Dom Mintoff might not have been publicly perceived as religious at all during his political life but very few know that he was a great admirer of Moses, the biblical figure.

His mother was extremely lively and intelligent – always laughing. So intelligent she could easily have run Malta

“He often referred to Moses and his story in his arguments,” said his younger brother Fr Dionysius, adding that he was an “extremely religious man” who looked at Christ as his role model.

Much is known about Dom Mintoff’s public persona but a week after the former Prime Minister’s death, precious little is known about his private life.

Fr Dionysius said Mr Mintoff mostly took after their mother, Ċetta.

“She was extremely lively and intelligent – always laughing. She was so intelligent that she could easily have run Malta,” he quipped.

She was a housewife, married to Laurence, a British Royal Navy cook. “Our father was often away at sea for long stretches of time.” Dom, who was the third-born out of nine siblings and the eldest of the boys, used to help his mother.

Whenever Dom’s father was away, she would never leave the house, saying “it was not proper” and only made an exception for the feast of the Immaculate Conception.

“So Dom would help her with the errands,” said Fr Dionysius, who described their mother as an “exceptional woman”.

Dom was very close to his mother and was distraught when she died in 1967. That is why he was “over the moon” when his daughter, Yana, named her own daughter Ċetta.

A few insights into his private life appeared in an article in The Times on his 90th birthday: he was an avid swimmer; loved minestra and homemade wine; had a passion for opera and books, in particular English literature.

He had been writing his memoirs, parts of which will probably be published by the newly set-up Fundazzjoni Duminku Mintoff.

It had also emerged that in 1971 when Mr Mintoff’s marriage was on the rocks, the then British Prime Minister intervened and planned an event to get Dom and his wife Moira together again. This was right in the middle of the Nato discussions and involved night-long talks with British Defence Secretary Lord Carrington. In his memoirs, The Course of My Life, former British Prime Minister Edward Heath wrote:

“Once Peter Carrington had left after lunch, I sprang a surprise on Mintoff. It was common knowledge that he and his English-born wife were separated and she now spent much of her time in England with her distinguished family.”

Mrs Mintoff, daughter of Lt Col Reginald Joseph Bentinck, married Dom in 1947 after they met while he was studying at Oxford University.

They had two children, Anne born, in 1949, and Joan (Yana), born in 1951.

The public garden close to his villa in Tarxien was named Joanne’s Garden after them.

For a time in the 1970s, the couple had been living separately and his daughters were educated in England. However, the British Prime Minister thought it fit to play marriage counsellor and invited them both – unknowingly to them – to his country residence.

“I invited her to Chequers and arranged for her to be shown into the White Parlour when she arrived. I then took Mintoff by the arm and led him along to the White Parlour saying I was sure that there would be somebody there whom he would be very glad to see. I ushered him in. He was obviously astonished to find his wife there,” he wrote.

But what happened during that tea at the Chequers? Mr Heath writes: “They had tea and when the time came to leave, they left together. In the end, everything was settled satisfactorily – between Malta and Nato, if not ultimately between Mr and Mrs Mintoff.”

However, they remained married until her death in 1997 and Dom was known to have cared for her during her illness.