Destinations: The Twin Temples of Gozo
Ggantija’s towering walls invite wonder—and speculation.
Some old-timers on Gozo—a small island in the Maltese archipelago 60 miles south of Sicily—like to spin yarns about the building of an ancient temple complex called Ggantija. They tell of a huge giantess who built the towering, 20-foot-high walls of the temple while munching on magic beans and toting her baby in a sling. Others have simply assumed that the temples were built by ancient Romans or Phoenicians. But recent radiocarbon analysis indicates that the Ggantija ruins are far more ancient than anyone suspected.
The pyramids of Egypt (early third millennium B.C.), England’s Stonehenge (late third millennium B.C.), King Solomon’s Temple (tenth century B.C.), the Parthenon in Greece (fifth century B.C.) and the Colosseum in Rome (first century A.D.)—all were built much later than the twin temples of Gozo. Even the Guinness Book of World Records has certified the ruins of Ggantija (first erected around 3800 B.C.) as the oldest freestanding stone building on the planet.
If a brawny giantess wasn’t responsible for building Ggantija, then how were the temples’ enormous stone blocks—each weighing up to 20 tons—hauled several miles from a quarry and pivoted into place? There is no evidence that the temple builders had access to wheels or metal tools; antler picks and wooden wedges were likely used to quarry the corraline limestone along natural fissure lines. The massive stones were probably roped to wooden sledges, dragged up earthen ramps and then levered into place. Smaller stones the size of soccer balls, found discarded at many Maltese temple sites, were employed like ball bearings to maneuver the limestone blocks into their final positions.
Ggantija remained exposed to the elements for millennia, and the buildings’ interiors eventually became choked with debris. In 1820, Gozo’s administrator (Malta had become a British colony following the Napoleonic wars) used local convicts to clear the site. Eight years later the British duke of Buckingham sailed to the island on his yacht and was so taken with the brooding ruins that he hired Charles Frederick Brocktorff, a German painter living in the Maltese capital of Valletta, to create a series of watercolors of Ggantija.
These drawings provide a valuable visual record of the temples’ appearance during the mid-19th century and helped guide Malta’s premier archaeologist, Sir Themistocles Zammit, when he launched the first scientific excavation of Ggantija in the 1920s. Zammit noted that weathering had caused significant damage to the site since Brocktorff’s visit: Many of the shallow, pitted patterns apparent on the stones in the artist’s watercolors were no longer visible.
The elements continue to take a toll today. Most of the red ochre pigment covering the temples’ plaster walls has washed away; tendril-like spiral relief carvings have eroded. Yet the site’s main architectural elements still remain intact after nearly 6,000 years.
The concave facade of the twin temples encloses forecourts used for public rituals, towering retaining walls, and corridors braced by 12-foot-high standing stones. Some of these enormous megaliths are capped by stone lintels, creating gateways into rounded chambers, or apses. The apses contain the earliest known examples of corbeled arches: Each course of stone in the walls of the chamber slightly overlaps the one beneath it, forming an arch.
According to some archaeologists, the temples’ rounded apses resemble the full-buttocked mother-earth figurines found at various Maltese archaeological sites. Ggantija may well have served as a sacred space devoted to a fertility cult. Libation holes found in the temple complex provide evidence of cultic rituals: Liquids were poured into the ground as offerings to the earth mother or other deities. There is no evidence of human sacrifice taking place within the temples, although animal sacrifice did occur. Loop holes used for tethering are found in some walls, and fragments of animal bones have been uncovered behind altars and in niches.
Life on Gozo during the period when its temples were in use (3800–2500 B.C.) must have been peaceful. No evidence of weaponry or defensive architecture has been found. Maltese temples are usually situated on gentle hillsides rather than on easily defensible peaks.
The inhabitants of Gozo planted crops, thus assuring themselves of a steady food supply. Sculptures recovered from temple areas depict people wearing woven garments embellished with buttons, waistbands and pleats. Women wore bead-and-shell necklaces and their hairdos incorporated stylized braids and diadems.
Where did these ancient islanders get such sophistication? Pottery remains point to Sicily. Thousands of years ago, mariners somehow managed to make the crossing from the mainland on crafts that were seaworthy enough to carry people, livestock, tools and household goods.
We’ll probably never know why the temple builders came to Gozo, how they built Ggantija or why they suddenly disappeared from the island around 2500 B.C. These unanswered questions simply add to the sense of mystery that hovers over Ggantija’s ruins.