester Archaeological Services (ULAS).

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F INDING U NIVERSAL V ALUES We have to start from the central concept that we will deal with throughout this symposium: Cultural Heritage.

I can try to define it, based on the legislation of my country, which is well developed on this subject: tangible and intangible elements (within their corresponding contexts if they are important for

C ASTRA

OF

F ORTIFIED H ERITAGE

the interpretation of the ensemble), which bear cultural and civilization testimonies, in several fields (historical, paleontological, archaeological, architectural, linguistic, documental, artistic, ethnographical, scientific, social, industrial or technical), comprising values of memory, antiquity, authenticity, originality, rarity,

peculiarity or exemplariness, that we must preserve, make use of and transmit to future generations because they constitute an important piece of our local, regional, national or world identity.

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ET URBS ROMANA

An Examination of the Common Features of Roman Settlements in Italy and the Empire and a System to aid in the Discovery of their Origins. Archaeological evidence from cities throughout the Roman Empire has shown similarities between certain sites such as Exeter (Isca

Dumnoniorum) in Britain and Timgad (Thamugadi) in North Africa. Despite the distance separating them, both of these cities share a grid-like system of streets that cross each other at right angles.

This orthogonal design betrays the military origins of these sites, based on the castra of the Ro-

man army that will be discussed below.

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