At a special ceremony that will be held next Sunday at Vittoriosa, a Maltese falcon will once again be offered to the King of Spain.
The elaborate and colourful ceremony will commemorate the 475th anniversary of the cession of the island of Malta to the Knights of St John by Emperor Charles V on 24 March 1530.
The Maltese falcon, on which the famous Humphrey Bogart film was based, is the bird which the Knights and the people of Malta sent every year to the Holy Roman Emperor and his descendants, the Kings of Spain, as a sign of their continuing fealty. The Maltese were subjects of Spain before the Knights came and continued being so even under the Knights.
A 27-strong delegation of Spanish nobles and businessmen is coming to Malta for the occasion. It will include Don Antonio de Castro y Garcia de Tejada, the Chief Falconer of the Kingdom of Spain, Archduke of Austria Andres Salvador de Habsburgo, the Protector of the Spanish Guild of Falconers and King Juan Carlos’s personal ADC, Lt Col Don Ignacio de Inza y Munoz.
At 9.30am next Sunday, the group, in full period costume, will be met by the MTA In Guardia troupe at Vittoriosa’s Couvre Porte and walk in procession to St Lawrence Church, the first Conventual Church of the Knights in Malta. The falcon, a real one, will be carried in a cage.
A solemn High Mass of Thanksgiving (in Latin) will be sung at 9.45am and the falcon blessed, after which guests and visitors will leave the church for the nearby Main Square where a Maltese actor, representing Grand Master L’Isle Adam will hand over the falcon to the Spanish Chief Falconer. The ceremony will then proceed from the Main Square to the Vittoriosa waterfront where some of the guests and visitors will leave in dghajsas.
The next day, on Monday 5 September, the guests will visit the National Library in Valletta where they will be shown the authenticated copy of the original Charles V document cedeing Malta to the Order of St John, including the annual donation of a Maltese falcon as proof of the Maltese people’s continuing fealty to the Spanish Crown.
The original plan was for the falcon to leave Malta by boat bearing the Cross of Malta but that may not happen as the Spanish delegation will be leaving by air. The original plan also included the presence of the Grand Master of the Order of St John and also a visit to the President of the Republic but that does not seem likely, either.
The falcon was to arrive at the port of Palma de Mallorca and be solemnly received by the mayor and the Council of the Balearic Autonomous Region. Then a Spanish naval vessel would take the falcon in custody and transport it to the port of Valencia where it would be received by the mayoress and the Generalitat Valenciana.
After which, it would taken to Madrid and presented to the King at the Zarzuela Palace and afterwards to the municipal and regional authorities of Madrid.