On 23 February 1721, Malta had just started its Carnival season under the rule of Grand Master Marc’Antonio Zondadari. This is the period most historians link to the introduction of the kukkanja into Maltese Carnival. Sources are clear on the year 1721 and on Zondadari’s role, but they do not give a clean, documented “first performance” date for the Kukkanja tradition. What we do know is that the kukkanja was introduced in 1721 and that it was a Neapolitan tradition. The kukk

On 20 February 1578, St John’s in Valletta was consecrated, a major milestone in the making of Malta’s new capital after the Great Siege. At the time, it was not yet a “co-cathedral” in the modern sense, but the conventual church of the Order of St John: the spiritual heart of the Knights inside the new fortified city they were building. The church had been commissioned by Grand Master Jean de la Cassière and designed by Girolamo Cassar, the same architect behind several of V