The façade of the Grandmaster’s palace in Valletta has been described as ‘simple and severe’ with few embellishments to attract the eye - a far cry from the rich décor within. This was probably intentional.

Many at the time believed that attracting envious eyes would have been a sure way of cursing the building and its inhabitants – even the knights were not immune to the Evil Eye (L-Għajn) – and so the less people stared at and admired the exterior, the better.

There is, however, one corbel holding up the corner of the northern balcony that is very different from the rest as it is unusually sculpted into a magnificent set of human figures. Even though most historians recognise the apotropaic nature of the carving (i.e. to ward off the Eye), few in this day and age understand what the three figures atop of each other represent.

The easiest to interpret is the one at the top who is sticking out both his arms and his tongue, taunting and jeering the onlooker. The protruding tongue is widely recognised as a deriding gesture, offensive through its sexual connotations and so he mocks and attempts to turn away the gaze of people passing by the palace. One can almost hear him shout: “What the… are you looking at!”

Open admiration, gazing or staring were regarded as dangerous. To counter this evil many resorted to indecent gestures. Even back in the days of Imperial Rome the fica (fig sign), the corna (horned hand) and the digitus impudicus (the finger) were both sexual insults and means to ward off evil spirits.

In Malta the mano cornuto (il-qrun) is still both sexually offensive (implying that the recipient of the gesture is a cuckold) and a way to ward off the Eye, which sort of makes sense. If you want to make people look away from you, it is better to offend them than appease them.

The central figure of the corbel is a bare breasted woman, which is rather surprising considering the traditionally scrupulous environment of Malta. So why do we have a naked female statue so publicly displayed in the centre of the capital city?

The stone guardian’s sole purpose was to prevent passersby from openly admiring or gazing enviously at the palace

First, we need to understand that even in the middle ages corbels sculpted in the form of exposed sexual body parts were considered apotropaic, much like the indecent gestures of ancient Greece and Rome. In fact, throughout Europe one can still see many medieval churches with stone figures exposing breasts, buttocks and genitals. One common type is a naked female exposing her genitalia, known in Ireland and Britain as a Sheela-na-gigg (Sheela of the breasts).

Apparently, people in Europe, even up to the 18th century, which is when the grandmaster’s corbel was sculpted, believed that demons cannot withstand fully exposed female nakedness.

This gives us an explanation for our nude lady and it is in line with that of the function of the person she is holding up on her shoulders. She would have been able to embarrass all modest onlookers, causing them to avert their potentially dangerous eyes away from her indecency and from the building she was protecting. Keep in mind that the Eye was believed to be transmitted also unintentionally by unknowing carriers.

She is, in effect, a modified Sheela-na-gigg; instead of exposed genitalia, her groin is belching out the third figure, a grotesque and melancholic face through a suggestive ring of flowers. This ugly visage, although not as shockingly embarrassing as sexual body parts, is surely repulsive enough to cause many an onlooker to look away in disgust.

The sculpture’s creative ability in maximising the obscenity is also seen in the way in which he has inserted a veiled optical illusion within the corbel. When looking at the top figure the first impression is that he is also exposing his genitals, but on focusing on his groin these turn out to be the head and breasts of the female figure below.

Without being overtly explicit, the artist has managed to combine a number of disgusting, offensive and embarrassing gestures into a single and effective stone guardian (Beżża l-art in The Maltese Bestiary, 2014), whose sole purpose was to prevent passersby from openly admiring or gazing enviously at the palace, thus protecting the grandmaster and his knights within, from the evil effects of the Eye.