Following the pilot project of the restoration of the Chapel of the Italian Langue completed a couple of years ago, work is in hand for the full-blown restoration of the Chapel of the Madonna of Philhermos, the icon which can certainly be called the Black Madonna of Malta.

There are some popular misconceptions about this chapel, Curator Cynthia Degiorgio told me in an interview.

This chapel, also known as the Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, holds the silver-clad icon of the Carafa Madonna, which is carried in procession every year on 8 December.

But the Carafa Madonna is, so to speak, a substitute. Its original collocation is the tondo on top of Mattia Preti’s altarpiece of the Coronation of Saint Catherine in the Chapel of the Italian Langue.

It was only after the Madonna of Philhermos was taken away that the Carafa Madonna was taken down from the tondo and in its place the Madonna logo put instead.

So. The Madonna of Philermos. The Order of St John considered two sacred images as its most holy relics – the Hand of St John, a gift by the Turkish Sultan to the Grand Master at the fall of Jerusalem, and the Madonna of Philhermos.

This blackish icon was considered by the Knights to be miraculous and they took special care to protect it and took it with them, along with the Hand, when they were forced out of Rhodes.

When, after the Great Siege, the Knights planned Valletta and its Conventual Church, none of the chapels was assigned (the assignment to the langues would come in the next century) but the icon was assigned a chapel next to the High Altar. While St John’s was still being completed, in 1576, we have evidence that the icon was already in the chapel and indulgences could be gained for visiting it.

This was the chapel considered by the Knights as the most holy one. They prayed to the icon, especially before going out on the Corso. When victorious, the returning knights would present the keys of the captured fortresses to the Virgin. Even today, one can see the keys of the castles of Lepanto and Patras hanging near the altar.

This too was the chapel that the Knights started decorating, well before they lavishly decorated the rest of the church.

In 1645, Fra Tommaso Hozzes and Fra Flaminio Balbiano commissioned a Florentine sculptor living in Messina, Vitale Covati, to adorn the wall around the icon with splendid red Italian marble.

The marble, brought over from Messina, and set to a design by Francesco Murtari, is of almost Renaissance design, contrasting with the later Baroque of the rest of the church.

The stone carving and gilding near the altar is also rather different from that found in the rest of the church. This was the first place where stone carvings were applied to the walls. The design was by architect Francesco Buonamici while that of the rest of the church was by Mattia Preti.

Of course, the other main feature of the chapel are the silver gates, which, as every Maltese knows, were painted black to look like iron gates to fool Napoleon.

There is a certain Greek atmosphere in the devotion to the Black Madonna. It was thus fitting that an iconostasis in the Greek orthodox tradition was installed – a gate – separating the blessed icon from the people. This silver gate was a gift to the church from the inheritance of two prominent knights – Bali Guglielmo de la Salle and Bali Francesco Rovero di Guarena.

So what happened to the icon? Again, contrary to what many Maltese believe, neither the icon nor the Hand were pilfered by Napoleon. On the contrary, Grand Master Hompesch carried them away when he capitulated and left Malta.

Hompesch took the relic and the icon with him to Russia and gave them to Czar Paul I, who became the Order’s protector (and later Grand Master).

The sacred items were taken to St Petersburg but after the Revolution, they were hidden in different monasteries so as not to be found and destroyed by the Bolsheviks.

It was only recently, some 10 years ago, that they were traced to a monastery in Montenegro. The icon is now exhibited in the Fine Arts Museum of Montenegro while only last year the Russian Orthodox Church organised a grand pilgrimage around Russia with the relic of the Hand.

The restoration

With the expertise, experience and knowledge obtained in the restoration project of the Chapel of the Italian Langue, St John’s Foundation decided to that the restoration of the Chapel of the Madonna of Philermos would be its next big project.

There is, of course, a big difference, as Ms Degiorgio pointed out, because while the restoration of the Chapel of the Italian Langue was financed by the Italian Protocol, the restoration of this chapel is being funded from the Foundation’s own resources.

Like most of the rest of St John, the problem with the chapel derives from the rising damp, which has eaten away all the gilding up to a height of some three metres.

The problem is the globigerina limestone, which is like a sponge and which allows rainwater to pass through by way of a capillarisation process.

In the case of St John’s, the process, as many people living in old houses can tell, was accentuated by painting the ‘zokklu’, the lower part, with oil paint. The paint acted as a sealer and only served to push the water and moisture upwards rather than outwards, thus increasing the damage as time passed.

Like in the Chapel of the Italian Langue, cleaning comes first, with di-ionised water to wipe away all damp. A mild solution of solvents is then used for incrustations.

It is only after this process is complete, that the restorers will start working on regilding. The Co-Cathedral Foundation, following experts’ scientific and technical advice, has firmly taken the decision to regild with the same technique used in the 17th century, with 24 carat gold.

On top of the pilaster, in the arch above the altar, the restorers found more problems: rainwater infiltration, now controlled all over the cathedral with a sophisticated roof membrane that is regularly checked.

It is only on the main vault of the church that there is no membrane, as the roof, and the Preti paintings all over the barrel vault of the church, are sheltered by the slanting roof protective cover which only last year was in turn replaced with a double layered and insulated protective cover aimed at keeping the main aisle of the church in a controlled temperature.

Contrary to the rest of the chapels in St John’s, there are only three small oil paintings in this chapel, scenes from the life of Mary, while even the lunette on the doorway is a rage of rays.

The walls of the chapel were covered with red damask, and it was in this chapel that the Polidoro crucifix, itself another icon, was kept in the times of the Order.

Work on the chapel has only just begun but it will only be after the cleaning process is completed that the restorers will decide on how much gilding is needed. Work on the chapel will hopefully be completed by November at the earliest, Ms Degiorgio said.

More restoration updates

The restoration of the Chapel of the Madonna of Philhermos is not the only ongoing restoration project undertaken by the Foundation.

The cleaning and regilding of all the arches in the church is now complete. Thus, at a glance, visitors can take in the opulence of the church, as the Knights wanted it to look. This has cost some e700,000, again funded from the Foundation’s own resources.

The next restoration, which will start around September, is the regilding of the organ boxes. However, the organ will fall silent again soon after, as the Mascioni firm, the organ’s maker, is to overhaul and replace some of its movable parts, which have been worn out by use and time.

This coming winter the Foundation intends to restore the Cappella Ardente and the Bartolott Crypt.

The Cappella Ardente is a baroque wooden chapel that used to be erected in the middle of the church on the death of the Grand Master and the Pope. The last time it was used was in 1963 when Pope John XXIII died.

It is kept in the Bartolott Crypt but it is showing signs of wood damage wood.

However, Ms Degiorgio explained, the Cappella Ardente, once restored, will probably be packed into boxes and stored as there is no adequate space where the chapel can be erected. It is almost as high as the main aisle’s windows and there is no other space that can be that high.

The Bartolott Crypt was dedicated to the Virgin of Graces, but was called so after a knight who used to live in the rooms next to it. It is a large crypt under the Oratory and ordinary Knights are buried there.

The Foundation had intended to use it to display the many silver and gold treasures the church has, just as it intended to display the around 300 priceless vestments of silk and gold thread, gifts of various Grand Masters, in the long corridor.

After that, the next big restoration project will be the restoration of the Chapel of Aragon, Catalonia and Navarre, next door to the Chapel of the Madonna of Philermos and the first chapel to be redecorated when the decision was taken in the mid-17th century to assign every chapel to a specific langue.

The Foundation was led in its decision by a funding offer from the Valencia Generalitat (local government). NSTF will fund the restoration of the two paintings of St Firminus and St Francis Xavier, while APS Bank will finance the restoration of a Mattia Preti lunette of the Martyrdom of St Lawrence.

One of the monuments in this chapel, the Grand Master Cotoner monument, has already been restored through the financing by Shireburn Software to commemorate its 25th anniversary.

It is quite significant and fully appreciated, Ms Degiorgio commented, that even in times of crises companies can finance restoration projects.

What about the Grand Masters’ crypt, one may ask. This is closed to the visitors at present. Environmental studies to measure the water vapour and other conditions present in the crypt day after day started in 2003.

By 2005 it was decided that more tests would be required. At one point it was feared that the vibrations caused by the organ were having a negative impact on the crypt but that now seems to have been ruled out.

For the past two years, even further tests have been carried and are being carried out with the daily results going straight, electronically, to the Courtauld Institute in London.

Although the last word still has to be said, it would seem that access to the crypt would be severely restricted, so that changes in climate will not have such a deleterious impact.

As every householder in Malta knows, when crystallization of the surface takes place, the only solution in ordinary homes is to repaint the walls. But you can’t do that when the walls are covered with frescoes.

It is important to note that every restoration and conservation work carried out at St John’s follows scientific and technical studies at different stages. Moreover, every restoration is covered by a detailed scientific and technical report for future reference. Some of these reports have been published.

One perhaps finds it difficult to appreciate the extent of attention and care that goes on throughout the year for the conservation of the Co-Cathedral.