In his letter ‘For history’s sake’ (June 22), Fr Mark Cauchi OSA wrote that, according to P. P. Castagna, Old Mint Street, in Valletta was centuries ago known as St Michael Street. Castagna gave no date and I very much doubt that what he recorded was correct.

Back in 1993, I had viewed a manuscript list of Valletta street names which went back to the early 1630s.

The list is in a volume, extant at the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, which contains several items of Melitensia, among which a plan of Valletta and a map of Gozo.

It seems that these belonged to the Sienese Fabio Chigi (1599-1667) who had them bound together before he became Pope Alexander VII in 1655.
Chigi was an eminent inquisitor in Malta who made peregrinations in both Maltese islands, which he described in a letter dated February 8, 1636.

In that street list, today’s Old Mint Street (Strada Zecca) had the name Strada di Santo Sebastiano, while Strada di Santo Michele later became Strada Ponente. Even Abela wrote that the Auberge de France was sited in Strada S. Sebastiano.

With the advent of the British rule, the names given to the streets were discarded. Strada San Sebastiano became Strada Zecca and the saint’s name was transferred to the street of the Auberge de Baviere. As buildings had gone up at the site of the old Manderaggio, Strada San Marco, Strada Ponente was cut off at its southern end, and it became Strada Scozzese, today Mikiel Anton Vassalli Street.

All these details appear on a plan of the city of Valletta (rare if not unique), which seems to have been published when Malta was hit by the plague of 1813/14.

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