Europe’s Oldest Civilization: Malta’s Temple-Builders

Copyright 2009 Mr Mark Miceli-Farrugia - All Rights Reserved

by Mr Mark Miceli-Farrugia, Malta’s Ambassador to the United States of America, assisted by Heritage Malta, the Neolithia Foundation, and photographer Mr Daniel Cilia
 

What was the Purpose of these Structures?

The sheer investment of effort required to cut, transport and construct these ‘Temples’ suggests that they were of central importance to Malta’s prehistoric inhabitants. The objects and furnishings found within them indicate that the temples may have served for one or a combination of three purposes:
 

1. The above-ground temples most probably served as sanctuaries: rituals were probably performed to worship ancestors and to venerate a corpulent fertility deity which may have represented ‘mother earth’;
    
2. The unique, easterly orientation of Mnajdra above-ground temple suggests another purpose: this temple may have served as one of the world’s oldest solar calendars. Sunrise lights up the interior of Mnajdra’s southern temple on the first day of each of the four seasons. On the Equinox days, a ray of sun enters the temple and lights up its main axis. On the Solstices, sunlight illuminates the entrance chamber’s megaliths – focusing on the left-hand vertical in Summer and on the right-hand upright in Winter; and
3. The underground hypogea – Hal Saflieni and the recently excavated Xaghra Circle – also served as burial grounds.
   
   
   What happened to the Enigmatic Temple-Builders?
   
   We cannot as yet explain the reason for the sudden decline of this magnificent Temple-Building Society around 2500 BCE. We can only guess that these master-masons may have been obliged to emigrate due to climatic factors or were decimated by epidemic disease. Although their monuments have survived, the more refined structures carved out of the softer globigerina limestone have, over the years, suffered serious degradation. Their conservation has since been entrusted to Heritage Malta, the government agency responsible for the protection and promotion of Malta’s cultural heritage.
    
   
   The Legacy of the Temple-Builders
   
   These Temple Builders not only left their buildings as a legacy to mankind, they also bequeathed their innate masonry skills to succeeding generations of Maltese. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) recognizes 8 Maltese properties deserving of World Heritage preservation due to their outstanding value to humanity. These 8 World Heritage sites include 6 above-ground Temples (Ggantija, Hagar Qim, Mnajdra, Skorba, Ta’ Hagrat, & Tarxien), the underground Hal Saflieni Hypogeum, and the majestic Baroque walled-city of Valletta. Not surprisingly, it is claimed that the stoneworking skills reflected in 16-17th century Maltese Baroque architecture are themselves a legacy of Malta’s Temple-Builders of the 4th millennium BCE.