The opening of Maltese early modernity : a comparative analysis of the transition from the late Middle Ages to early modernity through the acts of notary Giacomo Zabbara and research on the early period of the Order’s rule 1490s-1540s

Abstract

In 1530 the Hospitaller Order of St. John, displaced from their Rhodian home, would find a new headquarters in the Maltese archipelago. Their auspicious arrival would envisage a dramatic shift not only in Malta’s geo-political relevance and consular-diplomatic relations, now invariably extended across the new regime’s various foreign Euro-Mediterranean contacts, but held deep consequences for the local socio-economic realities. The Universitas of Mdina and Gozo would have new political competition originating from Birgu and Maltese trade relations, up until then largely, though not exclusively, marked by a pervasive insularity and Sicilian pre-dominance, would slowly reach-out across the sea. Such an extension would be protected by the new regime’s naval fleet, organised towards efficiency by new regulations, bureaucracy and financial instruments and empowered by the Hospitaller’s very raison d’etre. The shift from the late medieval to the early modern in Malta thus reflects a transition away from insularity towards an increased and diversified politico-economic connectivity, a move already plainly evident in the first decades of the Order’s rule. Moreover, both continuities and discontinuities with the medieval past pervade these early days. To elucidate these realities this work has privileged itself-off of the notarial acts of this transitional period, with principle importance given over to Notary Giacomo Zabbara’s contracts. Thus in the coming chapters the socio-economic transactions pertinent to landownership and agriculturalism, the premier insular continuities, and to peaceful and bellicose maritime trade, the major connective discontinuities, shall be investigated.