Fort St Angelo, or the Castrum Maris as it was known in the Middle Ages, is not just an impregnable fortress standing majestically in the centre of the finest harbour in the Mediterranean. It is the embodiment of Malta’s checkered history through the ages, an important landfall in the centre of this Sea of Destiny, a castle guarding ancient Porto delle Galere (Dockyard Creek).
Its medieval castellans, mainly Aragonese, initiated Malta’s European experience as it welcomed in its safe waters galleys from Pisa, Genoa, Venice, Catalonia and other western Mediterranean ports.
St Angelo should not be just a museum piece but a living museum that encapsulates our maritime, social, artistic, architectural and ecclesiastical heritage. As such, one of the main halls inside this castle should be reserved for a professional documentary relating to Malta’s maritime connections, traditions and other outstanding merits.
In tracing the fort’s maritime connections we have to consider that although the very early years of St Angelo are shrouded in the mists of time, many historians suggest that the name Malta is derived from the Phoenician word Maleth, a “safe and secure harbour”. And surely a Punic fort at the tip of the promontory and the deep inlet flanking it, offered protection to the Phoenician settlers who in circa 1000BC arrived in Malta from Lebanon.
To these intrepid seafarers and merchants Malta was an ideal trading outpost on the dividing line between the eastern and western Mediterranean. The attraction of the Castrum Maris and the outstanding beauty of the Grand Harbour drew to our shores famous personalities from the European mainland. It is securely recorded, according to Joseph Brincat of the University of Malta, that the first ever concert of European music took place in one of the large halls of St Angelo when in 1204 the famous troubadour Pietre Vidal visited the Castrum Maris to sing the praises of the fort and those of Enrico Pescatore, a Genoan overlord living there.
The texts of these musical documents are still extant, as revealed by Brincat during a 2004 lecture inside the fort accompanied by a group of French musicians specialising in this genre of music.
During the brief period of the arrogant Anjevins’ governance of Malta, in 1283 a naval battle took place in the shadow of St Angelo when the Anjevin fleet with its headquarters in this fort locked horns with the Aragonese in a bitter struggle for supremacy in the central Mediterranean basin.
The ruthless Aragonese admiral Roger di Lauria dealt a mortal blow to the strong Anjevin fleet commanded by Admiral Bonvin. Very few Anjevin galleys managed to escape and the rest were either sunk or scuttled in the centre of Grand Harbour’s fairway.
This sea battle is considered by international historians as one of the fiercest encounters of the period. The recovery of even one of the wrecks from the bottom of the sea and exhibited in St Angelo would be an added attraction.
In the late Middle Ages the presence of sailors and merchants from Pisa, Genoa and Venice gave St Angelo and its suburb Vittoriosa a cosmopolitan milieu with churches dedicated to Latin iconography like St Lawrence and Our Lady of Monsarrat.
The Anjevin inventory of 1274 listing sacred items at the rock-cut church of the Nativity is an important landmark in our ecclesiastical history, particularly the list of objets d’art belonging to the Latin rite and the musical documents.
St Angelo should not be just a museum piece but a living museum that encapsulates our maritime, social, artistic, architectural and ecclesiastical heritage
The Marian cult, so pervasive in Malta, saw its beginning in the Castrum Maris with two 14th century ancient icons, the Madonna Suckling the Child and Madonna del Soccorso. Both icons were irretrievably lost in the German blitz of 1941. Furthermore, the church of St Anne at the top of the fort introduced Gothic quadripartite vaulting, an important feature in Maltese architecture.
The elaborate graffiti in the oubliette, that subterranean hole where hardened criminals languished forgotten for years, are unique in their erudition and design. A major attraction for all visitors to the castle.
From that superb vantage point at the top of the citadel, where the white ensign representing the First Lord of the British fleet has been replaced by the flag of the religion, the symbol of the Knights of St John, you walk to the historic balcony overlooking the Grand Harbour.
It was from here that de Valette witnessed the macabre scene of headless knights and Maltese lashed to crude crosses floating on the waters of the harbour after the fall of St Elmo on June 23, 1565. If these historical bastions could speak, would they reveal how the famous Caravaggio managed to escape from the damp dungeons on his way to Syracuse?
Would they tell us about the ruthless knight Romegas, the dreaded corsair who spread terror and misery in the Aegean Sea? Or would they tell us about the Order’s gallant galleys that sailed to Lepanto in 1571 to deal a mortal blow to the Turkish fleet?
Would they remind us of the ill-fated British naval force that sailed to the Crimean disaster in 1869 or the more recent tragedy of a century ago when Commonwealth troops left for Gallipoli never to return?
Rummaging through more in recent memories, I recall the savage blitz on HMS Illustrious in January 1941. I was there on the Kalkara side of St Angelo wildly waving and cheering as the iconic tanker Ohio, a symbol of courage and defiance was limping bravely into the Grand Harbour in August 1942.
I was also there 37 years later when HMS London sailed out of the harbour for the last time among cries, tears and cheers that brought to an end Malta’s naval and military connections with Britain.
These experiences redolent with history and culture, deserve to be recorded and recounted to the younger generation and the many tourists that have finally been lured to admire the interminable historical and cultural treasures of the south.
This hallowed fort, the jewel in the Maltese crown of fortifications, isnow tastefully and aesthetically restored by Heritage Malta. Documents fromthe Middle Ages attest that St Angelo was undoubtedly an enclave of European sophistication.
Lying in close proximity to the Malta Maritime Museum along the elegant yacht marina, the fort should be a high profile destination for Maltese and foreigners. A professional rendering of Malta’s maritime experience will surely demonstrate that throughout history, even during the last war, whoever wanted to control the central Mediterranean had first to capture or neutralise Malta.
Fort St Angelo should also be the perfect location for musical concerts, theatre, lectures and debates.
A professional presentation of Christopher Marlowe’s play The Jew of Malta should be considered for next summer. Marlowe’s highly-charged drama sited in ancient Vittoriosa where a thriving Jewish community had its synagogue and its ghetto, known today as It-Triq tal-Lhud (Jews Street) will be a most fitting event in preparation for the auspicious occasion when Valletta is crowned European City of Culture in 2018.
Surely it would do no harm if St Angelo and ancient Vittoriosa were roped in with Valletta by calling the event VV18. After all Valletta owes its patrimony to this victorious city.
May I suggest that the Cospicua-Valletta ferry makes a stop at St Angelo every hour to facilitate access to St Angelo.