Wednesday, March 17 Mdina and Rabat

Dear kids & grands,

Today we took the bus to Mdina and Rabat (suburb of Mdina--"new money upstarts"--Rabat is only a few hundred years old; Mdina dates back to before the knights came in 1560's!) The ride there went throug the suburbs of Valletta--the Maltese version of Wentzville, Lake St. Louis, O'Fallon, St. Charles, etc--crammed full of shops, car repair places (lots of them!), little and big churches and furniture stores. The road ran alongside the deWignacourt (du Win-a-court) aqueduct--built by Grand Maste DeW. in the early 1600's to carry water from Mdina to Valletta after the knights built Valletta.

Mdina is a medievel city, completely walled in and surrounded by a great moat--which is now tennis courts and soccer courts! There are 3 entrances into the city--we went in through the main gate. It is a huge archway with carved escutcheon (coat of arms) and lots of Latin script. It was built in the 1560's after the knights took over Malta--they wanted to show the Maltese nobility who was boss, so they closed the old gate and built the "new" one. There is also a tiny Greek gate--so-named because it opened onto a Greek settlement just outside the walled city, and a "hole in the wall"--so named because the British chopped it into the fortress in order to gain easier access to the (now defunct) steam train station at the foot of the hill!

We explored the terrific St. Paul's Cathedral Museum--incredibly old religious stuff and giant old oil paintings. We read a papal bull written in the 1300's conferring nobility on the families of Mdina (many of which are still there, living in their ancestral palazzos!). There were numerous such documents, as well as illuminted (illustrated) pages from medieval lectionaries, music manuscripts, etc. They also have a fabulous collection of woodcuts by Durer (early 1500's)--priceless and incredibly fine detailing--hard to believe they were carved in wood and then printed on paper--you can even see the texture in the cloth curtains and fur on the animals in the pictures (each print is about notebook paper size). There are 20 depicting scenes from the life of the Virgin, as well as numerous others depicting lives of saints--a really cool one of St. Jerome in his study that I remembered from my humanities class in college.

We went into St. Paul's church next--it was so beautiful! The tile floor--all deep russet, dull gold, black and white marble--was so intricate and detailed that it looked like a persian-type carpet. The Mattia Prety frescoes and giant paintings of St. Paul were quite dramatic--very impressive. especially the huge one behind the altar depicting the shipwreck of St. Paul here Malta. (St. Paul is patron saint of Malta). There is also a terribly dark, small icon of the virgin---surrounded by great swathes of carvings and huge silver & gold radiant beams--that is reputed to have been painted by St. Luke when he was shipwrecked here with St. Paul in 60 AD. This church was truly breathtaking--vaulted nave, marble tiled markers on the floor (as in St. John's in Valletta) where nobles were/are buried (some were dated as recently as 1979).

We walked from the church down the cobbled streets to a little tea room set back under the battlements. I had a yummy chocolate hazelnut cake with a chocolate glazed coating, and Daddy had a Malta specialty--apple cake. This looks like apple pie, but the crust is made from an almond-cookie paste, sprinkled with white powdered sugar. It is stuffed with apples in a sugar glaze--no cinnamon. Daddy had milk, I had strong hot tea. There was a teeny tiny ladies room about the size of a closet, whith a closet-like folding door, and toilet paper! It was so small the hand-dryer was outside in the little corridor. We took pictures of most of Malta, which you can see from the battlements--Mdina is the highest place in Malta. It was a cold, grey, windy overcast day, which was a bit uncomfortable (thank goodness for the matching jackets--hurray for Bobby's idea of romantic!), but it also kept most of the tourists (except us!) away, which was nice, as the city is so small it is easily overrun. We saw the balcony where the French captain was "defenestrated" (thrown to his death out the window) when the Maltese nobility revolted against Napoleon's army. It was so chilly that we decided to move on to the other museums in Rabat, so Dad skipped the torture museum.

We walked out of the walled city and into Rabat, which was being decorated for the "festa"--big national holiday on Friday--we will go back for it! We wound through twisting cobbled streets and lanes until we reached St. Agatha's catacombs. This is a group of burial caves where St. Agatha hid out during the 3rd century AD from the king because she wanted to be a nun but he'd promised her to a nobleman. The oldest Christian altar in Malta is in these catacombs. I had to walk with my head ducked, it was so low--Daddy was really bent over! But it was fascinating--many of the bones from the catacombs are still there--the people were so small! They carved "agape" tables out of stone, as well as niches for burial. Alas, poor Agatha went home and was martyred in a most gruesome way (graphic statues tell the tale)--she is a patron saint of Malta also, since she spent so much time here. The paintings and carved altar in these catacombs date back to her time here--the 3rd century!

We also visited the site of the ancient Roman ruins--a small ruin of a temple to Apollo with terribly intricate tiled flooring and frescoes--many of the tiles in the mosaic flooring and frescoes were no bigger than a baby's fingernail--yet they covered whole walls and floors in ancient times! Just imagine the poor fellow (slave?) who spent all that time piecing those itty bitty tiles into those pictures/decorations! There were chunks of Corinthian columns, ancient (Sumerian) blown glass, giant flour grinding stones and an ancient olive pitter/press.

Daddy also lead the way to St. Paul's grotto. This is in a catacomb--in the 16th century they built a church over it, but preserved the grotto (it was originally a Roman prison). This is where St. Paul was kept, along with St. Luke, when he was shipwrecked at Malta as he was being taken to Rome for trial. It was here that he converted the Roman leader--Publius--after healing Publius' father (who they thougt was dying); the story is told in the Bible--in the Acts maybe? I don't remember for sure. It was here that St. Paul celebrated the first mass in Malta, conferred ordination on Publius and consecrated him first "Bishop" of Malta. Since it was so cold today, hardly anyone was out--Dad and I had the grotto to ourselves, and after showing us in, the guide left us alone in there with the shrine (a marble statue of St. Paul, incredibly old and beautiful). I looked around, took a deep breath and burst into tears! I can't describe how overwhelming it was to stand where St. Paul and St. Luke had stood (I would probably not survive a trip to Israel!) I got so blubbery it was embarassing. Daddy was so sweet--he took my picture holding St. Paul's hand (again, as in other places, nothing was blocked off!) in front of a plaque commemorating the Pope's visit here in 1990 (the Pope also held St. Paul's hand). He also picked up a tiny stone from the very back of the grotto, from the floor of an ancient lokuli (grave niche for a baby--no bones). So now I have a relic from St. Paul!

We also found (finally) a lace shop with actual hand-made lace--we could tell by the prices! It was so lovely, and the tiny lady who ran the little shop was quite sweet. She explained all about how the lace is made and how long it takes to make, etc. Daddy surprised me with an anniversary present from this little shop, and we picked out a few (small) prizes for kids and grands--we are now done with present buying, but we got the real thing!

Another body-slamming bus ride brought us back to Velleta, where we grabbed almond cookies and date bars at the city gate and came back to our room to get warm. The hotel man assures the weather will warm up by Friday--tomorrow will be cold yet, with a fierce wind (this time chilly, not hot!). We plan to (possibly) take the ferry over to the island of Gozo--but if weather is too rough, we will change plans as the sea is choppy enough to make the Maltese sick on the ferry ride! (so said the hotel man). Dad's napping, so I will close and take a warm bath--then we will see about anniversary dinner, maybe in the restaurant downstairs.

love to all! mama/mommy/faye

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