Claude de la Sengle
Claude de la Sengle (* 1494 in France ; † August 18, 1557 ) was the 48th Grand Master of the Order of Malta from September 11, 1553 until his death .
Born in France, he belonged to the Langue de France des order and was already as Bailli ( French : overseer, supreme of a province of the order of knights, the second highest office of the same) his "tongue" in the fight of the Order of Malta against the Turkish corsairs and Admiral Turgut Reis in the Mediterranean and in North Africa, especially around Djerba and Tripoli . He was elected as his successor after the death of his predecessor Juan de Homedes .
De la Sengle played a significant role in the military-technical expansion of the defenses and fortresses on Malta . Warned by Turgut's attack in 1551 and his conquest of the neighboring island of Gozo as well as the kidnapping of almost the entire population of the island into slavery, he had Fort St. Michael , the construction of which had begun in 1551 under Grand Master de Homedes, significantly expanded and reinforced. From 1554 he had the construction of the city of Senglea named after him and provided with his coat of arms on the peninsula called "L'Isla" parallel to Birgu . He also had Fort St. Angelo and the fortifications of Birgu reinforced. In order to better protect the Great Harbor, in 1552 he began the construction of the Fort St. Elmo on the tip of the Sciberras Peninsula, where after the end of the great siege of 1565 the Order built its new capital, Valletta .
It was also De la Sengle who first came up with the idea of establishing a public library in Malta in 1555 and issued an instruction that all books from the legacy of deceased or fallen knights should become the common property of the order. However, the formal resolution of the General Chapter to found the Bibliotheca Publica was only made in 1776 under Grand Master Emmanuel de Rohan-Polduc .
literature
- Pierre d'Avity , Johann Ludwig Gottfried : Archontologiae Cosmicae. Book III: Origo Ordinum Militarium, tam Regularium. Jennisius, Frankfurt am Main 1628.
Web links
- Claude de la Sengle at cilialacorte.com
- Claude de la Sengle at smom-za.org
- The 79 grandmasters at orderofmalta.org
Individual evidence
- ^ National Library of Malta - History ( Memento of August 31, 2006 in the Internet Archive )
| predecessor | Office | successor |
|---|---|---|
| Juan de Homedes |
Grand Master of the Order of Malta 1553–1557 |
Jean de la Valette |
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Sengle, Claude de la |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Grand Master of the Order of Malta |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1494 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | France |
| DATE OF DEATH | August 18, 1557 |