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Malta

Folklore in Malta

Although a mere 93 kilometres south of Sicily, the Maltese archipelago was never a researchcentre or a collector's destination for Viennese ethnographers or those associated with Vienna,as was the case for other more different regions of Italy. Even if there were vacation or educationaltrips to Malta, no Maltese artefacts made their way into the collections of the Austrian Museumof Folk Life and Folk Art. Searching for traces of possible ancient relics of material culture andways of life were Michael and Arthur Haberlandt, Rudolf Trebitsch and Eugenie Goldstern, as wellas Emmerich Prettenhofer, who researched as far as northern Italy, in particular Friuli, theAosta valley, Piedmont, into the Roman Campagna up to Calabria. One can also find a largerinventory of household goods and utensils from Sardinia and Sicily.

The ways of life of pre- industrialized society on the above- mentioned two large Italian islandsmay not be much different from those of Malta and Gozo. After a varied prehistory Malta wasclosely connected to the larger neighbouring island from the 11th to the 16th centuries. Thischanged in 1530 when Malta's rule fell under the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, who deter-mined the island's political and cultural life. After a brief French occupation during the Napoleonicperiod, Malta fell under British rule, which dictated more than just the island's linguisticcourse. Through foreign influences from the Phoenicians, Arabs, Spanish, the Order of St John,French, Italians, and British, Malta developed its identity within the Mediterranean region.It appears that it is ready to follow a new path among its future partners within the EuropeanUnion. No other member country besides Malta has obtained so many exemptions in the nego-tiations. This not only concerns the Maltese language with a Semitic sub- stratum and aRomance and English supra- structure, spoken by approximately 400,000 people, being anequally recognized official language of the European Union, but also involves traditional rightssuch as those relating to hunting, and trapping songbirds.

The Maltese language and folk culture, as evident from fairy tales, legends, songs, andriddles, have not only made Maltese folklore one of the most significant areas of scientificstudy, but have also attracted linguists from other countries, among them Reinhold Kontzi.Their work has made its way into our library, where there are several editions of correspondingtexts in both Maltese and German. Felix Karlinger, Hans Stumme and Bertha Ilg have publishedand paid tribute to Malta's folk narrative and songs. J. Cassar- Pullicino, a Maltese folklorist,presented the museum with a machine- typed manuscript on the history of Maltese folk taleresearch. Ġorġ Mifsud- Chircop, a contemporary anthropological folklorist, has also studiedand indexed Maltese folk- narrative culture, introduced Maltese folklore studies at the Universityof Malta( 2001-), organized Maltese folk singing on a sound footing through the annual NationalFolk Singing( Ghana) Festival( 1998-), produced and broadcast twenty- six audio- visual docu-mentaries on Maltese crafts, and introduced a scientific perspective in the research and analysisof Maltese folklore through his many publications in Maltese, English and Italian, two of whichare found in our museum.