Mastering their half of the world, defined by the Treaty of Tordesillas with Spain in 1494, the Portuguese began "infill development" of the part of the oecumene that they inherited, the main communication space of which was the Indian Ocean. All the vast territories of Asia and Africa, a small state even by European standards, such as Portugal, could not colonize, and Brazil was also at its disposal. Therefore, the optimal decision was made by the Portuguese to build strongholds on the most important communication routes. One of these points was the fortress built on the island of Hormuz at the entrance to the Persian Gulf.
The construction of the fortress of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary began in 1507 by the legendary colonizer Afonso de Albuquerque after he subdued a local ruler, whose name has not been preserved, and forced him to become a tributary of the Portuguese king Manuel I. It is noteworthy that the Portuguese often built their fortifications on islands. If we talk about the neighbors of the Hormuz fortress, these were the Portuguese forts of the nearby island of Qeshm and the island of Bahrain.
Located in the northern part of the island, the fortress of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary has the shape of an irregular trapezoid with sides along the outer perimeter: south - 180 m, north - 95 m, west - 235 m, east - 205 m (with an accuracy of 5 m) and occupies an area about 2.9 hectares; the area of the inner territory is about 0.8 hectares. The corners of the fortress form bastions, the largest of which is the southeastern one, since here the fortress was least protected from the sea. The rest of the bastions are approximately equal in size. The northwestern bastion remained only in plan.
The entrance to the fortress is located from the north, from the most protected direction from the sea.
A semi-underground barracks and a closed cistern for the distillation of seawater, which is a very complex engineering structure, have been preserved in the courtyard.
By the way, the water on the island of Hormuz is of particular value due to the unbearable heat. Back in my student years, I read about Hormuz from Afanasy Nikitin, who visited this island on his way to India and back, in his "Walk across the Three Seas": "The heat of the sun is great in Hormuz, he will burn a man." When I myself on August 20, 2018, that is, 547 years after Afanasy Nikitin, ended up on Ormuz, I became convinced of the truth of the words of my famous countryman: in two hours I drank the two liters of water I had, and then the whole meaning of my existence was reduced to search for a new source of life-giving moisture. Although the humidity on the island is very high, it cannot be called life-giving. Fortunately, by that time I had managed to take most of the pictures and field measurements.
The fortress survived several assaults. Albuquerque, who left the island of Hormuz in 1508 due to disagreements with his compatriots, returned it in 1515. In the same year, he continued its construction. In 1622, the fortress was captured by the joint forces of the inhabitants of the island and the British mercenaries of the East India Company. The latter, already at that time, were making every possible effort to oust the Portuguese from their colonies and establish control over the most important world communications. So, shortly before the capture of the Hormuz fortress, during the storming of the Portuguese fortress on the neighboring island of Qeshm, the English polar navigator William Baffin died. About the events of 1622the Russian merchant left a message, and in fact, the head of the first Russian state expedition Fedot Kotov in his report "On the move to the Persian kingdom and from Persis to the land of Tur, and to India, and to Urmuz, where ships come", who visited Persia through two years after the aforementioned event: “Earlier, the city of Urmuz was Indian (under the rule of the Portuguese Viceroy of India - PG), but it was taken by the Shah and the Germans (English - PG) together. And now, they say that that city of Urmuz belongs entirely to the Shah."
It is noteworthy that the Hormuz fortress had the same name as the main Catholic church in present-day Moscow. It is unlikely that a separate church building existed on the territory of the fortress, since no remnants of it, or even the foundation, have survived. Perhaps the church was located in one of the bastions.
I did not take the place here with portraits of King Manuel I and Don Albuquerque (they can be easily found on the Internet), but posted my photographs of the fortress used as a museum, which I present to dear readers.
The inner territory of the fortress. In the middle - the barracks, on the right - the cistern, the tallest structure - the southwestern bastion
Inside the tank
Inside the barracks
View from the south wall to the southeastern bastion
Artillery loopholes of the southeastern bastion
Cannons, possibly Portuguese
Casemates in the east wall
Southwest bastion cannon pointing towards the sea
