St. Agatha's Catacombs

Abstract

The catacombs of Malta were used only as burial places because no religious persecution during Arab rule was ever witnessed as was common belief. This image was given by writers during the rule of the Knights of St. John, commonly known as The Knights of Malta. Had it been so, the catacombs would not have been dug so low and obviously not hidden enough from the malicious eyes of any persecutor, apart from other factors that make the place uninhabitable such as narrow passages, low entrances, sometimes barely a metre high thus limiting the usage to younger and fitter persons. The custom comes from Roman times whereby to bury their dead, the Romans built their tombs outside the city walls. The walls of Melita, the old capital, before being limited almost a third to its existing boundary and renamed Medina by the Arabs, extended almost to St. Paul's Parish Church. The Rabat area is full of burial places and apart from the catacombs of St. Paul and St. Agatha, the two largest ever to be found on the Island, there are other smaller ones, namely of San Katald, L-Abatija Tad-Dejr and other small Jewish catacombs in the grounds of the Motherhouse of the Missionary Society of St. Paul.