1669 – Octavio Menni - An Engineer from Milan in Gibraltar
A very large number of plans and maps of the Rock were published during the early 18th century. Just about all of them depicted the Rock as it may have appeared during its last four sieges - the 11th, 12th, 13th, and 14th or Great Siege of Gibraltar.
On the other hand maps dated prior to the Anglo-Dutch and later British takeover of the Rock are few and far between apart from those produced by Anton Van den Wyngaerde in the mid16th century and those of Cristóbal Rojas in the early 17th and Luis Bravo de Acuña in the mid17th.
Hence my interest in my recently discovered plan of the Rock dated 1669 - a copy of which is shown below.
As regards the identity of the map-maker, considerable research by my good friend, Rafael Fernández allowed him to discover that the map was the work of an Italian engineer - Ottaviano Menni - or Octavio Menni - which must be news to many other dabblers in the history of Gibraltar. I for one had not come across either his name or his map previously – or indeed his connection with Gibraltar as an engineer.
Menni was probably born in Milan during the earlier part of the 17th century, by the middle of which he had become a captain of the Napolitan Infantry serving for a while as a military engineer in Milan.
By 1661 he found himself involved in the Portuguese Restauration War, a never ending defensive saga by both Spain and Portugal that began in 1640 and ended in 1668. He must have done a decent job as around 1664, the Duke of Medinaceli recommended him to Philip IV of Spain who in turn sent him to Gibraltar as an engineer. When he was there he soon became involved in an argument with the local council about the possibility of creating a cavalry company.
Philip IV of Spain (1644 – Velasquez)
I suspect he never managed to convince them of the suitability of such a project – I must admit I would have had serious doubts myself - but the rest of his work on Gibraltar’s defences must have been reasonably successful as in 1666 the King ordered him, through Medinaceli to go to Ayamonte on the Portuguese border to advise on its fortifications. This he managed to accomplish successfully, while at the same time visiting Gibraltar periodically to keep an eye on how things were shaping up on whatever work he had ordered to be done previously.
Menni’s map also includes an additional smaller section showing the entire Bay of Gibraltar as well as a proposal for a fortress designed for San García just west of Algeciras. It suggests that his overall remit was not just an overview of the defences of the Rock but also a general survey of the Bay as well.
By the end of 1667 his merits were recognised by the authorities and he was appointed “ad honorem” as Lieutenant General Field Master. In 1679 while at work in Melilla, the correspondent of la Gazeta de Madrid 0f the 2nd of May glowingly describes him as follows:
Aguardamos al famoso ingeniero, el Maestre de Campo Teniente General, Don Octaviano Meni, con las disposiciones necesarias para trabajar a las nuevas fortificaciones.
The map he produced in 1669 appears to be his last intervention in the affairs of Gibraltar – perhaps a summary of everything he knew about its fortifications and its defense capabilities. Although he continued his work as a military engineer for many years after the date of his Gibraltar map, he never seems to have revisited the Rock after 1669.
Curiously, most historical commentators have often mentioned the poor state of Gibraltar’s fortifications some 30 odd years later in 1704 during its capture by Anglo-Dutch forces. It suggests that Menni may have been the very last of that long line of engineers employed by the Spanish crown to improve and update these.
What is certainly the case from what happened next is that whatever improvements may have been carried out after Menni had left, they all proved incapable of resisting the Anglo-Dutch onslaught of 1704.
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For anybody interested in an analysis of the Napolitan engineer’s map, please note the following.
This manuscript contains close to a hundred different captions and names – including those of numerous murallas, baluartes, baterias and plataformas – some identified as “Puestos” - as well as religious buildings and other interesting details.
Menni, unfortunately if understandably uses old style letters as map captions which I often found hard to decipher. I have therefore taken the liberty of introducing modern letter captions , placing them next to the older versions that appear on the map itself
The plan is also supposedly colour coded in order to identify the state of several sections of the Rock’s defences – as advised in the following note on the map itself:
Para mayor inteligencia se advierte que lo colorado es lo que se ha hecho de nuevo y perfeccionado asta oy , el azul es lo que queda por acabar, y lo amarillo es lo que no se ha empezado aun por menos necesario. Y el oro es lo que se ha restaurado y perfeccionado.
In English that can perhaps best be interpreted as follows :
RED refers to those area that have been rebuilt and perfected to dateBLUE refers to work that is as yet unfinishedYELLOW refers to work that has yet to be started as it is considered to be of less urgencyGOLD refers is for that which has been restored and perfected.
Unfortunately some of the colours seem to have generally faded over time into a light GREY.I have therefore had to resort to guesswork as I sometimes found it impossible to be certain as to which colours are the right ones.
Finally, the sheer size of the plan has made me decide that it is probably best viewed in sections as identified below from 1 to 7.
To view each section in detail, together with my comments where possible, please click on the following links.
With many thanks to my digital friend Rafael Fernández. Without his endless help and advice I would not have been able to write these essays on Octavio Menni's map of Gibraltar.