Fortifications of Rhodes

The fortifications of a town of Rhodes are shaped like the defensive crescent around the medieval town as well as consist mostly of a fortification composed of a huge wall portrayed of an embankment encased in stone, equipped with scarp, bastions, moat, counterscarp together with glacis. The piece of fortifications facing the harbour is instead composed of a crenellated wall. On the moles, towers and defensive forts are found.

They were built by the Knights Hospitaller of Saint John by enhancing the existing Byzantine walls starting from 1309, the year in which they took possession of the island after a three-year struggle.

Like almost of the defensive walls, they were built with a technique called rubble masonry which authorises for a great mass capable of withstanding the gunshots with smooth outside stone faces to prevent climbing.

The defence of different portions of fortifications was assigned to different Langue tongues of Knights. The North face was under the direction of the Grand Master, then moving West and South the posts were held by the Langue of France and Alvernia, the Langue of Spain Spanish and Portuguese, the Langue of Germany English and German, and the Langue of Italy. Bastions and terrepleins still do the realise of the langue involved e.g. Bastion of Italy, terreplein of Spain.

History

Due to its geographical position as a gate to the Aegean Sea, Rhodes has always had a vantage position on the trade routes between the West and the East and has been an important stop thanks to its living protected harbours. During the Hellenistic period in the late 4th century BC, the town of Rhodes was already enclosed in defensive walls which allowed to withstand the siege of Demetrius Poliorketes king of Macedonia, in 305 BC. The famous Colossus of Rhodes was built to thank gods for the victory against Demetrius.

When the Knight Hospitallers conquered the island, the town was still wealthy but in decline. Rhodes underwent an economical growth thanks to the richness that the knights brought in from the Holy Land and to the inheritance of the Templars' assets condition to the Hospitallers after the Templar Order was suppressed in 1312 by decree of the king of France Philip IV. The richness of the island attracted the Ottomans from the nearby coast Turkey is just 18 km away and can be easily seen from Rhodes. The knights started continuous workings on the fortifications, both to add the new villages in the South of the historical Byzantine town and to improvements the fortification to the new military defensive techniques after the artillery started to be used currently as a siege means.

The Knights of Saint John had had a long experience in building fortresses and fortifications during the most three centuries of their stay in the Holy Land, nevertheless the reference advantage example for the construction of the fortification were the Theodosian Walls of Constantinople which, during the centuries, had reported a great capacity to withstand sieges.

The expansion of the walls was undertaken by Antonio Fluvian de Riviere who allowed the medieval town of Rhodes tothe current area of approximately 42 hectares 104 acres. The wall curtain was finished between 1457 and 1465. The Byzantine fortifications were demolished leaving just a point of those of the old fort call at the time of Knights as Collachium Greek: Κολλάκιον.

In 1440 the Mameluke sultan of Egypt tried without success to conquer the town sieging it for 40 days.

In 1480 Rhodes was Pierre d'Aubusson, Emery d'Amboise, Fabrizio del Carretto and Philippe Villiers de l’Isle Adam ordered the fortifications to be rebuilt to withstand the cannons. For the purpose they called to Rhodes the best Italian military architects. Among them Matteo Gioeni, Basilio della Scuola, Gerolamo Bartolucci and Gabriele Tadino da Martinengo. The latter two were present in Rhodes during thesiege in 1522.

The Bastion of Italy or Post of Italy in which the Ottomans had opened a breach in 1480 was rebuilt with a powerful chemin de ronde for the reverse fire of cannons on the nearby spans of wall. This bastion was named "Bastion Del Carretto" after the Grand Master. The gate of Saint John was closed and a pentagonal bastion with the same name was built on the western side of the walls to guard Gate d'Amboise. After The Ottoman conquered Rhodes in 1522 they did not demolish the walls but repaired them and kept them under maintenance during the four centuries of their rule.

The fortifications of Rhodes were frozen at 1522 so that Rhodes is one of the few European walled towns that still shows the transition between the classical medieval fortification and the sophisticated ones. The fortifications that still today make a belt around the medieval town, so that this is the a separate neighbour from the new town, were restored during the Italian supervision of the island and are, at present 2011, being studied, restored and maintained.

After their expulsion from Rhodes, the Hospitallers moved to the central Mediterranean island of Malta in 1530. They settled in the town of Birgu, and the number one fortifications they built within the city were in a similar set to the fortifications of Rhodes.