Every year since September 8, 1926 Valletta has been the venue of the 1565 Great Siege anniversary celebrations, marked with pomp and circumstance and including parades, band marches, speeches and a Pontifical High Mass in selected localities in the presence of the President of Malta, the diplomatic corps and, naturally, the Sovereign Military Order of St John.
Across the water, on that day, modest Vittoriosa, the city of the siege, lay strangely ignored and an eerie silence reigned in the extant site of this epic siege. It is inconceivable how the National Festivities Committee, some of whose members have contributed substantially to Malta’s historiography, still persists in holding such celebrations in Valletta, at those times a barren rocky terrain, totally ignoring the city of Birgu (Vittoriosa) where the knights saw their finest hour.
Understandably, developed countries with a mature intelligentsia go to great lengths, and distances, to commemorate historical events on the exact sites where they actually occurred. At present, when Malta’s history is being truly and objectively re-assessed, such insensitivity and ostracism are highly disturbing. It has lately been stated that when we conveniently start distorting facts and ignore authentic sites, then we are witnessing the end of history.
Without Vittoriosa, Valletta would never have been built
Through massive restoration, Vittoriosa has once again worn its medieval garb with numerous localities directly connected with the siege. A sense of history still pervades the narrow winding streets recalling the days when the scions of the European nobility made Vittoriosa their home and St Lawrence parish church the conventual church of the Order endowed with great artistic treasures brought from Rhodes and, subsequently, enriched by other outstanding works of art. Undoubtedly, it is the city that brought the knights worldwide recognition and lasting fame.
Without Vittoriosa, Valletta would never have been built.
Whoever has decided to relocate the September 8 Pontifical High Mass from where it had originally occurred, namely the monumental church of San Lorenzo-a-Mare, is committing a grave aberration, a deliberate straying away from the path of truth as willed by the intrepid knights themselves. It deserves the condemnation of genuine historians.
By all means, the Church authorities may hold the Pontifical High Mass on the occasion of September 8 in all parishes of Malta and Gozo but the successors of the original knights have a duty to be present at their erstwhile conventual church in Vittoriosa where the flag of The Religion now proudly flies from the highest ramparts of the Castrum Maris (Fort St Angelo).
Francesco Balbi da Coreggio, an Italian mercenary who joined the Spanish Brigade with the Piccolo Soccorso that reached Vittoriosa after the fall of St Elmo, included the following entry in his diary for September 8, 1565: “Never I believe did music sound so sweet to human ears as did the peals of our bells on this day, the Nativity of Our Lady but now they rang for Pontifical High Mass which was solemnly celebrated as we gave thanks to Our Lord God and His Holy Mother for their mercy vouchsafed to us.”
The moving homily by Capuchin friar Roberto d’Eboli to the tattered, maimed and starving populace and the few remaining knights is still recorded in letters of gold in the annals of the knights.
At this moment in time I think it will not be amiss to visualise in one’s mind’s eye the assembly of knights just before the outbreak of the Siege in this historic church as described by Tim Willocks in his blockbuster, The Religion, published in 2006: “The conventual church of San Lorenzo stood shrouded in a spectral violet light. Its open doors pulsed yellow against the monumental façade.
“San Lorenzo was the church of the knights of St John the Baptist. The whole convent of The Religion stood assembled as one and the stones shook as half a thousand soldiers of the Cross raised their voices to God. The monks stood rank upon rank in their plain dark robes meeker than lambs and fiercer than tigers, bound by love of Christ and St John. Proud of bearing and fearless and singing with a roaring exaltation.
“Smoking incense drifted along the aisle; the vast place glowed and flickered with countless burning candles but it seemed that every ray of light emanated from the tortured figure of Christ raised high above the altar”.
Historians, past and present, local and foreign, leave us in no doubt that Vittoriosa is essentially the city of the siege, the latest being the English historian Roger Crowley who, in his narrative book Empires of the Sea, published in 2008, devotes 80 per cent of his work to the exploits of the knights and the Maltese based in their citadel of Vittoriosa.
Vittoriosa continues to retain many sites still associated with the Great Siege of 1565 and World War II where it holds the sad record of 33 civilians buried alive in the German blitz of 1941.
I strongly appeal to the National Festivities Committee, the Sovereign Order of St John and to the Church authorities so that, on the threshold of the 450th anniversary of the Great Siege of 1565, they would stop this parody and hold the commemorations on the authentic sites still extant in the medieval maritime city.