Topic 3: Environmental Project 2011

Topic 3:
The main characteristics of the Maltese village

core
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Index
Introduction St. Pauls Parish Church Area St. Pauls Grotto St. Publius Church Collegiate Parish of St. Paul St. Pauls Catacombs Wignacourt College Museum St. Agathas Complex St. Agathas Catacombs St. Agathas Church Ta iezu Area Church of Saint Mary of Jesus Ta iezu Statues and Niches around Rabat Area around Howard Gardens Domus Romana Howard Gardens The Train Station St. Marks and St. Francis Church Area Nicola Saura Hospital Ospizio Saura Santo Spirito Hospital

3 4 4 4 5 6 7 8 8 8 9 9 10 10 10 11 12 12 12 13 13 14 14 14 15 15 15 15 16 17

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St. Francis Church The Saqqajja Hill Fountain Tal-Virtu Area Closer to Heaven Tal-Virtu Castle St. Sebastians Church St. Dominic Square Area The Dominican Priory Church of Our Lady of the Grotto Ta-agki, Tal-Balla and al-Bajjada Windmills Conclusion Bibliography

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Introduction
Rabat is a village located almost in the centre of the Maltese Island on what is known as the Rabat Dingli uplands. The coast of this region consists mainly of sheer cliffs about 200 meters above sea level. It is a village located just outside the old capital city of Malta, Mdina. The population of Rabat is around 12,462. The emblem of Rabat was designed in 1876. It has the colour of the Maltese flag. Half of Rabat formed part of the Roman city of Melita before the latter was resized during the Fatimid occupation.

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St. Pauls Parish Church Area
St. Pauls Grotto

St. Pauls Grotto was where Christianity started here in Malta for the first time. It was the meeting place of the first Christian Community. Our forefathers have treated the Grotto with a lot of respect and considerate it as one of the most sacred place on the Maltese Islands. Influential people such as Pope John Paul II in 1990 and Pope Benedict XVI in 2010, have visited this Grotto, prayed and showed respect for it. St Pauls Grotto of It to it Juan a Spanish towards St. was always kept as a pilgrimage suffered declined. and through Though

centre worship. devotion later, to devotion

many sieges and

plagues and so the Beneguas de Cordova nobleman, revived the the Grotto. According Paul was imprisoned

tradition,

here after he was shipwrecked.

St. Publius Church

This church is found on top of St. Pauls Grotto. It became a Collegiate church of the Order of St. John from 1620. The church was enlarged first by Lorenzo Gafa` in 1665 and then again by the Maltese architect in 1727. It was then consecrated in 1731 by Archbishop Paul Alpheran de Bussan. Inside on the main altar, there is a titular painting of St. Publius by Mattia Preti. Infront of the altar there is a hanging silver lamp by Aloisio Fenech. It carries the embems of Grand Masters Pinto and Wignacourt.

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Collegiate Parish of St. Paul

In 1575, Monsignor Dusina when he came to Malta, he saw that the Church was too old and in a bad state. So the Archpriest De Agatiis enlarged this Church which Monsignor Dusina reported as ecclesiam parochialem the Parish Church.

The present building began in 1653, the funds were provided by a noble woman Guzmana Navarra on the plans of Giovanni Francesco Bonamici which was an engineer of the Order of St. John from Italy. Inside the Church, there is a painting of the Shipwreck of St. Paul which is 4 meters long and 3 metres wide. The building of the Church finished in 1683. With respect to Guzmana Navarra, after she died her body was buried beneath the transept dedicated to St. Anthony within the Parish Church.

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St. Pauls Catacombs
The Catacombs were where early Christians used to meet secretly and perform Mass until Constantine I made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire and stopped persecuting Christians.

The funeral table or agape, are probably the most characteristic feature of the Maltese catacombs. They have only been found in Malta like their form with a cut in the middle of an apse. A good number of these still exist. The swinging stone doors of the tombs are found in Palestine.

Remains found inside the Catacombs

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<- A figural painting found in the Catacombs. Represents a person with a hand resting on a cylindrical object. A word Goodluck to you or Farewell is written. Below it is an anchor symbol of hope.

Wignacourt College Museum

The Museum of St. Pauls Collegiate Church is found in a baroque building known as Wignacourt College. It was established on the site by Grand Master Alof de Wignacourt. It contains the parish of St. Pauls Grotto Parish Church, music collections, manuscripts and things relating to the history of these institutions. In 1646, the building of this College started, and ended in 1749. The building was converted to a museum in 1981. Some unique attractions is the wooden chest on a loft above the bed, set in an alcove where the treasurer slept and where he could safely guard the silver and money of the Chapter kept in the chest, and a portable altar that was used on the Orders galleys The underground of Wignacourt College Museum is an extensive World War II shelter with 50 rooms leading to the inner courtyard. The founder of this museum is Monsignor John Azzopardi.

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St. Agathas Complex
St. Agathas Catacombs

The catacombs belong to the Church, situated amongst trees and bushes. The martyr St Agatha is said to have hid in these catacombs during the persecution of the Christians by the Roman Emperor Decius in 249 A.D. It contains many medieval frescoes some which date back to the 12th century. A characteristic feature of Maltese catacombs is the agape tables made out of rock. Mourners would hold a wake, farewell meal in honour of the dead. Nowadays in the entrance there is a museum displaying collections from coins of Romans and Etruscan, to Egyptian artifacts.

St. Agathas Church

The church was built in 1504. Beneath it there is a crypt where in it lays the remains of the Servant of God Joseph de Piro founder of the Missionary Society of St. Paul, and surrounded by names of the

deceased MSSP members. The Church was replaced by a bigger one in 1970. Two small chapels

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were added at the sides, one dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and another to St. Paul the Apostle.

Ta iezu Area
Statues and Niches around Rabat

Rabats streets are filled with niches, Tony Terribile an author, counted 107 statues and niches around Rabat, all dedicated to various saints.

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Church of Saint Mary of Jesus Ta iezu

The church was built in 1500 by the Franciscan Minor Friars, in gothic style. At first it was very poor and simple with a wooden ceiling. Though it was decorated with fine works of art, for example the marble statue of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception by the famous sculptor Antonello Gagini, and the titular painting famous triptych masterpiece painted by Antonello de Saliba in 1517. The church was dedicated to the Visitation of Our Lady to St. Elizabeth.In 1693, the churched suffered damages from a destructive earthquake and then was enlarged in 1957 with help from Italy, Spain and Portugal. It was then dedicate to St. Mary of Jesus.

Area around Howard Gardens

Domus Romana
nobles within the capital city of Malta, then known as Melite. Its ruins were discovered in the late 19th century buried underground. The mosaic in pavements 1881, in the

The Roman Domus is a house built during the 1st century BC. It was built for Roman

discovered

Roman house are the finest and oldest mosaic compositions from the western Mediterranean. An Arab cemetery was found overlying the Roman remains. It consisted of 245 skeletal remains, mostly young males. They were buried in a tomb with their feet pointing East towards the Mecca.

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Howard Gardens
These gardens are named after Joseph Howard, the first Prime Minister of Malta. The Cross monument found in the gardens is said to date b ack to 1091. In the garden, there are about 4 monuments plagues; Monument, Memorial, Monument and World Paul and a 2 marble Cross II Xuereb Love War The Stone

Monument, and a marble plaque commemorates the inaugurations of Howard Gardens in 1923 and another marble plague which commemorates the inauguration of the newly-restored

Howard Gardens in 2006.

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Train

The

Station
In the late 18th century, it took people 3 hours to walk from Mdina to Valletta, so in 1870, J.S. Tucker came up with the idea of building a railway to make the trip less than an hour. In fact the train took only 25 minutes to reach its destination. The railway was later extended to Mtarfa though in 1931 the company encountered financial problems and so the service was shut down. Today, one can still see the original Train Station.

St. Marks and St. Francis Church Area

Nicola Saura Hospital Ospozio Saura
This was the first hospital built in Malta that did not belong to the government. The main idea was to shelter old and sick people. It served also as a church hospital and later was enlarged by the designs of Lorenzo Gafa`. St.

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Jeanne-Antide Thourets Sisters of Charity Movement took care of this hospital. Nowadays it serves as an old peoples home.

Santo Spirito Hospital

At first, the hospital was known as St. Francis Hospital. The date when the hospital was completed is not clear yet but it may have originated under the care of the Cathedral Chapter of Mdina, and later under the Franciscan

Order. In 1433, its name was changed to become similar to other hospitals around Europe; Santo Spirito Hospital. The hospital was attacked by Barbary corsairs in 1541 and then was enlarged in 1668. During WWII, the hospital took care of the wounded, about 48000 war refugees. In 1990 the hospital was made into a Museum for the National Archives.

The Saqqajja Hill Fountain

The fountain built in 1610 by Grand Master Alof de Wignacourt is said to have been part of the initial stages of the aqueduct to transport water from Rabat to Valletta. It was also there to provide water for people coming up the hill. In

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the 19th century it stopped working as the passages were blocked though were reopened again by heavy rain in 1993.

Tal-Virtu`Area Closer to Heaven

Tal-Virtu` Castle
This beautiful castle was built at the beginning of the 20th century. It has four towers and built in the form of a square and currently is being used as a private residence. This castle is one of the architectural jewels of Rabat and like the rotunda church; it can be seen from several miles around.

<- A view of the garden/entrance of TalVirtu Castle

St. Sebastians Church

The church was first built in 1477, rebuilt in 1519 and restored in 1751. There are many paintings of; Pope St. Gregory the Great, St. Roque, Our Lady of Graces, the four evangelists and much more. It is taken care of by the Sisters of Charity of St. Jeanne-Antide. In front of the church is a small piazza where in the

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olden days there used to be a drinking fountain for animals known as Il-Ghajn ta San Bastjan.

St. Dominic Square Area

The Dominican Priory
The Dominican Priory started to be built in 1457 and finished in 1505. During the completion, three Dominican Fathers moved in who worked hard to collect funds for the building. In 1551, the priory was taken over by the Ottoman Turks and used it as their base to attack the capital city, Mdina. It severed severe damages after it was burnt during an attack. In the Great Siege (1565), the priory continued to suffer more severe damages. It was later rebuilt in the form of a traditional medieval fortification by the design of Capitano Antonio. In the middle of the priory there is a large internal garden and a statue of St. Dominic can be found in one corner. Large sundials were painted on walls of the terrace over-looking the garden, designed by the Dominician Fr. Benedetto Castrinio a mathematician, during the 18th century.

Church of Our Lady of the Grotto

Matthew Curmi built this small church in 1458 and furbished it with a painting and a bell. Around 1462, the church was given jurisdiction and in 1482, a wooden choir was ordered from Sicily which was later donated to St. Pauls Cathedral and now is now exhibited in the Cathedral Museum. The old choir was given to the Dominicans but was destroyed together with a large organ by the Ottoman Turks in 1565. The current one was sculpted by Anton Farrugia and Matthew Gambin in the late 18 th century. It went through many changes after the earth tremors in 1743.

Ta-agki, Tal- Balla and al-Bajjada Windmills

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Grinding of the grain trade phased out with windmills in Malta. Grinding in Malta dates back to pre historic times and during the Roman and Punic periods, hard stone mills were in use to crush grain. It consists of a main room where the beast circulates, a work shop, a store room and few rooms as living quarters. They were introduced by the Knights and a total of 31 windmills were built around Malta by different Grand Masters. Ta-agki, Tal- Balla and al-Bajjada were built by Grand Master Manoel de Vilhena in the late 18th century. Within the tower the mill equipment was lodged and at the middle of the tower there were sacks filled with flour.An important feature was the famous Triton which the miller used to blow it in trumpet-like fashion to indicate to the villagers that their produce could be turned into cereal products ie. like semolina and flour.

Conclusion

Rabat, over the years improved a lot. People contributed a lot to have the beautiful Rabat as one can see today. The heritage is very important and is what makes Rabat an interesting place to learn about its history as it has a mixture of everything due to its importance in the olden days. The historic remains are greatly taken care of and preserved for future generations.

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Bibliography
A New Geography of the Maltese Islands Anton Azzopardi
Discover Historic Treasures, Mystic Legends, Culture and Folklore of Rabat Pauline Dingle (2007)

www.sanpawl.rabatmalta.com www.heritagemalta.org St. Pauls Catacombs www.sanpawl@rabatmalta.com

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