MOZAMBIQUE: Planta da Praça de Moçambique

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MOZAMBIQUE: Planta da Praça de Moçambique

8,500.00€

 

An amazing and unique survivor, being a finely executed original manuscript map of the Praça de São Sebastião, the grand 16th century fortress which guarded the town of Ilha de Moçambique, the capital of Portuguese East Africa and a globally significant entrepôt for slaves, gold and ivory, and which today has the distinction of being the oldest complete fortress in Sub-Saharan Africa; the map was drafted during the mid 18th century when the Ilha de Moçambique’s economic and political power was on the rise – one of only very few detailed historical images of East Africa’s most important military base.

 

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Description

Anon.

“Planta da Praça de Moçambique”.

Manuscript, [mid-18th Century].

 

Manuscript, pen and ink and watercolour on fine laid paper watermarked ‘VL’ (Good, attractive patina, minor old surface abrasions affecting lower neat-line and scale, light vertical creasing centre right, old adhesive stains to blank corners), 35.5 x 52 cm (14 x 20.5 inches).

The Ilha de Moçambique, is a small coral island (around 3 km long and 0.5 km wide), located about 3 km off the mainland of northern Mozambique (today’s Nampula Province).  The island got its name from Mussa bin Bique, the island’s sultan at the time of the arrival of Vasco Da Gama in 1498 (the name was eventually given to the greater country).

In 1507, the Portuguese established a small fort and naval base on the island, as it possessed a decent natural harbour and its location provided is a good level of security from attack by indigenous forces from the mainland and from rival European powers from the sea.  In 1522, the Portuguese built the Capela de Nossa Senhora do Baluarte, a masterpiece of Manueline architecture on the northeastern tip of the island.  Today the chapel has the distinction of being the oldest European building in the southern hemisphere.

The Ilha de Moçambique was seen as the preferred administrative base for the archipelago of outposts that the Portuguese maintained along the Swahili Coast, which traded in slaves, ivory and gold.

In line with its significance, the Portuguese charged the military engineer Miguel de Arruda to build a large stone fortress on the island.  Arruda brought with him extensive experience building fortresses in Flanders, a region then known for being on the avant-garde of military science.  From 1540 to 1557, the Fortaleza (or Praça) de São Sebastião was built on the island’s northeastern tip, adjacent to the Capela de Nossa Senhora do Baluarte.   Built of local stone in an Italianate style, it formed an irregular rectangle roughly 110 metres long on each side, anchored by four bastions.  It boasted a sophisticated system for catching and storing rainwater on an island where fresh water was scarce.

The map of the Praça de São Sebastião, the “Planta de Monsabique” (1655) by the Leonardo de Ferrari, from the Marquis von Heliche Atlas, shows the fortress’s appearances from its creation through to early 18th century.  Please see a link courtesy of Wikimedia Commons:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/Planta_da_fortaleza_da_ilha_de_Moçambique%2C_Leonardo_de_Ferrari%2C_1655.jpg

In 1712, the Praça de São Sebastião had three of its four bastions extended, with the far northeastern bulwark built out to encompass the Capela de Nossa Senhora do Baluarte (details evident on the present map).  The fortaleza attained added importance from 1752, when Portuguese East Africa became its own colony (it was hitherto subservient to Goa), while the town of Ilha de Moçambique gained many important institutions as the headquarters of a colonial governor-general.  During 18th century, the Ilha de Moçambique did a brisk trade in slaves, ivory and gold, as well as being a key waypoint on voyages from Europe to India, all made possible by the peace secured by the Praça de São Sebastião.

The Ilha de Moçambique remained a significant trading centre and waypoint until the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, whereupon most shipping traffic between Europe and Asia no longer visited East Africa.  In 1898, the capital of Mozambique was moved from the Ilha to Lourenço Marques (Maputo), in the far south, so consigning the Praça de São Sebastião to obscurity (with the benefit that there was no money available to anyone who wished to tear it down or deface the fort).  Today the Praça de São Sebastião (which is in a decent state of preservation) has the distinction of being the oldest complete fort in Sub-Saharan Africa, as well as the anchor of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of the Ilha de Moçambique.

 

The Present Manuscript in Focus

Here is an amazing survivor and a highly important artefact from the long Portuguese colonial presence in East Africa.  It is a very finely executed original manuscript map of the Praça de São Sebastião.  Likely made by a Portuguese military engineer, due to its style and content, it was drafted sometime in the mid-18th century, during the period when the Ilha de Moçambique assumed greater prominence as a colonial capital.  The Praça was the headquarters of the commander-in-chief of the Portuguese military in East Africa and served to intimidate unruly indigenous nations on the mainland, so securing the flow of slaves, ivory and gold through the island.

It is worth referring to another map from the roughly the same period, which shows the plans (later aborted) to build massive new works to the south of the base, although the ground plan of the existing fortress is the same as on the present map.  This map being the “Planta da fortaleza de Mofs [Moçambique] com as novas obras projectadas para melhor defesa” (1741), [held by the Biblioteca Nacional do Brasil], please see link, courtesy of the Library of Congress:

https://www.loc.gov/item/2021668352

It is worth noting that very few original 18th century manuscript maps of any place in Sub-Saharan Africa survive, while the present work is one of the oldest surviving detailed maps of the Praça de São Sebastião.  It dates from roughly the same time as the aforementioned 1741 plan and greatly predates the “Planta da Fortaleza de S. Sebastião da cidade de Mossambique / levantada por ordem do Tenente General João Manoel da Silva, nomeado Governador e Capitão General da Capitania de Massambique ; pello Capitão do Real Corpo de Engenheiros, Xavier Schmid von Belliken, em Novembro de 1821”, held by the Biblioteca Nacioal de Portugal (A10; G7; P1; no 20 (v602)).

The “Notas”, in the lower left of the present map, feature a numbered key that identifies all the salient features of the Praça de São Sebastião complex (with the map orientated to the southeast):

 

  1. Porta da Praça [Fortress Gate]
  2. Quartel com corpo da Guarda [Barracks with Guardhouse]
  3. Baluarte de N. Senhora [Bastion of Our Lady]
  4. Baluarte de S. Sebastião [São Sebastião’s Bastion]
  5. Baluarte de S. Gabriel [São Gabriel’s Bastion]
  6. Baluarte de S. João [São João’s Bastion]
  7. Irmida de N. S.ra do Bal. [Chapel of Our Lady of the Bastion]
  8. Freguesia de S. Sebastião [Parish Church of São Sebastião]
  9. Armazem da Pólvora [Gunpowder Magazine]
  10. Armazens [Warehouses]
  11. Quarteis [Barracks]
  12. Cisternas [Cisterns]

 

The present manuscript comes from the private collection of a Portuguese navy admiral, and as best as we are aware it has never been seen or studied by scholars.

 

References: N/A – unique manuscript, seemingly unrecorded. Cf. Stephane PRADINES, ‘Portuguese Fortresses in East Africa’, Fort, vol. 44 (2016), pp. 50-75, esp. pp. 62-3.

 

 

 

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