A history of archaeological excavations

Although Antonio Annetto Caruana is best remembered as one of the early archaeologists who shed light on several aspects of Malta's cultural past, he could not bring himself to accept that there was a civilisation in Malta that preceded the Phoenicians.

This episode is recalled in the new book in the Kullana Kulturali series called L-Arkeologija ta' Malta by Ernest Vella, Marlene Borg and Anthony Bonanno.

According to the authors, Caruana felt that the prehistoric temples, a marvellous example of engineering and architecture, must have been the brainchild of a high civilisation like the Phoenicians and not the work of primitive people.

In fact, the first archaeologist who declared that the temples in Malta were prehistoric was the German Mayr who carried out field research here between October 1897 and January 1898. Mayr also referred to the critical study Caruana had drawn up about the temples, suggesting ways and means how to preserve them.

In 1907, Mayr revisited Malta to carry out further research. Following on-site visits and other research, the German concluded that the temples were the work of a prehistoric civilisation much older than the Phoenicians. Unfortunately, the authors say, Mayr was not very well received by Maltese academics for two basic reasons.

The first was that Mayr wrote in German, a language with which Maltese researchers were unfamiliar and, secondly, Mayr's conclusions - especially the local tradition of the early Christians in Malta and the continuity of that religion during the occupation of the island by the Arabs - did not fit into the beliefs of the political and religious authorities.

This and other gems of information that throw light on the history of archaeological excavations, not to mention the findings themselves, make this book an added treasure for all those who like to know more about the chequered history of these islands.

Each set in the Kullana Kulturali series comes in threes with the other two books, this time round, being Ir-Rumanz Malti fit-Tieni Nofs tas-Seklu Ghoxrin by Charles Briffa and L-Istorja tat-Turizmu f'Malta u Ghawdex by Julian Zarb.

The series was originally meant to include 60 hardbound volumes and this set of three in fact concludes the series by PIN Publications. The publishing house has, however, decided to go beyond the 60th book up to the 72nd, encouraged by the high demand for the series.