Things to do in Malta
Mistra Bay is an inlet with¬in St Paul's Bay, on the oppo¬site shore from the town and harbour. Reached by a road through the rural landscape and reed beds of Kalkara Rav¬ine, it has the attraction of a sandy, although sometimes weed covered beach. For some really fine views, walk the rocky tracks round the headland facing St Paul's Islands, and hike or drive up to Selmun Palace, the knights' redoubt on the hilltop.
Mellieha Bay, just under Marfa Ridge (the 'tail' of fish shaped Malta), is the biggest stretch of sandy beach in the islands, and likely to be crow¬ded in the high season. Perched on the commanding spur of Mellieha Ridge, the town of Mellieba itself has a superb view of Marfa Ridge and Com¬ino with Gozo stretching be¬yond.
Car hire from Malta International Airport at Luqa
Malta is a tiny island and the best way to see the fascinating cities and historic sites is to book a hire car from Malta International Airport at Luqa before you leave home. The stone church at Marfa stands like a reddish fortress on the promontory. It dates from the 18th century, but nestling with¬in is a chapel from the early Middle Ages, now a site of pilgrimage. A small chapel next to the church contains a paint¬ing of the Virgin said to be by St Luke. To drive or walk along et Marfa Ridge is almost like flying, the views in all direc¬tions are so spectacular. The knights' Red Tower (1649) is the most prominent of the de¬fence posts from various eras that dot the ridge.
On its northern shore, you'll find stretches of sandy beach and hotels at Annier, Ramla and Paradise Bays. Cirkewwa is the landing stage where you can take the car ferry for the 20-minute crossing to Gozo. Across the narrow neck of land from Mellieha Bay, rocky but beautiful Anchor Bay was so named because it once had large anchors on the shore. Children will be thrilled to discover the engagingly ram¬shackle Popeye Village, con¬structed there as the set for the film Popeye and retained as a tourist attraction. A small ad¬mission fee is charged, but you can then use the beach for as long as you like.
Golden Bay Malta
Golden Bay (Ramla Tal¬Mixquqa) is a broad crescent of sand, not always pristine clean, with a good selection of cafes and a big tourist com¬plex on the hillside just above. The much smaller Ghajn Tuffieha Bay just next door, reached via a long staircase, attracts (and can take) fewer swimmers than Golden Bay. Inland to the south, you'll find the interesting remains of an Omani bathhouse. Charming Gnejna Bay, with its colour¬ful boathouses cut into the cliffs, has a sheltered, calm sandy beach.
The Prehistoric Sites of Malta and car hire
Malta's prehistory is impres¬sive and enigmatic, and most of the sites can be visited by hire car from Luqa Airport. The settle¬ment by humans began with the arrival of agricultural im-migrants who came from Sici¬ly around the year 5000 BC. Futher waves of immigrants followed and the correspond¬ing phases of development have been classified and given names which you'll encounter both at prehistoric sites and in museums.
All prehistoric dates must be regarded as approximate. Those quoted here agree with the latest available research, which gives dates sub¬stantially earlier than the re¬sults from carbon14 testing that were accepted hitherto. The different stages of Maltese prehistoric civilization have been called after the im¬portant sites associated with them, such as: the Ghar Dal¬am period, lasting up to about4500 BC; the Skorba period, 4500 -4100 BC; the Zebbug period (3900 BC); the Mgarr period (3700 BC) and the Ggantija period (3600-3000 BC).
Temples in Malta
Outstanding in this latter are the temples at Ggantija on Gozo), Magar Qim, and an early temple at Tarxien. The Hal Saflieni Hypogeum is a remarkable complex poss¬ibly dating back to 3300 BC and continuing in use through the Tarxien period (around 3200-2500 BC), which left impressive temples at Tarxien itself, Mnajdra, Skorba and Borg inNadur. Then, around2500 BC, an unexplained sudden end came to temple building.
Drought and starvation, emigration, re¬ligious hysteria and mass sui¬cide have all been guessed at as reasons for this mystery. The next group of immi¬grants used Tarxien as a ceme¬tery from 25001500 BC ¬they're called the Cemetery People. Around 1500 BC, the Borg in Nadur (Bronze Age) period began with the last group of migrants to arrive ¬until the Phoenicians came in about 800 BC. Few hard facts are known about the religion practised by the temple builders. Phallic symbols and their female equi¬valent, triangles, the huge, fat and skirted figure at Tarxien (the original is in the Valletta National Museum) and various smaller versions would seem to suggest a fertility cult.
The temples' curved outer walls were usually made of hard coralline limestone with faces or edges of blocks alter¬nately projecting. Then came a packing of rubble and the inner walls, usually of globigerina limestone. Doorways and passages were erected on the trilithon principle resembling posts and lintel.
Most temples were built in lobes or apses around a central court or passage. Common fea¬tures included altars, possible 'oracle chambers' and hol¬lowed stones, perhaps used for collecting libations of blood from sacrificial animals. There was usually also a massive, concave front wall with an im¬pressive entrance. Early tem¬ple interiors and altars had a pitted decoration and later there were carvings, which must have been done with stone, since no corresponding metal tools have been found.
During the Bronze Age, sophisticated metalworking techniques came to the islands, but the new immigrants pro¬duced nothing comparable to the earlier achievements, many of which predate other ancient wonders such as the Great Pyramid and Stonehenge. Mal¬tese construction techniques are considered unique: it seems the builders invented every¬thing themselves.
Go early in the morning if you want to avoid crowds (and be cool) and go with a qualified guide if you don't want to miss a lot of subtle details. About 10km (6 miles) from Valletta, Ghar Dalam is an important cave site. The small museum there shows the types of animals that existed on Malta in the Pleistocene era.
The exhibits include hippo¬potami and dwarf elephants. At one time the sea covered Malta, then it receded greatly, probably leaving at first a land bridge to Sicily, by which the large animals crossed. As the climate grew drier and food became scarcer, the number of animals gradually dwindled, and dwarf varieties developed. Animal bones and later human remains were found in the cave, a short walk downhill.
Uncovered from the late 19th century on, the natural cave intercepts a wide, or rav¬ine, carved out of the hill by rushing water. Layers of detri¬tus, including bones of wild animals, were washed down the ravine and into the cave. Human bones and carbonized grains found in upper layers show that the cave was in¬habited in Neolithic times and that these earliest settlers were agricultural people. The cave is cool and restful, but there's not much to see except a few stalactites and stalagmites.
St Georges Bay Temple
Less than a mile away, on the way to St George's Bay, is Borg in Nadur, a village that was fortified around 1500 BC, with some remaining ruins of houses and 'cartruts' nearby. The strong defen¬sive wall includes stones from earlier temples. Skorba at Zebbiegh is the oldest dwelling site in Malta, with a wall built before 4000 BC, and the remains of farmers' and herdsmen's huts and two megalithic temples. Magar Qim and Mnajdra, about 13km (8 miles)from Valletta, can be reached via Zurrieq or Siggiewi.
The site . of Hagar Qim is spectacular high above the sea, with a view of Filfla island. You'll see the typical concave fa9ade of the main temple and a complex series of rooms. Unusually, this temple is almost entirely built of the softer globigerina limestone, so it is eroded and weathered.
Interesting details include tethering loops for animals in the stone near the entrance, various ‘mushroom' or 'tea table' altars in the second court, and other altars with the early pitted decoration. The lower half of one of the famous 'fat lady' figures was found in this temple, a skirted cult fig¬ure with piano legs now in the National Museum. Mnajdra is a five-minute walk down a stone causeway towards the sea, in an even more beautiful setting. The temples here are contemporary with Magar Qim and the two sites have many features in common, but at Mnajdra, the stone is particularly subtly worked and curved.
Look for the remarkable multiple door¬ways and the cleverly cut oracle holes and, for an overview, climb a short way up the hill behind the site. The Hal Saflieni Hypo¬geum (a Greek word meaning ‘underground') is in Paola, a southern suburb of Valletta. This eerie labyrinth, carved from soft limestone, is vast and overwhelming, not recom¬mended for sufferers of claus¬trophobia. It was hollowed out on three different levels, the deepest plunging to a depth of 12m (40ft), and was discov¬ered by accident when workers were digging cisterns for new houses in 1902. Professionally explored by archaeologist Sir Themistocles Zammit, it is one of Europe's most fascinating prehistoric sites.
The Tarxien Temples Malta
You descend by a modern spiral staircase into near darkness. The first level would seem to be the oldest and cut the roughest (around 3300 BC). The two lower levels were made aroundthe time of the Tarxien Temples (3200-2500 BC) and were carved out with increasing care and sophisti¬cation. The middle level has imitation corbelling, and doors and niches cleverly copying the features of the above¬ground temples. The Oracle Chamber has a hollow where men (and only men, it seems) can make an odd echo effect. In the Main Chamber, the 'sleeping lady' statuette (now in the National Museum) was found. Some rooms have red or black decoration in spirals or hexagons; one wall drawing is meant to be a bull.
The whole complex covers an area of 800sq m (8,600sq ft) and is estimated to have con¬tained 7,000 bodies. Sheltered from attack by the outside elements, this is undoubtedly ancient Malta's best-preserved monument. Only 400m (l,300ft) away, the Tarxien temples date from the same era as the lower levels of the Hal Saflieni Hypogeum, but their garden setting makes a complete contrast. The temples were discovered by a farmer who was having trouble ploughing his fields with all the megalithic stones in his way: on hearing of this, the archae-ologist Sir Themistocles Zam¬mit jumped at the chance to uncover the site, which was excavated between 1915 and 1919.
The temples were built at different times, from about 3200-2500 Be. On the way in you'll see a plan of the area, some replicas of carved stones and another piano legged 'fat lady' statue. The first temple you come to has replicas of lively bas-relief carvings ¬spirals, sheep, goats, pigs, cat¬tle, and the lower half of yet another 'fat lady', whose vast thighs are an inspiration to any weightwatcher. The second temple is origi¬nal in having six lobes or oval bays off the main axis, instead of the more usual four or five. Part of the floor has been removed to show some of the hundreds of heavy stone balls used as rollers for the huge slabs they were left in place as supports.
The third temple of the group is the oldest with, a little further on, parts of the ancient Ggantija period temple. The legendary siren Calypso kept Ulysses enthralled here for seven blissful years, and Gozo still enchants people who like its sleepy pace and rustic charm.
Mellieha Bay, just under Marfa Ridge (the 'tail' of fish shaped Malta), is the biggest stretch of sandy beach in the islands, and likely to be crow¬ded in the high season. Perched on the commanding spur of Mellieha Ridge, the town of Mellieba itself has a superb view of Marfa Ridge and Com¬ino with Gozo stretching be¬yond.
Car hire from Malta International Airport at Luqa
Malta is a tiny island and the best way to see the fascinating cities and historic sites is to book a hire car from Malta International Airport at Luqa before you leave home. The stone church at Marfa stands like a reddish fortress on the promontory. It dates from the 18th century, but nestling with¬in is a chapel from the early Middle Ages, now a site of pilgrimage. A small chapel next to the church contains a paint¬ing of the Virgin said to be by St Luke. To drive or walk along et Marfa Ridge is almost like flying, the views in all direc¬tions are so spectacular. The knights' Red Tower (1649) is the most prominent of the de¬fence posts from various eras that dot the ridge.
On its northern shore, you'll find stretches of sandy beach and hotels at Annier, Ramla and Paradise Bays. Cirkewwa is the landing stage where you can take the car ferry for the 20-minute crossing to Gozo. Across the narrow neck of land from Mellieha Bay, rocky but beautiful Anchor Bay was so named because it once had large anchors on the shore. Children will be thrilled to discover the engagingly ram¬shackle Popeye Village, con¬structed there as the set for the film Popeye and retained as a tourist attraction. A small ad¬mission fee is charged, but you can then use the beach for as long as you like.
Golden Bay Malta
Golden Bay (Ramla Tal¬Mixquqa) is a broad crescent of sand, not always pristine clean, with a good selection of cafes and a big tourist com¬plex on the hillside just above. The much smaller Ghajn Tuffieha Bay just next door, reached via a long staircase, attracts (and can take) fewer swimmers than Golden Bay. Inland to the south, you'll find the interesting remains of an Omani bathhouse. Charming Gnejna Bay, with its colour¬ful boathouses cut into the cliffs, has a sheltered, calm sandy beach.
The Prehistoric Sites of Malta and car hire
Malta's prehistory is impres¬sive and enigmatic, and most of the sites can be visited by hire car from Luqa Airport. The settle¬ment by humans began with the arrival of agricultural im-migrants who came from Sici¬ly around the year 5000 BC. Futher waves of immigrants followed and the correspond¬ing phases of development have been classified and given names which you'll encounter both at prehistoric sites and in museums.
All prehistoric dates must be regarded as approximate. Those quoted here agree with the latest available research, which gives dates sub¬stantially earlier than the re¬sults from carbon14 testing that were accepted hitherto. The different stages of Maltese prehistoric civilization have been called after the im¬portant sites associated with them, such as: the Ghar Dal¬am period, lasting up to about4500 BC; the Skorba period, 4500 -4100 BC; the Zebbug period (3900 BC); the Mgarr period (3700 BC) and the Ggantija period (3600-3000 BC).
Temples in Malta
Outstanding in this latter are the temples at Ggantija on Gozo), Magar Qim, and an early temple at Tarxien. The Hal Saflieni Hypogeum is a remarkable complex poss¬ibly dating back to 3300 BC and continuing in use through the Tarxien period (around 3200-2500 BC), which left impressive temples at Tarxien itself, Mnajdra, Skorba and Borg inNadur. Then, around2500 BC, an unexplained sudden end came to temple building.
Drought and starvation, emigration, re¬ligious hysteria and mass sui¬cide have all been guessed at as reasons for this mystery. The next group of immi¬grants used Tarxien as a ceme¬tery from 25001500 BC ¬they're called the Cemetery People. Around 1500 BC, the Borg in Nadur (Bronze Age) period began with the last group of migrants to arrive ¬until the Phoenicians came in about 800 BC. Few hard facts are known about the religion practised by the temple builders. Phallic symbols and their female equi¬valent, triangles, the huge, fat and skirted figure at Tarxien (the original is in the Valletta National Museum) and various smaller versions would seem to suggest a fertility cult.
The temples' curved outer walls were usually made of hard coralline limestone with faces or edges of blocks alter¬nately projecting. Then came a packing of rubble and the inner walls, usually of globigerina limestone. Doorways and passages were erected on the trilithon principle resembling posts and lintel.
Most temples were built in lobes or apses around a central court or passage. Common fea¬tures included altars, possible 'oracle chambers' and hol¬lowed stones, perhaps used for collecting libations of blood from sacrificial animals. There was usually also a massive, concave front wall with an im¬pressive entrance. Early tem¬ple interiors and altars had a pitted decoration and later there were carvings, which must have been done with stone, since no corresponding metal tools have been found.
During the Bronze Age, sophisticated metalworking techniques came to the islands, but the new immigrants pro¬duced nothing comparable to the earlier achievements, many of which predate other ancient wonders such as the Great Pyramid and Stonehenge. Mal¬tese construction techniques are considered unique: it seems the builders invented every¬thing themselves.
Go early in the morning if you want to avoid crowds (and be cool) and go with a qualified guide if you don't want to miss a lot of subtle details. About 10km (6 miles) from Valletta, Ghar Dalam is an important cave site. The small museum there shows the types of animals that existed on Malta in the Pleistocene era.
The exhibits include hippo¬potami and dwarf elephants. At one time the sea covered Malta, then it receded greatly, probably leaving at first a land bridge to Sicily, by which the large animals crossed. As the climate grew drier and food became scarcer, the number of animals gradually dwindled, and dwarf varieties developed. Animal bones and later human remains were found in the cave, a short walk downhill.
Uncovered from the late 19th century on, the natural cave intercepts a wide, or rav¬ine, carved out of the hill by rushing water. Layers of detri¬tus, including bones of wild animals, were washed down the ravine and into the cave. Human bones and carbonized grains found in upper layers show that the cave was in¬habited in Neolithic times and that these earliest settlers were agricultural people. The cave is cool and restful, but there's not much to see except a few stalactites and stalagmites.
St Georges Bay Temple
Less than a mile away, on the way to St George's Bay, is Borg in Nadur, a village that was fortified around 1500 BC, with some remaining ruins of houses and 'cartruts' nearby. The strong defen¬sive wall includes stones from earlier temples. Skorba at Zebbiegh is the oldest dwelling site in Malta, with a wall built before 4000 BC, and the remains of farmers' and herdsmen's huts and two megalithic temples. Magar Qim and Mnajdra, about 13km (8 miles)from Valletta, can be reached via Zurrieq or Siggiewi.
The site . of Hagar Qim is spectacular high above the sea, with a view of Filfla island. You'll see the typical concave fa9ade of the main temple and a complex series of rooms. Unusually, this temple is almost entirely built of the softer globigerina limestone, so it is eroded and weathered.
Interesting details include tethering loops for animals in the stone near the entrance, various ‘mushroom' or 'tea table' altars in the second court, and other altars with the early pitted decoration. The lower half of one of the famous 'fat lady' figures was found in this temple, a skirted cult fig¬ure with piano legs now in the National Museum. Mnajdra is a five-minute walk down a stone causeway towards the sea, in an even more beautiful setting. The temples here are contemporary with Magar Qim and the two sites have many features in common, but at Mnajdra, the stone is particularly subtly worked and curved.
Look for the remarkable multiple door¬ways and the cleverly cut oracle holes and, for an overview, climb a short way up the hill behind the site. The Hal Saflieni Hypo¬geum (a Greek word meaning ‘underground') is in Paola, a southern suburb of Valletta. This eerie labyrinth, carved from soft limestone, is vast and overwhelming, not recom¬mended for sufferers of claus¬trophobia. It was hollowed out on three different levels, the deepest plunging to a depth of 12m (40ft), and was discov¬ered by accident when workers were digging cisterns for new houses in 1902. Professionally explored by archaeologist Sir Themistocles Zammit, it is one of Europe's most fascinating prehistoric sites.
The Tarxien Temples Malta
You descend by a modern spiral staircase into near darkness. The first level would seem to be the oldest and cut the roughest (around 3300 BC). The two lower levels were made aroundthe time of the Tarxien Temples (3200-2500 BC) and were carved out with increasing care and sophisti¬cation. The middle level has imitation corbelling, and doors and niches cleverly copying the features of the above¬ground temples. The Oracle Chamber has a hollow where men (and only men, it seems) can make an odd echo effect. In the Main Chamber, the 'sleeping lady' statuette (now in the National Museum) was found. Some rooms have red or black decoration in spirals or hexagons; one wall drawing is meant to be a bull.
The whole complex covers an area of 800sq m (8,600sq ft) and is estimated to have con¬tained 7,000 bodies. Sheltered from attack by the outside elements, this is undoubtedly ancient Malta's best-preserved monument. Only 400m (l,300ft) away, the Tarxien temples date from the same era as the lower levels of the Hal Saflieni Hypogeum, but their garden setting makes a complete contrast. The temples were discovered by a farmer who was having trouble ploughing his fields with all the megalithic stones in his way: on hearing of this, the archae-ologist Sir Themistocles Zam¬mit jumped at the chance to uncover the site, which was excavated between 1915 and 1919.
The temples were built at different times, from about 3200-2500 Be. On the way in you'll see a plan of the area, some replicas of carved stones and another piano legged 'fat lady' statue. The first temple you come to has replicas of lively bas-relief carvings ¬spirals, sheep, goats, pigs, cat¬tle, and the lower half of yet another 'fat lady', whose vast thighs are an inspiration to any weightwatcher. The second temple is origi¬nal in having six lobes or oval bays off the main axis, instead of the more usual four or five. Part of the floor has been removed to show some of the hundreds of heavy stone balls used as rollers for the huge slabs they were left in place as supports.
The third temple of the group is the oldest with, a little further on, parts of the ancient Ggantija period temple. The legendary siren Calypso kept Ulysses enthralled here for seven blissful years, and Gozo still enchants people who like its sleepy pace and rustic charm.
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