Modern veneer – medieval grace: Malta

The slightly built man slicing deli meat turned out to be a Knight of Malta. His store was in a fashionable neighbourhood, but he assured me his sword and black cloak with its white Maltese cross were always at the ready.

The grocer and his fellow Knights of Malta are the latest in a line of religious champions in Europe. And just about everything they fought for is still intact.

Malta held out heroically against the Nazis in the Second World War. Some 400 years earlier, a medieval garrison of 700 knights fought off a siege by 40,000 Turks, unleashed from Istanbul by an old foe, Suleiman the Magnificent. Today, the island fortress of Malta is filled with cathedrals, palaces and walled cities, a legacy of those swashbuckling knights of yore.

Before the knights brought order and stylish architecture to the island, Malta had been a drop-in centre for traders and raiders from the Phoenicians to the Normans. Prehistoric tribes left behind temples that are older than Stonehenge and the Pyramids. The remains of these remarkable structures guard the western coast at Hagar Qim. The largest temple, called Ggantija, is on Malta’s sister island of Gozo (legend insis that the huge temple was not built by human hands but by a giantess).

Sampling the medieval era
Near the temple, a terrific hole-in-the-wall restaurant called Gesthers serves centuries-old Maltese specialties: sheep’s cheese coated with peppercorns, rabbit roasted in garlic and octopus simmered in capers, tomatoes and olives. When the knights took over Malta in the 16th century, they built a new capital, the walled fortress of Valletta, and most of the original buildings have survived.

The Grandmaster’s Palace, a jewel of stone and marble, is now home to the Maltese Parliament. Next door is the Bibliotheca, a medieval library, and down the street you’ll find the pocket-sized Manoel Theatre, an exquisite horseshoe-shaped opera house with tiers of golden balconies.

The knights’ treasure is the cathedral, a dark and heroic memorial. The marble floor is a checkerboard of knights’ tombs decorated with crosses, bloodied swords and skeletons. The walls are deeply carved in Maltese crosses.
This, however, is but one church in a tiny country boasting one for every day of the year. On a summer evening, somewhere in the islands, there is bound to be a church celebrating a festa, the feast day of the parish’s patron saint.

Pageantry and fireworks surround the parish church, its interior pillars decorated in red and gold damask and its altars adorned with silver.

Catholic – with a touch of Egypt
Malta is staunchly Roman Catholic. All day and all night, bells ring out from every corner. Many buses have shrines set up near the driver. Often, it’s a nativity scene squeezed in beside soccer pennants and pin-ups from Italian magazines. It’s not unusual to see nuns in traditional habit riding the buses. Looking out the window, you might spot a parish priest and two altar boys delivering Holy Communion to shut-ins.

At Rabat, there are early Christian catacombs, but in most harbours, one pagan idea lingers: the eye of Osiris is painted on the bows of colourful fishing boats, an ancient tradition to ward off evil.

Malta is nothing if not modern. New vineyards have been planted near neo-lithic caves. The only golf course has been shaped around the stone remnants of a medieval battlefield. Hamburger and pizza chains abound. Malta has a casino, discos, fine restaurants, 10-pin bowling and cable television – but very few traffic signals.

Politically, Malta has set a new course: Western Europe’s most medieval country has decided to enter the very modern European Union. This past May, ancient Malta joined the club in Brussels.

But old ways die hard. If you’re out on enjoying an early morning walk, you may spot a basket dangling from a balcony. A bread man loads up the basket, which then is reeled in by withered hands. Sometimes, on an afternoon, those same hands work making lace, one of Malta’s finest crafts.

Nowhere is the contrast between old and new so striking as in the centre of Malta. On a cliffside within sight of the bustling airport and a network of noisy expressways perches Mdina, the ancient capital and a World Heritage Site.
Mdina is called the Silent City; it allows no cars.

By day, its silence is shattered by the crash of church bells and the clatter of horse-drawn tourist carriages through the stone streets. By night, the lamplit city is all but deserted.

Behind the Cathedral, a nun closes up the convent for the night, putting out the garbage. Through the clear plastic can be seen pop cans, potato chip bags and chocolate bar wrappers. The door closes, and night settles down again, the only sound the tapping of high heels as a young woman and her boyfriend stroll the safe and empty streets of the 4,000-year-old capital.