I was raised in Senglea but was forced to leave my birthplace at the age of 10 to escape the devastation by persistent Axis bombing that laid waste to most of the city.

At that age I could absorb and clearly remember the layout and undulations of almost every single street of my home city before it was destroyed.

Thanks to this past experience and my memories, I find it relatively easy to imagine and conjure up in my mind’s eye what the place looked like hundreds of years ago, when still almost barren ground covered in scrub and consisting of rock surfaces interspersed with pockets of soil planted with carob and olive trees, and possibly some pomegranates as well.

It would have been a man-made forest created by the Knights to satisfy the Grand Master’s passion for hunting wild fowl and rabbits.

I have no doubt whatsoever that the site of the still existing and oldest chapel in Senglea, named after St Philip, in Two Gates Street was carefully chosen by the Order to provide easy and close access, via a landing place a few metres down where shallow water permitted convenient landing from a barge conveying the Grand Master and his entourage across the harbour from the Knights’ headquarters in Vittoriosa.

I presume the Grand Master attended morning prayers and mass on arrival at the chapel prior to starting his hunting skirmishes.

There surely must also have been an adjoining room or rooms where the group could shelter and relax and prepare breakfast for the boss – consisting of fresh bread brought with them, morning coffee with milk from a few goats, and soft cheeses from sheep – both milk-producers left there to graze unhindered on the abundant scrub that is ideal for milk production.

Knowing intimately the surface undulations and contours of the place, I can visualise the beginning of the forest at the upper end of the land close to the site of the present parish church.

From there the forest falls gradually to the lowest spot where the present bus terminus is and resumes its rise again, terminating near the Jesuit Church site.

What remains of this forest is probably just the miniscule garden presently guarded by the attractive dome-shaped and sculptured observation post at Gardiola point built by the Knights.

At that particular point in time, l-Isla must have been just an island linked to its neighbours by a narrow road leading to Cospicua. Hence the name Isla – derived from a corruption of the Italian word isola (island).

It is quite possible that at the lowest point between the two ridges there might have been a lake which would have been highly useful and beneficial for watering the animal kingdom inhabiting the area.

When Grand Master La Sengle took office and decided to build a new city in the forest area, his planners detailed with the project designed a geometrically perfect city layout with parallel streets running in both directions intersecting each other at right angles.

The area where the two pre-war cinemas stood, both excavated deep into solid rock on the same side at the depression of Strada Vittoria must surely have served as a soft stone quarry for the development of the areas around the Jesuit’s church and the parish church respectively.

These were highly useful supplies in addition to the stone derived from the sites of the nearby buildings which, by and large, included a basement for use by tenants.

The streets were conveniently graded to the minimum possible gradient and when this happened to be too steep, hard stone steps running the whole width of the street were introduced.

It is a pity that the new city plan for Senglea’s reconstruction after the war affected and detracted quite seriously from some of the original harmonious perspectives and building lines.

This negative vision is further accentuated by the non-reconstruction of some war-damaged highly pleasing and elegant façades imparting an air of delicacy to the Baroque style.

The completed city, to honour and show its appreciation for its creator, adopted the name of Senglea while the old designation of L-Isla was still retained and proudly so.

After the new dockyard, established by the British as the most important in the Mediterranean, became operational, a large number of dockyard employees moved from their old homes in distant localities to new homes in central parts of Senglea, a few metres walk from their place of work.

As a result, some local women married British dockyard employees and their surnames –such as Dunkerly, Kingswell, Thake, Curran, Copperstone and Warrington, to mention just a few – are still quite prominent in present-day society.

Senglea was ferociously defended by the Knights and the local Maltese during the Great Siege and never yielded a metre of its territory. Hence the proud title given to the city of Citta Invicta, equivalent to the unique award of the George Cross presented by Britain to Malta for its brave and unyielding defence during the Second World War.

What a marvellous and pleasant change at the present now, with Senglea’s Bay being developed to welcome and accommodate the tens of thousands of international tourists visiting the island on the huge city-like ships.

Edwin Calleja

BALZAN