Malta’s Notarial Archives store a treasure trove of information and history about Malta and its people.
Sarah Carabott met up with the women who, led by Joan Abela who became known as Joan of Arc(hives), have made it their mission to save the archives.
Joan Abela
Joan Abela
It all started in 2002, when Joan, then an undergrad student, stepped into the decaying building on St Christopher Street in Valletta. When she inhaled the smell of mould and saw the desperate state of thousands of notarial volumes covered with layers of dust, she knew she had a mission to accomplish.
Treasures of Malta,
Fondazzjoni Patrimonju Malti
It had to be something like the latest issue of Treasures of Malta to provide a most welcome modicum of cheer in these bleak times, not least with its striking cover of a detail from a 16th-century frescoed map of Malta hailing the 1565 victory over the Ottomans. It lies in the Hall of Maps at the Vatican, one among several showing the lands over which the pope held authority. In 1732, Louis XV gifted Grand Master Manoel de Vilhena with a fine portrait of himself by Jean Baptiste van Loo. Van Loo took over the commission from the famous portrait painter Hyacinthe Regnaud and managed to paint a most competent work of art, which is one the highlights of the President’s Palace but “which has failed to be given its due academic importance”. Carlos Bongalais’s paper supplies the background to this painting, which has tended to be overlooked in the palace’s collection.