Following the end of the Siege of Malta in 1565, the Order of St John decided to establish a new city on the Xiberras peninsula in order to consolidate its position in Malta and bind the Knights to the island.

It was a grand master of the Order, Jean Parisot de Valette, who Sir Oliver Starkey refers to as “the scourge of Africa and Asia and the shield of Europe”, who laid Valletta’s foundation stone on March 28, 1566.

Descendants of the Vaccaro family

The Order referred to Valletta as ‘Humilissima Civitas’, while the ruling Houses of Europe dubbed it as ‘Superbissima’ because of its bastions, curtains and ravelins and for the splendour of its baroque palaces, gardens and churches.

Legend has it that the grand master took over the barren land from the Xiberras family and, on a specific date each year, possibly to mark the end of the historic siege, the head of the family was permitted to ride into Valletta on horseback. A silver jug or chalice with water from the well would be brought to this representative of the family as soon as he entered the palace yard of the Grand Master’s Palace.

After he had done drinking, a knight’s personal guard or a servant-soldier would slap the horse on the back and see him off. That served as payment for the territory taken and what is now known as Valletta.

The book by Sceberras Inguanez entitled The Family of Inguanez (1888) has a description of this custom. The text (p. 35) reads as follows:

“Monte Xiberras, the spot chosen by the Grand Master La Valette, for the site of the new town, commenced by him in 1566 and finished by his successor Del Monte, was probably in the possession of this family, as a tradition exists that each Grand Master,  on taking his investiture, should present the head of the Xiberras family with a glass of water, in acknowledgment of some territorial right by which Monte Xiberras was formerly held.” 

However, Giovanni Francesco Abela, in his Descrittione di Malta (1647), does not connect Mount Xiberras to the family of the name. All he says is (p. 9) “La parte di detta lingua di terra, che soggiace al Promontorio, fu’ chiamata da gl’ Arabi Sciaaret Meuia, che significa pred inculto di Meuia nome proprio d’Arabo. Il Promontorio doppo, o’ parte della collina piu’ eminente Sceb, e Ras, cioe’ a’ dire luogo rilevato, il quale sovrasta al Capo, ch’ e’ la punta sopra detta dove nell’ anno 1566, fu’ fabricate l’Inespugnabile Citta’ Valletta, ch’ apprese il nome dall’ Invittissimo Fondatore VALLETTA GRAN MAESTRO, essendosi intitolata per comun consenso della Religione L’UMILISSIMA doppo l’assedio di Malta, il tempo della costui fondatione con altre circonstanze si legge nell’ infrascritto Epitafposto sopra la Porta Reale.” 

Be it so, the British governors of Malta upheld the idea or tradition that the family’s descendants should receive an annual payment for the territory that is now known as Valletta.

On the other hand, the 19th-century commissioner’s report on the Maltese nobility gives an unfair impression that the surname Xiberras is not among the 121 families listed or mentioned by Giovanni Francesco Abela in his Notitia Terza – Di Alcune Delle Antiche, e Ragguardevoli Famiglie di Malta as being prominent or ennobled.

Abela provides a hint as to what might have inspired the 19th-century legend of Mount Xiberras while recounting the illustrious histories of the Bordino and Mombron families.

In 1512, a rich little girl by the name of Imperia Bordino, the daughter of the sixth baron, had come to hold a monetary fief after her father’s death. The fief had its basis in two grants dated 1397 of the territories Benuarrat and Culeja to the Vaccaro family, who were her ancestors. These property fiefs eventually became yearly payments that were due to the royal treasury.

Writing in the early 17th century, Abela lamented that these feudal dues were a pittance in comparison to the actual fruits of the land. In any case, these monetary fiefs were subject to the usual rule of investiture and this privilege was passed down from one generation to the next.

Xiberras surname’s history and lustre at joining the ranks of the aristocracy as early as 1519 is not as recent as some have attempted to suggest

Interestingly, this particular monetary fief could be used as a basis for membership in the Consiglio Popolare. Since this fief was recognised as a feudum nobile by repeated declarations of the kings or viceroys of Sicily, the invested holders were styled as ‘barone’. 

It was then customary to consider the fief-holders as ‘titolati’. On March 12, 1512, little Imperia’s mother, Bartolomea, diligently paid homage and was invested in the girl’s name but, sadly, the girl passed away shortly afterwards in 1514.

The Bordino and Mombron families are not given much attention by Abela but he recorded for posterity that the infant feudataria was succeeded “ex pacto, et providentia Principis” by a cleric named Pietro de Mombron (p. 465), who was invested on  August 18 of the same year and, again, shortly after King Ferdinand’s death in 1517.

Abela records that the cleric de Mombron was succeeded by his niece, the Noble Imperia d’Avello Mombron and her husband Antonio Xiberras (p. 507), who were both jointly invested “dal Conte allora di Monteleone Vicere’ di Sicilia a’ 22 di Gennaro 1519, come registrata si vede nell reg. Cancell”, with a grant of 12 oncie (a unit of account in the Middle Ages); this feudal concession forming part of Imperia’s dowry.

Perhaps Antonio Xiberras’s descendants won’t argue over a cup of water, on whether the peninsula was ever obtained from him or any other family member bearing the same family name, but the Xiberras surname’s history and lustre at joining the ranks of the aristocracy as early as 1519 is also not as recent as some have attempted to suggest.

Acknowledgements

Genealogist M. Lanfranco; C. A. Gauci’s The Genealogy and Heraldry of the Noble Families of Malta, Volume 2 (1991); Maltagenealogy.com.