Prehistoric megaliths have been discovered in Sannat just before the construction of apartments was about to begin.
A spokesperson for the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage told Times of Malta that the series of boulders are being conserved in situ and the design of the development has been modified to allow their conservation.
“Probably prehistoric megaliths”, the boulders were identified along the perimeter of the site which will see the construction of 43 garages, overlying 30 units on two floors and an additional 12 apartments at set-back floor level.
The site is located in an area of archaeological sensitivity and the unearthing of remains last year fuelled questions over whether the medieval church of the Santa Marija ta’ nofs Awwissu had finally been located.
But the superintendence, which was monitoring the cleaning of the site, told Times of Malta that according to an extensive investigation, the remains belong to a rural building of an agricultural nature which collapsed over a period of time. These remains will not be preserved.
“No cultural material usually associated with churches and shrines were found. Furthermore, a comparative assessment with existing built rural churches indicated that the proportions and building technology of the remains at Sannat do not belong to rural churches but to a typical razzett structure,” he said.
The ruins of the razzett could not be dated since very little cultural material, such as pottery, was retrieved from the site and its construction methodology has a very wide time-range.
It appears that the farm collapsed some time in the 20th century, as one of the remaining walls was integrated within a stretch of a rubble wall that is more modern than the other rubble walls in the vicinity.
The remains of the rural building have been documented and permission for their removal has been granted because they are “too scanty and beyond restoration to be considered of a cultural heritage value that merits physical preservation”.