Galatea - Management of Coastal Cultural Heritage
Galatea was the greatest sculpture created by Pygmalion, King of Cyprus, who spared no effort to work on the slightest detail and who subsequently fell in love with his artistic creation. Aphrodite, the goddess of love, rewarded his loving dedication and pursuit of excellence by bringing the statue to life.
Malta is rich in archaelogical jewels, crying out to be brought back to life. With the collaboration of Projects House of the Works Department and Din l-Art Ħelwa, the Għajn Tuffieħa Tower has recently been restored.
Ramla also has many historical ruins that need protection. The foundation has drawn up a Management Plan for the cultural heritage of Ramla (2000) in collaboration with the Museums Department in order to ensure the proper management and protection of these sites.
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Għajn Tuffieħa Tower
left in a state of disrepair
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Għajn Tuffieħa Tower
following restoration
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The Għajn Tuffieħa Tower (aka Għajn Mixkuka Tower). Built in 1637 by the knights of St. John under Grand Master Lascaris as part of a coastal watch system.
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:: The Coastal Watch Towers built by the Knights of St John (1530 - 1720)
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Coastal Watch Towers
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A concern for the safety of the local inhabitants led the knights to turn their attention towards the coastal defences and the opening decades of the 17th century saw the erection of a number of towers built by Grand Master Wignacourt. Between 1637 and 1649, Grand Master Lascaris increased the number of coastal towers, and Grand Master De Redin in 1658-1661, embarked on a large scale programme involving the construction of several watch-towers. Parallel to these developments in Malta, a smaller number of similar towers were built in Gozo, where the last tower erected there was by Grand Master Nicholas Cotoner in 1667. A single tower was built in Comino in 1618. [Read More]
:: Defence systems employed by the Knights of St John in the 18th century
The system of coastal defence adopted by the Knights in the eighteenth century relied on three basic components - the coastal batteries, redoubt and entrenchment. The coastal batteries, which were usually sited at the mouth of a bay, were designed to engage with their heavy cannon enemy vessels attempting to disembark their troops. But once ashore, hostile forces could outflank and capture with relative ease the majority of these isolated works. For this reason the French engineers employed by the Order designed and built infantry redoubts in the middle of most of the vulnerable bays. These were originally conceived as defensible strong points against head-on landings and were designed to deny the enemy the possibility of establishing beachheads and concentrating his forces once ashore.
Redoubts
- Ramla Middle Redoubt - 1715-16 (Gozo-Demolished)
Coastal batteries
- Ramla Left Battery - 1715-16 (Gozo - Ruin)
Entrenchments
- Ramla Bay Entrenchment (Gozo - Demolished)
- Għajn Tuffieħa Entrenchments
- Variations on theme of coastal entrenchments
Fougasses (1740)
- Fougasse armed and ready to be fired
All the information presented in this section has been reproduced, with permission from the author, from Fortresses of the Cross - Hospitaller Military Architecture (1136-1798)
by
Stephen C Spiteri Phd
(Heritage Interpretation Services, 1994).
www.fortress-explorer.org
