Maltese Cosmopolitism and Colonial Urban Strategies: two faces of the same phenomenon

Valletta has undergone foreign dominations since antiquity and has been considered a strategic place from the economical, military and political points of view during Modern Age by European states; so it represents a microcosm, where urban strategies have been applied by foreign conquerors (only during Modern Age the island had to face the Knights of Saint John, the French and the British). The concept of “cosmopolitism” has been transformed during colonialism, when the force relationship between East and West became different and Mediterranean was considered above all from an exotic point of view, maybe to legitimize colonial enterprises. Under the Knights, Malta was a city-state with complex multiplex links to continental Europe. Under the British, Malta became a satellite of a distant metropolitan centre, progressively developed as a part of continental Europe or indeed the Mediterranean. This was the first “proper” colonialism Malta had experienced probably since Roman times. Next to the violent and rough invaders Malta (as for example the French who destroyed their churches) has to undergo the ‘kind’ colonialists, the colonialists of art and culture. It is clear that many foreign, especially British, artists actively searched for orientalist themes when depicting Malta, even to the extent of distorting experience. These data are historically significant because they indicate what artists wanted to discover and see. But Malta notwithstanding the “brassage” of different cultures always maintains its own identity, its own religion, its feasts, its ceremonies and its vernacular language.