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412 Miguel Ángel de Bunes Ibarra

Rena’s papers do not provide much information on artillery, but
other documents stored in the archive of the kingdom of Navarre
enable us to shed some light on the matter. The majority of the
crown’s artillery during these years was stored in warehouses in the
city of Malaga. From February 1535 onwards, the emperor put even
greater pressure on all the officials involved in preparing the
campaign to finalise their various tasks so that everything would be
ready for an early departure. He ordered more harquebuses to be
made in the province of Vizcaya, and demanded that they be handed
over as soon as possible, having been fully tested to ensure they were
safe and in working order. They were to be sent to Malaga, where
they would be shipped with all haste to Barcelona and distributed
among the galleys there. On reading this, Francisco de los Cobos,
Secretary of state and one of the emperor’s two leading ministers,
warned that they could not be sent to Malaga because the port could
not cope with what they had already been assigned to do by the
authorities. He suggested that they should take the best of what
weapons were available to make up the 12,000 pikes, 4,000
harquebuses and 50 muskets that were needed .
41
The correspondence between Cobos and the marquis of Mondéjar,
who was Captain General of the kingdom of Granada, make frequent
references to the need for money to be sent urgently to enable imperial
officials to fulfil the orders emanating from Madrid and Barcelona.
Unless the imperial council provided prompt and full payment it would
not be possible for everyone and everything to be on board and ready to
sail on time. This was vital as the Spanish fleet had to rendezvous at
the designated time with the other naval squadrons being prepared in
four other Western Mediterranean ports . Orders were issued for the
42
authorities in Malaga to provide the necessary girths, powder horns,
fodder and victuals for the several thousand horses and their
attendants who had embarked in Barcelona. That was before they were
asked to add provisions for the fifty Albanian horses that had been
taken on board ships in Naples, part of a contingent of light cavalry that
would go on to distinguish itself in action on several occasions during
the campaign. Vermeyen depicted them in his tapestries.
The most acute problem Mondéjar faced was finding enough
shipping to transport the large number of soldiers to North Africa.

41 Ags, E, 30, s. f., Málaga, 25 February 1535.
42 «Recibí las cartas de v. mg. de xvi y de xviii de febrero y puede presuponer que lo
que a mí toca de hazer quanto la embarcación de la jente de a pie ninguna cosa ay que
detenga el armada, sino la falta de dinero. Si ay manera de prover de otra parte más
breve que de Sevilla, V. Mg. lo mande prover porque para tan grande cantidad como es
menester acá no se puede suplir». Ags, E, 30, s. f., Málaga, 25 February 1535.

Mediterranea - ricerche storiche - Anno XVII - Agosto 2020
ISSN 1824-3010 (stampa) ISSN 1828-230X (online)