• DOI:10.1080/09518960412331302203
• Corpus ID: 153559318

Maltese seafaring in mediaeval and post-mediaeval times

@article{Mcmanamon2003MalteseSI,
  title={Maltese seafaring in mediaeval and post-mediaeval times},
  author={John M. Mcmanamon},
  journal={Mediterranean Historical Review},
  year={2003},
  volume={18},
  pages={32 - 58}
}

• John M. Mcmanamon
• Published 1 June 2003
• History
• Mediterranean Historical Review

Despite a dearth of material evidence, excellent historical detective work, especially that by a dedicated local school of Maltese historians, invites a survey of Maltese economic and political developments from a Mediterranean maritime perspective. In the economic sphere, cotton, shipped to Sicilian ports where it was traded for grain, eventually proved to be mediaeval Malta's chief cash crop. A pattern of non-diversified trade led to the politicization of the economy in the fourteenth century and its militarization thereafter. In naval affairs, Malta played a small but important role for almost 1,000 years as a frontier garrison. During the period of Angevin hegemony, a tiny squadron was based at the Seaside Castle in Birgu. The Grand Harbour witnessed battles between Catalan and Angevin galleys in 1283 and between Ottoman besiegers and Knight defenders in 1565. Throughout mediaeval and post-mediaeval times, piracy and privateering supplied essential support for the functioning of the maritime system, and Maltese seafaring developed most vigorously in proportion to the intensity of the islands' contacts with North Africa.