This 3000-year-old city, once the political center of Malta,
is filled with Norman and baroque
buildings and narrow cobblestone streets. The best-preserved medieval building
is the Norman-style Palazzo Falzon, built in 1495. Mdina has a beautiful main
piazza, where you'll find the 11th-century Roman Catholic Sicula-Norman
Cathedral, one of the few buildings to survive an earthquake in 1693. The
cathedral museum houses a collection of Dürer woodcuts. The icon of the Madonna above the tabernacle is attributed to St Luke. The
nearby suburb of Rabat, which
translates roughly as 'suburb', has the interesting Museum
of Roman Antiquities, which offers
exhibits on the island's 1000 years under Roman rule.
Ħaġar Qim
Dating from as early as 3600 BC, this megalithic temple complex is adorned
with carved animals and idols, sacrificial altars and oracular chambers, all
executed with nothing more than flint and obsidian tools. Giant limestone slabs
form a series of ovals laid out in a pattern that some archaeologists have
compared to Mother Goddess figurines found on the site.
Visiting Malta
Malta
can be accessed by air from most cities in Europe, as
well as North Africa and the Middle East.
There is also a ferry service during the summer between Malta
and Sicily. Malta
and Gozo can be explored on foot, but a rented car is also a good option. There
is a ferry service between and Gozo which takes about twenty minutes.