The news of the relocation of the Hal Resqun Early Christian Catacomb is very welcome. This is one of Malta's most important Paleochristian antiquities and is especially notable for its carved decoration.

Hal Resqun is the name of a deserted late medieval settlement that occupied the space between Gudja and Malta International Airport, to the northwest of the old parish church of Santa Marija ta' Bir Miftuh. The site has archaeological value and includes megalithic remains in the near neighbourhood of the catacomb.

"Groups of tombs ... open and half full of stones and dust" were brought to the notice of the Valletta Museum in August 1912. Themistocles Zammit cleared and surveyed one of them. Unfortunately it had been disturbed in 1887 during the digging of a trench for water mains. Zammit reported "fragments of glass, pottery, etc. ... of the late Roman period". A plan and section were prepared and the discovery was recorded in the Museum Report. To ensure its preservation it was sealed up.

In January 1934, Zammit was informed that it had been broken into and filled with debris. He had it cleaned again and, with the assistance of his son Charles George Zammit, carried out a more detailed survey that he published in the Bulletin of the Museum.

To prevent further desecration, a small room with a sheet metal door was built above the shaft and the key was kept at the Valletta Museum. I visited the catacomb on various occasions between 1968 and 1972, and in 1969 I included it in the itinerary of cultural tours that I organised for the then Ministry of Education and Culture.

The catacomb suffered no further damage until 1975 when, during works outside the old runway, the room was pulled down and the entrance to the tomb buried beneath a new road. The Museums Department was not even informed! I brought the matter to the attention of the then Director of Museums, the late Mr F.S. Mallia, who relocated the catacomb and had it cleaned once more and covered with sealing slabs.

In October 1978 letters about it appeared in The Times (October 4, 13, 1978) and the Director of Information, Mr Toni Pellegrini, gave his assurance that the catacomb was "safe and sound, inside a traffic island" and that it was "proposed to re-erect the room to a new design so long as no driving-safety hazard would be involved".

Nothing more was heard about it until its welcome relocation earlier this month.

I discuss the catacomb in my book Late Roman and Byzantine Catacombs and Related Burial Places in the Maltese Islands (Oxford 1986, 246-249) and in several of my later publications.