Prehistoric and Present Day Malta
Wednesday, March 7, 2018
We spent most of the day
today in Valletta, the capitol city of Malta, and a bustling place it is. The site is at the end of a peninsula, and
the entrance to the city is from a grand plaza through gates leading to a new
parliament, all designed by Renzo Piano, and completed in 2015. Here’s the plaza leading to the gates:
Guarding the city is a
giant ditch, a half mile across the entire peninsula on which the city occupies
the tip. There’s not sufficient water
here for a moat, so a ditch made do:
Just inside the gates is
the brand-new parliament:
Republic street runs the
length of the city and is a pedestrian mall the entire way:
Our first stop was the Archeology
Museum which is housed in the Auberge de Provence, dating from 1571. Each of the seven other lands of the Knights
had an auberge here which functioned as the hospitality house and embassy to
the Malta location, and this auberge has been turned into a museum. It’s not so
special on the outside, but the ceiling of the reception area has just been
renovated:
The museum’s collection is
stunning. The presentation and the
arrangement of the artifacts, not so much.
But no matter, I’ve had to choose what to show, so here’s a
selection.
First, though, a timeline:
3600 BCE Malta
Temples
2530 BCE Great
Pyramid
2000 BCE Stonehenge
1700 BCE Knossos
Palace, Crete
600 BCE Acropolis,
Athens
214 CE Great
Wall of China
So the Malta prehistoric
artifacts and temples represent extremely early human undertakings, and the
temples represent the earliest known major buildings. Now to the sights here. Pottery shards from 5200-4500 BCE:
A female figure from one
of the very first known agricultural settlements, Skorba (come to think of it,
there were no full male figures although there were some phallic-shaped pottery
pieces):
We will be visiting the
funereal caves of Hypogenum on Sunday; here’s a vessel from there:
Here’s a female figure
from the Temple Period (3600-2500 BCE):
There are a number like
her, and all seem to have had mobile heads, not firmly attached to the
body. One theory is that the heads might
have been moving while making pronouncements, sort of like using a doll with a
ventriloquist, but on a much larger scale, and perhaps with proclamations of great
seriousness.
Here’s an astonishing
figure of an older female, also from the Temple Period:
An unusual carving of four
fish:
There was energy enough
for body decoration:
Here’s the crown jewel of
the collection, called the “sleeping lady", she dates from about 3000 BCE and has
a special place and her own room. She is
magnificent:
There are other floors
dedicated to later things. We started in
the Bronze Age rooms; here’s a statuette which is as different as it could be
from the Stone Age figures:
We ran out of time, but we
did get a wonderful visit to the oldest things here. Nearby is another museum devoted to weapons
and coats of arms. The collection is
giant:
They have so many coats of
arms that they have an entire platoon set up:
The display of weapons
includes spears with many different kinds of tips. Here’s one kind:
There also were cannon,
long guns, pistols, and other implements of war. It was vast.
After lunch we continued
our walk and at the end of Republic Street is a wonderful view of the Great Harbor
of Valletta:
We returned to the hotel,
took a brief rest, and at 5:30 began a phenomenal lecture on Caravaggio and his
time in Malta. Our lecturer was Rev. Fr.
Marius Zerafa, a Caravaggio expert as well as a raconteur. And does he have stories to tell! He was the negotiator and ultimate rescuer of
a stolen Caravaggio and it was he who negotiated with all the involved parties
for restoration of a different damaged Caravaggio by a thief. At age 88 he is as vibrant as could be, and he
captivated our group for 90 minutes and would have kept going but our dinner
was set for 7:00.
A tremendous and
fulfilling and exhausting day! Tomorrow
the island of Gozo.
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