Malta Libraries is holding its next lecture in the series Knowledge in the Making: Towards an Intellectual History of Early Modern Malta on January 26.

The lecture, titled ‘Contested identities in the antiquarian imagination: Reflections on the intellectual milieu of Abela’s Descrittione di Malta’, will be delivered by Reuben Grima.

Giovanni Francesco Abela and his monumental Descrittione di Malta are at once familiar and enigmatic. This lecture considers some of the networks of knowledge and power that Abela formed part of during the first half of the 17th century. This milieu shaped the world views of antiquarians in this period, and in turn influenced more widely-held and enduring attitudes to the past.

Taking the frontispiece of the Descrittione as a point of departure, Grima will explore how antiquarians deployed the past in the construction and contestation of identities. This work builds on archival research undertaken in 2022 on the theme of Inventing the Past, during the tenure of the Shortland-Jones Fellowship at the British School in Rome.

Grima is a senior lecturer in the Department of Conservation and Built Heritage at the University of Malta. He read for his PhD in archaeology at the Institute of Archaeology, UCL, while holding a Commonwealth Scholarship. From 2003 to 2011, he served as Heritage Malta’s senior curator responsible for Malta’s prehistoric world heritage sites. His research interests include cultural landscapes, the history of archaeology and public engagement with the past.

The series of lectures, coordinated by Maroma Camilleri, Jean-Paul De Lucca and Mevrick Spiteri, is being held in collaboration with the Department of Philosophy, University of Malta. All lectures are held at the National Library of Malta, Valletta, and start at 6.30pm.

Entrance is free and no booking is required.

For more information, e-mail events.library@gov.mt.