Page 318 - Perú indígena y virreinal

frequency or punctuality. His management, the account of which is fully explored on his Memoirs of Government, coincided with a prosperous period for Peru in which the domestic and foreign economy of the Americas was on the up, even in spite of the decline being suffered in the mining industry. Although in 1768 he had to put into effect the decree expelling the Jesuits from all territories under his control, the many positive deeds of a more social nature of which he was responsible should not be overlooked, such as the importation of refined Rococo customs to Lima, improvements to public safety including the introduction of street lighting and night-watches, as well as the lottery that Charles III had brought over from Naples to Spain. From his profile as “Enlightenment Man”, his interest in Lima’s urban development stands out, as can be seen in projects such as the Acho Bullring, the “Water Walk” known as the Paseo de Aguas as well as his house, La Quinta del Pardo, all of which reflect his Francophile tastes, without forgetting the most evidently Rococo of Lima’s buildings: the church of Santo Cristo de los Milagros in the Monastery of the Nazarene Carmelites.
His cultural management, which included the universities in Lima and Santiago de Chile, brought together his patronage of scientific expeditions in Spanish frigates to the
legendary Easter Island (renamed San Carlos) in the Pacific Ocean in 1770 and two years later to Tahiti, which figures on a maritime map from the period as “Amat Island”. He also put special interest in defending the Pacific coast, building fortifications of which the most notable is the Royal Felipe Fort in the port of Callao, an expansive collection of installations that replaced part of the original city wall and whose plans he personally supervised, drawing on his experience as a military engineer. Neither ought we to forget his training at the Royal and Military Academy of Mathematics in Barcelona which allowed him to design and oversee the production of mortars for the port that were cast in Lima, artefacts unknown in Peru until his rule.
The Legacy that Manuel de Amat left to the history of Spain was 15 years of brilliant management of the Viceroyalty of Peru: a second-rank noble who achieved a prestigious place for both his lineage and his homeland within the annals of Spanish History. Barcelona, in turn, is indebted to him for the construction of the most emblematic building at the heart of the Ramblas, the Palace of the Vice-Queen, the project he planned out whilst still in Lima. Although Amat was never to stay in this mansion, it became his widow’s residence, thus immortalising his name in Catalonia’s capital.
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