Bastion Of Santo Domingo, Cartagena on:
[Wikipedia]
[Google]
[Amazon]
The Baluarte de Santo Domingo is a
The Baluarte de Santo Domingo is a bastion
A bastion or bulwark is a structure projecting outward from the curtain wall of a fortification, most commonly angular in shape and positioned at the corners of the fort. The fully developed bastion consists of two faces and two flanks, with fi ...
located in Cartagena de Indias
Cartagena ( , also ), known since the colonial era as Cartagena de Indias (), is a city and one of the major ports on the northern coast of Colombia in the Caribbean Coast Region, bordering the Caribbean sea. Cartagena's past role as a link ...
, in Colombia
Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...
. The bastion of Santo Domingo has a particular importance, since it is the origin of the construction of the city walls of Cartagena de Indias in the early 17th century. This work of fortification was conceived around 1602 by the engineer Battista Antonelli
Battista Antonelli (or Bautista) (1547–1616) was a military engineer from a prestigious Italian family of military engineers in the service of the Habsburg monarchs of Austria and Spain.
Biography
Antonelli was born in Gatteo in Romagna, a ...
and his nephew Cristóbal de Roda
Cristóbal or Cristobal, the Spanish version of Christopher, is a masculine given name and a surname which may refer to:
Given name
*Cristóbal Balenciaga (1895–1972), Spanish fashion designer
* Cristóbal Cobo (born 1976), Chilean academic
* ...
, also engineer, who decided to build it on the avenue through which the pirate Francis Drake
Sir Francis Drake ( – 28 January 1596) was an English explorer, sea captain, privateer, slave trader, naval officer, and politician. Drake is best known for his circumnavigation of the world in a single expedition, from 1577 to 1580 (t ...
had penetrated, in 1586.
The city did not have stone barracks, and its few defenders, placed in an improvised trench in the strait of the isthmus that separated Bocagrande
Bocagrande is a neighbourhood in the city of Cartagena de Indias in Bolívar, Colombia. It was designed with first-world standards, such as residential areas of restricted access, and a separate plant for processing waste water.
Economy and cu ...
from the city, just where Avenida Santander is nowadays, could not face the invader. From this episode is a curious document written in Latin and signed by Drake, where he acknowledged receipt of the formidable rescue that the authorities were forced to pay, and a few years later, the decision to close the avenue of Bocagrande with the bastion of Santo Domingo .
Therefore, the bastion protected the access to the city from the peninsula of Bocagrande, constituting itself in the first one of the great bastions of the walls of Cartagena.
This bastion is model of the proportions regulated by the Italian school of fortification. In its collar the low squares are opened, that is to say, the lower parts of the esplanade of the bastion, where in the 16th and 17th centuries it was customary to locate the cannons. At the beginning of the 18th century, during the considerable reforms of Juan de Herrera y Sotomayor
''Juan'' is a given name, the Spanish and Manx versions of ''John''. It is very common in Spain and in other Spanish-speaking communities around the world and in the Philippines, and also (pronounced differently) in the Isle of Man. In Spanish, t ...
, the lower squares disappeared, but the vaults that served as access remained on both sides of the ramp.
From that same period they must date the canals, which carry the waters from the most hidden cracks of the bastion to the public cistern. Herrera also added the large watchtower, which crowns the main angle of the bastion and which points to the sea.
Don Juan de Herrera also moved the gate puerta de San Felipe from the left side to the opposite flank of the bastion, where it can still walk quietly.
This bastion was also known by the name of San Felipe and Santa María, but it was the name of the gate puerta de Santo Domingo, also contiguous to the bastion, which gave it the name it carries until today.
See also
*List of colonial buildings in Cartagena, Colombia This is a list of impórtant colonial buiildings in Cartagena de Indias
Cartagena ( , also ), known since the colonial era as Cartagena de Indias (), is a city and one of the major ports on the northern coast of Colombia in the Caribbean Coas ...
*Spanish fortifications in America
The coastal 'fortifications' of Spain in America are the works of military engineering that bear witness to the four hundred years of Spanish presence in America. They were built from northern California to Tierra del Fuego. Their purpose was the ...
References
{{coord missing, Colombia Spanish colonial fortifications in Cartagena, Colombia 1602 establishments in the Spanish Empire 17th-century fortifications Buildings and structures completed in 1602 Forts in Colombia