Portuguese Wall Painting at Fort Jesus, Mombasa, Kenya

At Fort Jesus in Mombasa, Kenya, from the time the Portuguese built the Fort as a military base in 1593 until the time the Omanis captured the Fort in 1698, the Portuguese soldiers painted on the walls.

The paintings were made in black and red carbon on the plaster walls of the revetment wall in the bastion of San Mateus. They are the work of unknown soldiers or sailors who were stationed in the Fort.

At the time of the restoration of Fort Jesus from 1634-1639 another wall was built in front of the revetment wall and the space in-between was filled with chips of coral (the Fort was built on a coral outcrop).

The favourite subject of the soldiers and sailors appears to have been ships, but there are also churches, fish, an animal (probably a chameleon), and grotesque human figures. There are also motifs such as a heart pierced with an arrow.

The paintings were removed from the wall and restored with the aid of a grant from the Gulbenkian Foundation in 1967-1968.

MARTINA NICOLLSis an international aid and development consultant, and the authorof:- Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom(2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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