The artistic relevance of the Santa Maria Addolorata cemetery, Malta 1870-1940

Abstract

To date, no exhaustive written works concerning the Addolorata Cemetery have been published. The main corpus of written works referring to this theme was done solely in part fulfillment of a University of Malta degree. Konrad Buhagiar's Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century A History of Neo-Gothic in Malta (B.E.&A. - June 1982) mainly outlines the development of a Neo-Gothic architectural style in Malta. His focus was predominantly on the movement's main exponent architects, namely Giorgio Bonavia and Emmanuele Luigi Galizia, along with their contributions to this style. Claude Calleja's Extramural Internment in Malta (Inst. Rel. Studies - June 1989), focused entirely on the socio-political struggles and conflicts that arose between the Maltese Church and the British governing body during the mid nineteenth century. My previous dissertation The Addolorata Cemetery: A Study of a Select Number of Funerary Chapels of the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century (B.A. History of Art - May 1998) focused entirely on the construction of private funerary chapels within the Addolorata Cemetery grounds. The research unearthed several architects who had contributed to the shaping of Maltese architecture through their sepulchral designs. Other brief references to the cemetery were made by Christian Attard in An Italian Artistic Presence in l 9'h and 2dh Century Malta (1850-1960), (M.A. (History of Art) - March 1999), and Malcolm Borg in British Colonial Architecture Malta 1800-1900, (M.A. (History of Art) - 1996). H.B. Formosa, prior to his death, had carried out extensive research on most of the cemeteries found in Malta and Gozo. The work was never published and the various manuscript gatherings are today found in the Archives and Rare Books section at the University of Malta under the heading of MS. 262/3 H.B. Formosa (1968).