2. The. Island in General. — The island of Malta lies in the Mediterranean, about sixt}' mUes south from Cape Passaro, in Sicily. It is about seventeen miles in length, and nine or ten in breadth. Near it, on the west, is a smaller island, called Gozo, the ancient Gaulos. Malta has no mountains or high hills, and makes no figure
from the sea. It is
naturally a barren rock, but has been made in parts abun- dantly fertile bythe industry and toil of man. It was fa- mous for its honey andfruits, foritsrc It- ton- fabrics, for ex- cellent buildiii stone, and for a \\ 1 known breedotdi ^ A few years btd i St. Paul's viMt. ( 1 r- sairs from his n.un province of Ciln 1 1 made Melita a fre- quent resort , and through subseiiuent periods of its histo- ry, Vandal and Ara- bian, it was often as-
sociated with piracy. The Christianity, however,introduced by Paul was never extinct. Melita, from its position in the Mediterranean, and from the excel- lence of its harbors, has always been important both in commerce and war. The island was first colonized by the Phoenicians (hence the term "barbari- an," that is, neither Greek nor Roman, used in the sacred narrative, Acts xxviii, 2), from wiiom it was taken by the Greek colo- nists in Sicily, about B.C. 736 ; but j the Carthaginians began to dispute its possession about ,C. 528, and eventually became entire masters of it. The Phoenician language, in a corrupted form, continued to be spoken there in St. Paul's day (Gesenius, Versuch iib. malt. Sprache, Leips. 1810). From the Carthagini- ans it passed to the Komans in the Second Punic War, B.C. 242, who treated the inhabitants well, making Meli- ta a municipium, and allowing the people to be governed by their own laws. The government was administered by a proprietor, who depended upon the prajtor of Sicily ; and this office appears to have been held by Publius when Paul was on the island (Acts xxviii, 7). Its chief officer (imder the governor of Sicily) appears from inscriptions
Coin of Melita.
to have had the special title of -rrpwroQ Me^tTaiwv, or Primus Melitensium, and this is the very phrase which Luke uses (xxviii, 7). j\Ir. Smith coidd not find these
(This view
' St Paul's Bi\,' Milti. taken from a point at the back of the bay, near the castle. shutting in the bay is Salmonetta.)
The island shown as
MELITO
64
MELITO
jnscript ions. There seems, however, no reason whatever to doubt their authenticity (see Bochart, Opera, i, 502; Abela, Descr. Melilce, p. 14G, appendcil to the last volume of the Antiquities ofGncvius; and Bijckh, Co/y). //wf. iii, 575i). On the division of the Homan empire, Melita be- longed to the western portion ; but having, in A.D. 553, been recovered from tlie Vandals by Belisarius, it was afterwards attached to the empire of the East. About the end of the 9th century the island was taken from the Greeks by the Arabs, who made it a dependency ujjon Sicily, which was also in their possession. The Arabs have left the impress of their aspect, language, and many of their customs upon the present inhabitants, whose dialect is to this day perfectly intelligible to the Arabians and to the Moors of Africa. Malta was taken from the Arabs by the Normans in A.D. 1090, and after- wards underwent other changes till A.U. 1530, when Charles V, who had annexed it to his empire, transferred it to the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, whom the Turks had recently dispossessed of Rhodes. Under the knights it became a flourishing state, and was the scene of their greatest glory and most signal exploits (see Por- ter, Jfdita and its Kiw/lifs, Lond. 1872). The institu- tion having become nnsuited to modern times, the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, commonly called Knights of Malta, gradually fell into decay, and the island was sur- rendered to the French under Bonaparte wlien on his >Vay to Egypt in 1798. From them it was retaken by the English with the concurrence and assistance of the natives; and it was to have been restored to the Knights of Malta by the stipulations of the treats of Amiens; but as no sufficient security for the independence of the order (composed mostly of Frenchmen) could be ob- tained, the English retained it in their hands; and this necessary infraction of the treaty was the ostensible ground of the war which only ended with the battle of Waterloo. The island is still in the hands of the Eng- lish, who have lately remodelled the government to meet the wishes of the numerous inhabitants. It has .recently become the actual seat of an Anglican bishop- ric, which, however, takes its title from Gibraltar out of deference to the existing Catholic bishopric of iNIalta. See, in mliliiinn In the works above cited, P. Carlo, Ori'/ii,> </,//:> /■;,/. ;,/ .\/„//<i (Milan, 1759) ; Carstens,/>e apolhiM l',n,ll in M.liu, (Lubec, 1754); L.de Boisgelin, Mal/e ancieime et imnknie (Par. 1809); Bartlett's Ocer- land Route (Lond. 185 1 ), p. 3-1 1 8 ; Smith's Diet, of Class. Geofjr. s. V. Melita ; M'C'ulloch's Gazetteer, s. v. Malta ; also the observations and travels cited by Engelmann, Bibl. Geofi. (see Index, s. v. Malta) ; and the monographs cited Ijy Volbeding, Index Pro//raiii. p. 84. See Paui,.