Treasures of Malta, No. 91, Christmas 2024, Vol. XXXI, No. I 

Fondazzjoni Patrimonju Malti

The editorial of the latest issue of Treasures of Malta, the flagship publication of the Fondazzjoni Patrimonju Malti, underscores the Jekyll and Hyde relationship with our national heritage. While, on one hand, important and most praise-worthy restoration work has been carried out on several sites, other no less relevant sites are left to rot away, often given a strong helping hand to their dilapidation.

The restoration of the sanctuary of Our Lady of Mercy at Qrendi is a feather in the cap of all concerned. Ivana Farrugia, Tabitha Dreyfuss, Norbert Gatt, and Joseph Magro, all members of the of the interdisciplinary team at the RPD within the ministry for national heritage, the arts, and local government, record the approach followed and the actual changes affected, including the recovery of the original colour scheme of the reredos and the internal walls. In the process a couple of welcome serendipitous discoveries were made.

On the other hand, Fort Chambray is being led to the chopping block with the connivance and the deafening silence of our political parties.

In this issue, Joseph Scicluna, the author of the monumental prize-winning biography of Chambray, gives the background to the development of one little aspect of this outstanding local example of 18th-century fortifications: the polverista or gunpowder store. Designed by the Italian engineer Francesco Marandon in 1760, it could hold up to 310 barrels of gunpowder and included all the latest advances in fortress design. It seems that the polverista is going to avoid the Talibans. For small mercies…

After the Bath by Mabel Pace Asciak

Edward de Gaetano’s favourite object is a most competent workshop copy after a painting by Giacomo Favretto made by his maternal grandmother Mabel Pace Asciak. It is an oil on canvas After the Bath made by the artist then a couple of years out of her teens and who was to die tragically in her late 20s.

Malta’s participation at the 1924 Wembley Exhibition is reviewed once again by Giovanni Bonello. Meant to be the showcase of the achievements of the empire on which the sun never set, it paraded the best of 56 of the colonial territories. Although it eventually attracted 17 million visitors, it still managed to achieve a financial loss.

The Malta pavilion, designed by Giuseppe Cachia Caruana, showed a walled fortress and covered 379 square metres, including three large halls, dedicated to prehistory, the Order of St John, and contemporary industry, trade, and art respectively.

One of the exhibits in the latter section was meant to be an exquisite wrought-iron gate, a gem of local craftsmanship, made by the master blacksmith Carmelo Calleja of Naxxar. Its presence was unfortunately hit negatively by its late arrival and arguments later arose about payment due. It was eventually bought by Lady Strickland for Villa Bologna whose garden it still graces. John Magro tells the story behind this masterpiece.

Elaborate iron gate, presently at Villa Bologna, Attard.

After a successful academic career in Rome, Carlo Magri (1617–1693) returned to Malta in 1682 where he was appointed archpriest of the Gozo matrice (but not of the Gozo cathedral, since the sister island had not yet then been declared a separate diocese). His crowning achievement there was the commissioning of Lorenzo Gafà to rebuild the matrice.

Magri was no less active in the literary field, with his Latin translation and augmentation of his brother’s Notizie dei vocaboli ecclesiastici running into many editions and remained in print for almost a hundred years. In addition to other works of various genres, he published two tragicomedies, with one of them, the first comedy written and published by a Maltese, also finding notable successes even in Italy and some European countries. Mario Pace recalls the life and achievements of this remarkable personality.

Emanuel Camilleri presents a cartographic and historical analysis of a very detailed broadsheet map of Valletta, its harbours, and the three cities made by Jean Boutlanger in 1645. The second state includes a descriptive text and key on a separate sheet. An interesting unique feature is that the map shows Manoel Island as two separate islands.

Ġaħan and the Door (1934) by Robert Caruana Dingli

Ġaħan must be the islands’ favourite fictional character whose pranks, a mixture of innocence and cunningness we have cherished since childhood. Kylie Aquilina writes about visual representations of the character, who is first mentioned by Mikiel Anton Vassalli in 1828.

Robert Caruana Dingli’s depiction of Ġaħan as a young urchin in Il-Ġabra ta’ Ward schoolbook remains probably the most iconic for those of a certain age. He also collaborated with Aldo Farini. Other artists who drew Ġaħan include Willie Apap and, closer to our times, Joseph Mallia, whose drawings appeared in Id-Denfil.

Ġaħan also featured as the title of two newspapers, where the character was used for passing biting political comments. His re-emergence after independence was greatly due to the studies of Ġuzè Cassar Pullicino and Ġorġ Mifsud Chircop and probably reached his literary apotheosis in Francis Ebejer’s Il-Ġaħan ta’ Binġemma. As Aquilina shows, there is much more behind the figure of Ġaħan.

Old photograph of the church of Our Lady of Mercy, Qrendi.

Quite recently, Ġaħan has also achieved a local partisan dimension, certainly not based on his political acumen.

Matthew Robert Shirfield analyses the cover of this issue which shows Joseph Kalleya’s Mother and Child.

Also included are book reviews, a most useful subject index to the illustrations in Vol. XXX of Treasures of Malta compiled by Paul Xuereb, the cultural review by Cecilia Xuereb, and the calendar highlights by Antonia Critien who also compiled the essential index to this volume.