https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/40381 2026-04-11T03:02:10Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/39337 Title: Malta's economy in the nineteenth century Abstract: The economy of the Maltese Islands under Britain took the form of an artificial cycle determined not by the vicissitudes of the market, but by the exigencies of military security. War marked the upswings of the Maltese economic cycle; the return of peace was always the harbinger of a downswing. With the assumption of the Islands into the British Crown, the economic performance of the country became a function of Britain's demand for Malta's services as a fortress. It is proposed here to describe the unfolding and the evolution of that role since the departure of the Knights of the Order of Saint John. Malta's economic history makes little sense unless incorporated into the story of her political life. In interweaving both aspects of this period of the history of the Maltese, we hope we are working out a pattern that is more realistic than one that could be given by treating each aspect in isolation. 1965-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/39336 Title: Lamartine's impressions of Malta Abstract: Alphonse Marie Louis de Prat de Lamartine (October 1790 - February 1869) was one of the outstanding French poets of the Romantic movement, the first of the truly important ones. A native of the town of Macon, he was descended from a family of Franc-Comtois landowners. Lamartine was a versatile figure who was not only a creative writer but also a noted statesman and orator. He was educated at Lyons and later at the Jesuit college at Belley, where he spent the years from 1803 to 1807. In June 1820 he married at Chambery a young Englishwoman named Anna Eliza Birch, whom he called 'Matianne' and who was a person of some means. Shortly thereafter he left for Naples, where he served as an artache of the French Legation. Also during the 1820' s he served in the French embassy in London and in Tuscany. King Charles X in 1825 bestowed upon him the cross of the Legion of Honor, a distinction the recipient shared with another Romantic writer, Victor Hugo. 1965-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/39335 Title: The Galley-Convicts and Buonavoglia in Malta during the rule of the Order Abstract: Throughout its long stay in the Maltese Islands (1530-1798), the Order of St. John usually employed large numbers of convicts and buonavoglia (volunteer rowers) on the galleys, in addition to the inevitable hundreds of Moslem and Jewish slaves. For its galley-commanders it was really a matter of high policy to do so, because they expected the Christian convicts and buonavoglia to keep a constant watch on the doings and sayings of their non-Christian comrades. Care was therefore always taken to distribute them throughout the places on boats that contained Infidels - one of them, for example, being invariably posted to each oat-bench, where he worked in the company of-three or four slaves. 1965-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/39334 Title: Malta in 1565 : some recommendations Abstract: The four hundreth centenary year of the Great Siege is possibly a good time to reconsider certain aspects of the story of events in the summer of 1565. It has long been commented that we know very little of the Moslem side of the story. This is, of course, hardly surprizing for Turkish sources are not easily available to Western European writers and there is a not inconsiderable language problem. But even allowing for this gap in our knowledge, and Turkish official sources may not prove to be very rich, we still lack a carefully documented and analytical account of the Siege based upon Western European source material. This short paper is not an effort to provide such an account but it is an attempt to ask whether certain assumptions made about the Siege have a reasoned and documented basis. 1965-01-01T00:00:00Z