Malta under the Cottoners 1660-1680

Abstract

Although many works have appeared, in which mention has been made of the two Cottoner brothers, Raphael and Nicholas, no one has at yet attempted to discuss their magistracies in great detail. The aim of this thesis, is therefore to throw more light on the two Grand Masters, who ruled over the Maltese Islands in succession from 1660 to 1680. In the first section, in Chapter 1, an attempt is made to create a more detailed biography of the two brothers. Unfortunately this is limited due to the fact, that the information available in Malta, is limited to a list of posts they held, till their election to the Magistracy, and a description of their election, installation and funerals. The position of the Order and Malta in the middle of the seventeenth century, are briefly discussed in Chapter II. In this chapter is included a description of Malta, by Philip Skippon in 1664. This description has been chosen, since to our knowledge, it is best available. The Cottoners' contribution to various aspects of Maltese Life and Institutions is discussed in the second section. In Chapter III, the fortifications which remain till the present day the greatest monument of the Cottoner era are described, but more emphasis has been laid on the financing of the erection of these fortifications, and the difficulties encountered in raising the money required. The Hospital and the Social Services then existing, are discussed in Chapter IV. In this chapter apart from discussing the enlargements made during the Cottoner decades, an attempt is made to give more information on the staff and the provisioning of the hospital. The Cottoner's contribution to the Arts in these islands is seen in Chapter V, in the chapter on the Conventual Church. Their initiative in the embellishment of the Conventual Church is here discussed. In discussing the Fleet in Chapter VI, more amphasis has been laid on the organization and the disputes in which the Order was involved, then in the actual fighting. The same line is adopted in the following chapter on the Corso, where a number of disputes in which the Order was involved are also discussed. Slavery which in those days was an accepted though evil institution, is discussed in Chapter VIII. Here stress has been made on the employment of the slaves, the running of their prison, their clothing and feeding, and the measures taken to prevent their escape. The third section is devoted to the disputes between Church and State. These chapters show how over a period of twenty years, the Cottoner brothers strive unsuccessfully to put an end to the abuses arising out of Ecclesiastical Immunity and Jurisdiction. The absence of the Magisterial correspondence from 1671 to 1674, and the total absence of any Inquisitional Correspondence for the period 1660 to 1680, with the exception of one volume in the Royal Malta Library has rendered a more detailed discussion of these jurisdictional conflicts impossible. The calamities which afflicted the island in the last decade of the Cottoner era, that is the plague, the threat of famine and the bankruptcy of the Brancati are discussed in the fourth section. The threat of famine which hovered over the island between 1671-1672 and from 1676 to 1680, is here amply discussed, and it shows the problems which Nicholas Cottoner had to face in feeding an island, entirely dependent on imports for its foodstuffs. In the last section an attempt is made to give the Maltese their proper place in the Cottoner decades. Here again information on our forefathers is absolutely unobtainable through lack of documents, and the only records available give only very slight information.