Forts and Cannon of Oman.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Barka Fort proved to be more incredible as access was granted for a special visit today. You dont at first realise that the fort originally stood inside a giant triangular wall making defence doubly strong. Each point of the triangle had a further tower and heavy armament. The main doors had slots above so that should the enemy be fortunate in getting that close hot molten dates could be poured on top of them. The doors in addition were iron spiked against elephant attack.

Cannon varied at the Barka Fort from English 6 pounder through Armstrong 9 pounder to Monks and Dundas 32 pounder balls fired from two and a half ton barrels!!...Cannon were first used by Oman in 1616 at Sohar fort.

What is clear is that gunpowder was a game changer… Forts had to be re constructed to take the heavy recoil and for protection against incoming rounds. Barka has one peculiar cannon designed to fire small shot like a claymore charge.

My favourite Cannon are a pair of weapons gifted by the English and stamped and decorated with the rose configuration and ER and dated 1587. A makers mark IP? appears over the breach end with their regimental numbers. There were a few shot out barrels discovered excavated from the sand in front of the Fort near the sea, badly corroded but probably English 6 pounders and one barrel blown apart.
The Fort cannon are complete with all their oak water barrels and ash ramrods etc.

As noted the first thing to note about the Fort is that the huge triangular external defensive wall is absent! see pictures below. Apparently local people helped themselves to that wall to build their houses about 250 years ago. It therefor stood inside a massive external triangular 20 foot high perimeter wall with a tower in each corner and must have protected a small population of traders, probably slavers soldiers and local people. The extra layer of defence would have been formidable and with the addition of the fort proper… almost invincible. The fort is built around two massive towers one of 8 sides and the other round. There are hundreds of rifle ports in addition.

Cannon and inhabitants use a lot of water so Barka was built with 4 water wells built into it. The Fort has dungeons simply very deep holes down which prisoners were lowered and a grate dropped over the hole. Food was simply dropped down the hole.

Shown below are a variety of cannon some from different forts as "examples" of weaponry in general circulation including at Rostaq, Jabreen and in the South at Mirbat (with the peculiar spoked wheels).

Ibrahiim al Balooshi.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Note as to originality of what is on view~ both in the Fort structures and Cannons and Equipment. As has been said the first Omani cannon shots were fired at Sohar in 1616. Forts at that time and between then and now have fallen apart and been rebuilt for different reasons not least because heavy rain often washed out the walls causing partial collapse and because some of the forts were ancient they simply fell to bits. Rebuilding to take the extra weight of cannon and recoil as well as a program to refurbish Forts has meant a clouding of the original form and in some cases; drastic rebuilding. If you ask me to what extent Barka fort has been rebuilt I would have to say plus of 80%...including innerds that were not in the original and of course minus the great outer triangular wall...now incorporated into local houses. I am uncertain as to why Omani Forts have crenelated tops like Beau Geste Morocan fortifications since that was not the Omani style...however Morocan builders were employed in the 80s to renovate many Forts...

In terms of Cannon it appears that weapons have been centralised in the modern era after 1970...and redistributed to Forts as they have been renovated. This means two things viz;

1. Cannon have moved about and are not in their original locations....
2. Replicas are present in several locations including replica auxiliary equipments...ramrods water buckets cannon balls etc.

For that reason I show for example above at Barka fort in addition to the cannon on display there...other cannon from other Forts. No one is able to say what exact cannon there were in each location...such was the decay and condition of Omans Forts and Cannon stock.

Where possible if evidence exists such as in the case of the rusted barrels above ...being found at Barka just in front of the Fort in beach sand I shall give that information. Generally it appears that a mix of cannon were used in Omani Forts though precise details are not extant.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

This print shows Forts Mirani and Jellali ..The two major Forts constructed by the Portuguese ..There also built a few towers around Muttrah.

[Kubur]

Salaam,

A good reference for Omani forts in East Africa
https://www.academia.edu/4719393/Oma...n_East_Africa_

best

[fernando]

Very often fortifications were built over the foundations or remnants of earlier castles, although with designs more compatible with contemporaneous defence needs.
Fortifications Jalali (ex-São João) & Mirani do not escape the rule; they were built upon earlier Islamic forifications by Portuguese Rui Freire.
Mucat presents an extremely nice and curious defence net. Formed by three defence sysems, each with a different purpose.
The first one composed by a wall of envolving the city, as a primary line of defence. In the surrounding mountain heights towers of survey and atck form a circle around the harbour and the city.
These third complex, Jalali and Mirani together with Matrah, were the more sophisticated expression of what may be called the art of defence based in a Luso-Arab cultural whole and not Luso-European.
This might have been the greatest Lusitanian creation on what concerns their way of projecting and living architeture. Seeking to mix with the gigantic landscape that involves it and to which forms an integring part, all geographic irregularities are profited, with the capacity and shrewdness well typical of their know how to live with geographic discontinuity.
Although this formidable defence complex was considered unassailable, it was subdued by the Omanits in 1653.


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[fernando]

Being nowadays a Sultanate Government-institute, also apparently the fort of Soar was rebuilt by Portuguese, in the case by Rui Freire de Andrade, having had at the time for Captain Gonçalo da Silveira,
It is also beleived that Soar was fortified with trace of Architet Inofre de Carvalho.


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[fernando]

I wonder where the more comprehensive displays of artillery in Oman are already open to public. In fact a rather complex and expensive work took place quite a few years ago for the purpose; an episode that i happened to follow at the time.
Those are the Castles of Al Hazm, turned into an artillery museum and Bayt Ar Rudaydah, this one converted into a heritage small arms museum which displays the historical progression traditional weapons in Oman.

Attached a picture of a Portuguese crest in a cannon at the entrance of one of Muscat forts

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[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Originally Posted by Kubur

Salaam,

A good reference for Omani forts in East Africa
https://www.academia.edu/4719393/Oma...n_East_Africa_

best

Salaams Kubur... That is a superb resource ... I wonder if there is a majic button to get it translated into English for Forum Library that I haven't seen on the site... non the less it is in easy to follow French and the diagrams are great... Thanks for adding that fine reference

Regards,
Ibrahiim al Balooshi.

[fernando]

Originally Posted by Ibrahiim al Balooshi

... non the less it is in easy to follow French and the diagrams are great...

There you may discern a good example of the said difference between property and origin, when you read the title 'Omani Forts in East Africa'.
As may be read in the text, the Fort Jesus de Mombaça (as the name Jesus denotes), was built by Portuguese in 1593-1596 and only taken by the Omani in 1698.
Built upon a coral formation, is considered one the more significant examples of Portuguese military architeture of the XVI century in the oriental African coast; nowadays classified as world patrimony by UNESCO.

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