Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/33684
Title: A 1636 murder in Vittoriosa - and its far-reaching fallout
Authors: Bonello, Giovanni
Keywords: Knights of Malta -- Malta -- History -- 17th century
Order of St John -- Malta -- History -- 17th century
Malta -- History -- Knights of Malta, 1530-1798
Murderers -- Malta -- 17th century
Inquisition -- Malta -- History -- 17th century
Murder -- Malta -- 17th century
Lascaris Castellar, Giovanni Paolo, 1560-1657
Issue Date: 2016-12-04
Publisher: Allied Newspapers Limited
Citation: Bonello, G. (2016, December 4). A 1636 murder in Vittoriosa - and its far-reaching fallout, Sunday Times of Malta, pp. 46.
Abstract: In November 1636, an oil merchant, Francesco Scarlatta, was murdered in his house in Vittoriosa by a Sicilian compatriot, Nicolo Ciardi. The murder of the oil trader left substantial traces in three important Maltese archives : the Notarial Archives, those of the Inquisition,and the archives of the Order of Malta housed in the National Library. After having committed the murder, Ciardi fled immediately to the Greek Church in Birgu, but the police of the Castellania plotted a stratagem to lure Ciardi outside the church. This murder is emblematic of the tensions between the three powers that then ruled Malta (the Grand Master, the Bishop and the Inquisitor). The Ciardi affair and the criminal's virtual abduction by stealth by the civil police from his inviolate church sanctuary, pitted the Grand Master against the Bishop, with both desperately eager to rope in the Inquisitor on their side.
URI: https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar//handle/123456789/33684
Appears in Collections:Melitensia Works - ERCWHMlt

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