Islam in Malta

Mariam Al-Batool Mosque in Paola

Islam in Malta, although only recently being reintroduced in a sizeable number in the latter half of the 20th century, has had a historically profound impact upon the country—especially its language and agriculture—as a consequence of previous centuries of Muslim control and presence on its islands. Today, the main organizations represented in Malta are the Libyan World Islamic Call Society and the minority Ahmadiyya.

History

Byzantine rule: 533-869

Prior to Muslim rule, Eastern Christianity had been prominent in Malta during the time of Greek-Byzantine rule and even remained significant during the Islamic period.

Muslim rule: 870-1090

Mdina, capital of Muslim ruled Malta.

Islam is believed to have been introduced to Malta when the North African Aghlabids, first led by Halaf al-Hadim and later by Sawada ibn Muhammad, conquered the islands from the Byzantines, after arriving from Sicily in 870 (as part of the wider Arab–Byzantine wars). However, it has also been argued that the islands were occupied by Muslims earlier in the 9th, and possibly 8th, century. The Aghlabids established their capital in Mdina. The old Roman fortification, later to become Fort St Angelo, was also extended.

According to the Arab chronicler and geographer Muhammad bin Abd al-Munim al-Himyari (author of Kitab al-Rawd al-Mitar), following the Muslim attack and conquest, Malta was practically uninhabited until it was recolonised by Muslims from Sicily in 1048–1049, or possibly several decades earlier.

The Muslims generally tolerated the Christian population of Malta.

Medieval Period: 1091-1224

Malta returned to Christian European rule with the Norman conquest in 1091. It was, along with Noto on the southern tip of Sicily, the last Arab stronghold in the region to fall to the Christians.

The Arab administration was initially kept in place and Muslims were allowed to practise their religion freely until the 13th century. The Normans allowed an emir to remain in power with the understanding that he would pay an annual tribute to them in mules, horses, and munitions. As a result of this favourable environment, Muslims continued to demographically and economically dominate Malta for at least another 150 years after the Christian conquest.

In 1122 Malta experienced a Muslim uprising and in 1127 Roger II of Sicily reconquered the islands.

Even in 1175, Burchard, bishop of Strasbourg, an envoy of Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor, had the impression, based upon his brief visit to Malta, that it was exclusively or mainly inhabited by Muslims.

In 1224, Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, sent an expedition against Malta to establish royal control and prevent its Muslim population from helping a Muslim rebellion in the Kingdom of Sicily.

The conquest of the Normans would lead to the gradual Latinization and subsequent firm establishment of Roman Catholicism in Malta, after previous respective Eastern Orthodox and Islamic domination.

1225-1529

According to a report in 1240 or 1241 by Gililberto Abbate, who was the royal governor of Frederick II of Sicily during the Genoese Period of the County of Malta, in that year the islands of Malta and Gozo had 836 Muslim families, 250 Christian families and 33 Jewish families.

In 1266, Malta was turned over in fiefdom to Charles of Anjou, brother of France’s King Louis IX, who retained it in ownership until 1283. Eventually, during Charles's rule religious coexistence became precarious in Malta, since he had a genuine intolerance of religions other than Roman Catholicism. However, Malta's links with Africa would still remain strong until the beginning of Spanish rule in 1283.

By the end of the 15th century all Maltese Muslims would be forced to convert to Christianity and had to find ways to disguise their previous identities. Notwithstanding the claim in this latter statement (attributed to the author Stefan Goodwin), Professor Godfrey Wettinger, who specialized in Malta's medieval history and whose work is used to support the claim, writes that the medieval Arab historian, Ibn Khaldun (1332—1406), puts the expulsion of Islam from Malta to the year 1249. Wettinger goes on to say that "there is no doubt that by the beginning of Angevin times [i.e. shortly after 1249] no professed Muslim Maltese remained either as free persons or even as serfs on the island."

Knights of St. John: 1530-1798

Arrival of the Turkish fleet during the Great Siege, by Matteo Perez d' Aleccio

Sculpture of a Muslim slave on the funerary monument of Nicolas Cotoner

During the period of rule under the Knights Hospitaller, thousands of Muslim slaves, captured as a result of maritime raids, were taken to Malta. In the mid-18th century, there were around 9000 Muslim slaves in Hospitaller-ruled Malta. They were given a substantial amount of freedom, being allowed to gather for prayers. Although there were laws preventing them from interacting with the Maltese people, these were not regularly enforced. Some slaves also worked as merchants, and at times were allowed to sell their wares in the streets and squares of Valletta. A mosque was built in 1702 during the Order of St John for Turkish slaves within a prison building of which no traces remain nor description of its architecture. After the failure of the Conspiracy of the Slaves (1749), laws restricting the movement of slaves were made stricter. They could not go outside the city limits, and were not to approach any fortifications. They were not allowed to gather anywhere except from their mosque, and were to sleep only in the slave prisons. Moreover, they could not carry any weapons or keys of government buildings.

There was also a deliberate and ultimately successful campaign, using disinformation and often led by the Catholic clergy, to deemphasize Malta's historic links with Africa and Islam. This distorted history "determined the course of Maltese historiography till the second half of the twentieth century", and it created the rampant Islamophobia which has traditionally been a feature of Malta (as well as other southern European states).

20th to 21st century

Islamic Cultural Centre in Paola

In 2003, of the estimated 3,000 Muslims in Malta, approximately 2,250 were foreigners, approximately 600 were naturalised citizens, and approximately 150 were native-born Maltese—most notably Mario Farrugia Borg, who is part of the personal secretariat of Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and was the first Maltese public officer to take an oath on the Koran when co-opted into the Qormi local council in 1998. By 2010, there were approximately 6,000 Muslims in Malta—most of whom are Sunni and foreigners.

There is one mosque called the Islamic Centre of Paola in Paola, founded in 1978 by the World Islamic Call Society, and one adjoining Muslim school called the Maryam al-Batool school.

Impact

The strongest legacy of Islam in Malta is the Maltese language, and most place names (other than the names Malta and Gozo) are Arabic, as are most surnames, e.g. Borg, Cassar, Chetcuti, Farrugia, Fenech, Micallef, Mifsud and Zammit. It has been argued that this survival of the Maltese language, as opposed to the extinction of Siculo-Arabic in Sicily, is probably due to the eventual large-scale conversions to Christianity of the proportionally large Maltese Muslim population.

The Muslims also introduced innovative and skillful irrigation techniques such as the water-wheel known as the Noria or Sienja, all of which made Malta more fertile. They also introduced sweet pastries and spices and new crops, including; citrus, figs, almond, as well as the cultivation of the cotton plant, which would become the mainstay of the Maltese economy for several centuries, until the latter stages of the rule of the Knights of St. John. The distinctive landscape of terraced fields is also the result of introduced ancient Arab methods.

The Catholic religious traditions of the Maltese were also impacted by the Muslim presence.

In modern times, Malta's unique culture has enabled it to serve as Europe's "bridge" to the Arab cultures and economies of North Africa.

See also

• History of Malta
• History of Islam in southern Italy
• Siege of Malta (1429)
• Invasion of Gozo (1551)
• Great Siege of Malta