On Wednesday, March 9, Maltapost issued a new set of stamps illustrating three landscapes by Edward Said in the series Treasures of Malta. The three landscapes featured Valletta, Manoel Island and the Citadel of Gozo.

Maltapost also published a newly designed stamp folder which is far more beautiful and valuable than the previous ones.

However, there are two things which I did not like very much. The first one is the position where the set of stamps had to be fixed, that is on the illustration showing Fort Manoel.

The beautiful picture had to be marred by the postmark of the first day of issue, something that I did not like at all.

The second one is the inaccurate historical information regarding the Gozo Citadel. The new fortifications were not built in just four years, i.e. 1599-1603! This is a gross historical error. It took until the year 1622 to have all the works completed.

The building of the gunpowder fortifications on the southern side of the old oppidum of Gozo was a prodigious undertaking. In the first place all the old mediaeval ramparts facing Rabat had to be pulled down and upper coralline limestone and greensand rock had to be dug out to suit the new plan for two demibastions (St John’s and St Martin’s), a central bastion (St Michael’s), and two curtains in between. Around the new huge masonry work a dry ditch had to be excavated and surrounded by an outer wall and a counterscarp (Maltese: ħaġġarija) to support the covered way. A ravelin in front of the main entrance and a battery on the eastern side were also built. Two high cavalier towers crowned the whole complex of formidable walls.

All the building blocks for these huge construction works were quarried at Wied Ħmar near Lunzjata Valley where there is an outcrop of lower coralline limestone. It is not true that the northern side of the Citadel dates back to the Aragonese period. It is older than that. The Aragonese Chronicler Ramon Muntaner, in 1283 wrote of Ruggiero de Lauria’s attack on the old Gozitan town (la vila), in which there was a tower (castel que es ab la vila ensems), and which was surrounded by fortifications because the town had its own raval or Rabat, and lo raval means a built-up locality outside the fortifications of a town (Part d’una poblaciò que esta’ abans fora de seu recinte). So the Aragonese found the fortifications of the Citadel there when they took over Gozo from the Anjevins.

In my opinion, in future issues, such notes should be signed so that the author would be more cautious when he jots down his information. Maltapost clients who spend their money on philatelic material have every right for best quality items and a sterling service.