Malta

Many ancient burial places in Malta have remained conspicuous since antiquity. The ubiquitous presence of ancient burial sites in the Maltese landscape, and especially the high concentration of Christian catacombs in Rabat, just outside Mdina or Melite, as it was known in Antiquity, meant that knowledge of these monuments persisted. The island’s toponomy, mostly Mediaeval Arabic in origin, is full of references to burial places, while catacombs frequently attracted the curious and the antiquarians. A full-size anthropomorphic sarcophagus of Hellenistic Punic origin was a well-known part of a 17th-century Cabinet of Curiosities (Abela 1647). By the 19th century, Punic cremation urns adorned many private collections, several rock-cut chamber tombs were explored and often thoroughly rifled, while vedutisti and scholars carried out the first surveys of the major catacomb labyrinths at Rabat (Becker 1913; Caruana 1898). Though a long-known curiosity, ancient burials were mostly sought for artefacts. Human remains were never examined or recorded. The discovery of the Ħal Saflieni Hypogeum in 1902 (Zammit 1926; Pace 2000) marked an

important turning point in the study of Maltese antiquities. This subterranean prehistoric cemetery of Neolithic age (c. 4000-2500 BC) brought home the need for more organized excavation and recording techniques, as well as the need to establish a central authority in the form of a museum of Maltese antiquities. Until 1902, antiquities belonging to public collections formed part of the national library, and therefore still resembled a Cabinet of Curiosities in character. The excavators of the Hypogeum, Fr Manuel Magri SJ (1851-1907) and Sir Themistocles Zammit (1864-1935), were acutely aware of the importance of the prehistoric cemetery for studies of Maltese prehistory. Overall results of the site’s excavation and policy-setting decisions now appear uneven at a distance of over a century since the monument was first discovered. The fragility of the bone material and the poor conditions of the deposits prevented a satisfactory retrieval of human remains or a proper recording of burials (Zammit et al. 1912). Zammit estimated that at least 7000 individuals had originally been buried at the site, though his counting methodology was never clearly described. Only seven skulls were retrieved, some in a fragmented state. In one of the subterranean chambers, a pile of sieved soil was left for visitors to view; in another chamber, Zammit left an unexcavated burial deposit for future generations

of scholars to study if at all necessary. The protection of this small deposit foreshadowed modern concerns with the extent to which archaeological sites and cemeteries should be excavated. Over-excavation is sadly a hallmark of archaeology: it is short-termist and results in the depletion of valuable reference resources. This period also saw the discovery of Bur Mgħez., a natural cave cemetery used during the

Neolithic, a unique cremation cemetery of the Early Bronze Age (Zammit 1916), and two very large human molars exhibiting a form of taurodontism from Għar Dalam (Despott 1917, 1918, 1923). Once again these discoveries were unevenly treated and recorded. Coming hot on the heels of the Ħal Safieni discovery, the discovery of Bur Megħez. was a missed opportunity. The subterranean cavern was poorly recorded and inadequately described (Tagliaferro 1911). Ceramic remains from the cave later showed that the site was certainly used for inhumations during the Tarxien Phase of Maltese prehistory (3000-2500 BC). Given its size, the cave may have contained a high density of human remains, comparable perhaps to that experienced at Ħal Saflieni a few years earlier. The site was unfortunately quarried away. A small number of human teeth from Bur Megħez. are housed at Malta’s National Museum of Archaeology and a few have been traced to the Natural History Museum in London. In 1913 the megalithic building site of Tarxien (c. 3600-2500 BC and 2500-1500 BC) was

brought to the attention of Zammit, who began to excavate the monument in 1915. Though the site was contemporary with the Ħal Safieni cemetery and Bur Megħez burial cave, its original purpose and function were not related to inhumations, as was the case with other contemporary megalithic sites which were all constructed between 3600 and 2500 BC. However, Tarxien stands out in Maltese prehistory: at the end of the Maltese Late Neolithic, several chambers of the building and other enclosures were used as a cremation cemetery by a metalusing community. This deposit commonly referred to as the Tarxien Cemetery, a period dated to about 2500-1500 BC (Maltese Early Bronze Age), contained remains of numerous cremation burials. Zammit’s description unfortunately lacks accuracy. The boundaries of the cremation deposits were never established properly; a distinction between cremation areas and actual places of burial was not established; cremation urns were not adequately described and have not been identified since the excavation; and distinct cremation burials and accompanying funerary embellishments, such as votive bowls and copper daggers, were not recorded in any detail. No deposits were conserved in situ and no samples of any significant use to the study of human remains were collected. Since the excavation of this extensive prehistoric deposit, no comparable cremation cemetery has been encountered on the islands. At Għar Dalam the discovery of taurodont-like molars inspired much interest in a possible

Maltese Palaeolithic (Keith 1924). However, the cave’s archaeological layers were disturbed and the nature of the teeth – to this day a matter of controversy – has never been adequately explained, even more so with similar features having been noted in modern people (Mangion 1962). Worthy of note is the lack of evidence for pre-Neolithic human presence in Malta, which is a reflection, perhaps, of the current state of field research rather than of the certainty of such an absence. The discovery of the Ħal Safieni Hypogeum in 1902 opened a period of exploration and

excavation across the Maltese islands which came to an end shortly before Zammit’s death in 1935. Within three decades, many of Malta’s major prehistoric and historical sites were noted and in many cases thoroughly excavated. The period led to a slightly more systematic description of tombs and graves, which at a minimum were individually announced in the Museum Annual Report. Zammit published a number of reports on his excavations of tombs in the Museum Annual Reports, and synthesized available information in a short paper on the subject (Zammit 1910). The development of the investigation into prehistoric burial places has been

synthesised by A. Pace (Pace 1992, 2000). Today we know of over 480 burial sites from the Museum Annual Reports, from Zammit’s field notes and from sporadic 19th-century references. But apart from Zammit’s field notes, which sometimes depicted light sketches or schematic figures of human remains, the bulk of what should have been a formidable repertoire of human remains went unrecorded. Many of the sites have not survived. Apart from the intense interest in archaeological discoveries throughout Malta and Gozo, the

first three decades of the 20th century also saw pioneering anthropological studies. Works by Bradley (1912), Dudley Buxton (1922), Zammit et al. (1912), examined various osteological features of the limited range of skeletal remains known at the time. Such studies compiled measurements and other important reference data, and attempted to incorporate knowledge of Malta’s ancient human remains into broader syntheses of world anthropology. Though such studies have been superseded by modern anthropological theory and practice, their value lies in the early reference data that they contain. During the past 65 years or so Maltese archaeology has adopted contemporary techniques

and advances in osteoarchaeology and anthropological studies. The output of osteoarchaeological studies has been uneven with regard to novelty, some work simply revisiting pre-Second World War material, other studies focusing on Punic material, and other more recent studies dealing with the Neolithic cemetery at the Xagħra Circle, Gozo (c. 4000-2500 BC for the Neolithic deposits). In the early 1960s, J.J. Mangion revisited the case of taurodontism in the Għar Dalam teeth, arguing that this phenomenon was also observed in modern humans (Mangion 1962). The matter surfaced again with much controversy in recent years. A. Mifsud and G. SavonaVentura (Mifsud and Mifsud 1997; Savona-Ventura and Mifsud 1999) challenged views of a number of scholars who, they believed, denied a Neanderthal presence in Malta. Mifsud and Savona-Ventura re-assessed the stratigraphy of the Għar Dalam Cave and argued that this denial was the result of a mistaken interpretation of the original contexts in which the molars were found (Savona-Ventura 1998: 5-12). They also argued that an error on the part of Sir Kenneth Oakley led to the assigment of a Neolithic date to the molars (Savona-Ventura and Mifsud 1999: 19). In 1972, J.L. Pace, Professor of Anatomy at the University of Malta’s Medical School, presented a small display of figurines and skeletal remains to discuss anatomical features of prehistoric human beings in the archipelago (Pace 1972). The exhibition catalogue reflected older paradigms of race and migration of human beings from North Africa, an aspect which is more of a historiographic rather than a scientific importance. This study was followed by those of Schwidetzky (1978) on human remains from the Ħal Safieni Hypogeum and Schwidetzky and Ramaswamy (1980) on a selection of human remains from Punic rock-cut chamber tombs. Since the late 1980s, the number of scientific excavations increased exponentially across

the archipelago. Improved recording techniques and the increase in number of professional Maltese archaeologists have led to a larger number of cemeteries being examined and recorded. These excavations have addressed different periods, burial rites and archaeological contexts, with a broad chronological frame ranging from the Late Neolithic, the Punic period, the Late Roman and Byzantine periods, as well as the Early Modern period. On Gozo, the Xagħra Circle prehistoric cemetery provided a wealth of human bone material, including a significant number of complete articulated skeletons from the Maltese Late Neolithic, dated to between 4000 and 2500 BC (Malone et al. 2009); while the recent excavation of prehistoric tombs at Kercem, also in Gozo, by the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage have yielded another three complete skeletons of the period 3000-2500 BC. Punic and Roman period tomb recordings have increased, so that the Superintendence now possesses a larger repertoire of securely-contexted inhumation and cremation burials from these periods in comparison to the number of similar assemblages noted up to the First World War. During this period the Museums Department (1902-2003)

and the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage (established in 2003) also excavated a small number of highly significant Early Christian catacombs, which have yielded an important repertoire of human remains dating up to the end of the seventh century. Of interest are a number of Late Mediaeval and Early Modern burial contexts representing old chapel cemeteries. Since the Second World War several important advances have been made in the fields of

archaeology, anthropology and osteoarchaeology. These disciplines are now part of mainstream higher education in Malta (e.g., in Archaeology departments), while several researchers also follow postgraduate training abroad. Contemporary excavation techniques and laboratory procedures have become well-established standards throughout the country. If not available locally, laboratory testing and analyses (e.g., palaeodietary analysis; Richards et al. 2001) are carried out abroad. The Museums Department and its replacement, the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage, have consolidated post-excavation approaches and rationalized the archiving of old and more recent skeletal material. Future plans will focus on the creation of a national database of existing ancient skeletal material. At the time of writing, the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage is reviewing osteoarchaeology and anthropology policies with a view to establishing a firm research framework for a more systematic cataloguing and study of ancient human remains.