Focus on archaeological heritage under three dominations

Lovers of history and Melitensia will soon have another welcome addition to their bookshelves: Malta: Phoenician, Punic, And Roman by Anthony Bonanno.

The book, jam packed with information by an undisputed expert on the topic, will be launched on June 23 by Midsea Books Limited.

It is the second in the series Malta's Living Heritage and follows the great academic and popular success of David Trump's Malta: Prehistory And Temples.

Malta's unique prehistoric temples have been deservedly given pride of place in the archaeological literature over the last century or so. This preference, however, has tended to be at the almost total expense of the archaeological heritage of the later periods, which is far from negligible.

Prof. Bonanno's book redresses that imbalance and deals with the history and archaeology of three of those periods: the colonisation of the Maltese islands by the first literate people, the Phoenicians; the islands' eventual incorporation within Carthage's domain in the Punic period and their integration within the vast empire of the Romans.

"Each of these dominations have left precious tangible relics of their presence on the islands. The Phoenicians left the first writings inscribed on stone, together with intriguing items of funerary furniture. Their successors in the Punic period saw their temple dedicated to the female goddess Ashtart rise to international fame.

"Inside this temple, now identified with the remains at Tas-Silg, near Marsaxlokk, archaeologists have retrieved items of ivory, architectural decoration, pottery and sculpture of very high quality, together with a mine of data related to various aspects of human life and ecology of the period," Prof. Bonanno said.

"Far from being a remote, forgotten backwater of the Roman empire, Malta's role as a vibrant commercial centre is being re-discovered by recent specialised archaeological literature. On the other hand, the discovery of the richly decorated and furnished Roman town-house at Rabat in 1881 has remained unrivalled in terms of the fineness of its mosaics and imperial portrait sculpture," he added.

All this heritage finds its place in the new book, where the text is complemented by more than 500 photographs by Daniel Cilia and by plans, drawings and artistic impressions.

The book includes a comprehensive guide to all the major local sites as well as instructions as how to reach them.

The book, a handy 360-page manual, will be available in both hardback and soft-cover formats.