The aim of this article is to provide insight into the lives of children and adolescents who lived on the Maltese archipelago between 1565 and 1632, a period of significant change for both the people of Malta and their overlords, the Knights Hospitaller of St. John the Baptist. In this study, there is an equal concern with “childhood” and “adolescence” as a set of ideas, and with “children” and “adolescents” as people with experiences, for neither has been looked at before. Such a focus reflects current historiographical debates but is also a consequence of the nature of the sources used here, that is, the court records of the Magna Curia Castellaniae (the secular law court) and the Tribunal of the Roman Inquisition. Ideas about young people and their life experiences were forged through a multifarious interaction among gender, age, religion, law, work, and violence.
Nigel Nicolson, Virginia Woolf (London, 2000 ), 1.
2.
Philippe Ariès , L'Enfant et la vie familiale sous l'ancien regime (Paris, 1960); Shulamith Shahar, Childhood in the Middle Ages (London, 1992), 1-7; Hugh Cunningham, Children and Childhood in Western Society since 1500 ( London, 1998), 6-8; Nicholas Orme, Medieval Children (New Haven, Conn., 2003), 3-10; and Margaret L. King , “ Concepts of Childhood: What We Know and Where We Might Go” Renaissance Quarterly60 (2007): 371-407.
3.
Maxine Rhodes , “Approaching the History of Childhood: Frameworks for Local Research,” Family and CommunityHistory3 (2000): 121.
4.
Micheale Antonio Zondadari, Breve e Particolare Istruzione del Sacro Ordine Militare degli Ospitalari (Padova, Italy, 1724); Jonathan Riley-Smith, The Knights of St. John in Jerusalem and Cyprus 1050-1310 ( New York, 1973); and Victor Mallia-Milanes, “ A Pilgrimage of Faith, War and Charity: The Order of the Hospital from Jerusalem to Malta,” in Religion, Ritual and Mythology: Aspects of Identity Formation in Europe, ed. Joaquim Carvalho (Pisa, Italy, 2006), 83-96.
5.
Charles Dalli, “ A Muslim Society under Christian Rule,” in Melitensium Amor: Festchrift in Honour of Dun Gwann Azzopardi, ed. Tony Cortis, Tony Freller , and Lino Bugeja ( Malta, 2002), 37-56.
6.
Stanley Fiorini, “ Demographic Growth and the Urbanization of the Maltese Countryside by 1798 ,” in Hospitaller Malta, 1530-1798: Studies on Early Modern Malta and the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, ed. Victor Mallia-Milanes (Malta, 1993), 297-310.
7.
Charles Cassar, Society, Culture and Identity in Early Modern Malta ( Malta , 2000), 29-62.
8.
Charles Cassar, A Concise History of Malta (Malta, 2000 ), 122; and Joseph F. Grima, Żmien il-Kavallieri f'Malta 1530-1798 (Malta , 2001), 118.
9.
Cassar, A Concise History , 121-30; and Grima, Żmien il-Kavallieri f'Malta, 115-18.
10.
Philippe Ariès , Centuries of Childhood: A Social History of FamilyLife (New York, 1962), 128-29.
11.
Will Coster , Family and Kinship in England 1450-1800 (Harlow, UK, 2001), 7-11.
12.
Cunningham, Children and Childhood, 1-2.
13.
Helen Victoria Speechley, “Female and Child Agricultural Day Labourers in Somerset, c.1685-1870” (Ph.D. diss., University of Exeter, 1999), 151.
14.
Cunningham, Children and Childhood, 2-3.
15.
Ibid, 13-15.
16.
Joanne S. Derevenski , Children and Material Culture ( London, 2000), 12.
17.
Laurie A. Wilkie , “Children,” in Encyclopaedia of Historical Archaeology, ed. Charles E. Orser (London, 2002), 99.
18.
Nyree Finlay , “Kid Knapping: The Missing Children in the Lithic Analysis,” in Invisible People and Processes: Writing Gender and Childhood into European Archaeology, ed. Jenny Moore and Eleanor Scott (London, 1997), 203-5, 210.
19.
Eleanor Scott , “Introduction: On the Incompleteness of Archaeological Narratives,” in Moore and Scott, Invisible People and Processes, 2-6.
20.
Pio Pecchiai , “Il Collegio dei Gesuiti in Malta,” Archivio Storico di Malta2 ( 1939 ): 129-69, 273-93; Joseph Cassar-Pullicino, “ Pre-Jesuit Education in Malta,” (Malta) Sundial4 (1946): 14-18; Andrew P. Vella, “The University of S. Maria Purtus Salutis,” (Malta) Journal of the Faculty of Arts2 ( 1962): 164-80; and Vincent Borg, “ Developments in Education outside the Jesuit Collegium Melitense,” (Malta) Melita Historica6 (1974): 215-54.
21.
Attilio Critien , “The Foundlings under the Order and After ,” (Malta) Scientia5 (1949): 3-19; Paul Cassar, Medical History of Malta ( London, 1964); and Charles Savona-Ventura, Knight Hospitaller Medicine in Malta [1530-1798] (Malta, 2004), 120-24.
22.
Joseph M. Brincat , “The Language Question and Education: A Political Controversy on a Linguistic Topic,” in Yesterday's Schools: Readings in Maltese Educational History, ed. Ronald Sultana (Malta, 2001), 137-58.
23.
Charles Savona Ventura , L-Istorja tal-Medicina fil-Gżejjer Maltin (Malta, 1999), 48-50.
24.
Colin Heywood , A History of Childhood: Children and Childhood in the West from Medieval toModern Times ( Cambridge, 2001), 6.
25.
Ariès, Centuries of Childhood , 128.
26.
Ibid, 35-38; Andrew Martindale, “The Child in the Picture: A Medieval Perspective,” in The Church and Childhood, ed. Diana Wood (Oxford, 1994), 197-232, as quoted in Hugh Cunningham, “ Histories of Childhood,” American Historical Review4 (October 1998): 1199; and Adrian Wilson, “The Infancy of the History of Childhood: An Appraisal of Philippe Ariès,” History and Theory19 (February 1980): 145.
27.
Ivan Gaskell, “ Visual History,” in New Perspectives on Historical Writing , ed. Peter Burke ( Cambridge, 2001), 198.
28.
Barbara A. Hanawalt, Growing Up in Medieval London: The Experience of Childhood in History (Oxford, 1993), 6; Paul Griffiths , Youth and Authority: Formative Experiences in England, 1560-1640 (Oxford, 1996), 10; Maureen Mulholland and Brian Pullan, eds., Judicial Tribunals in England and Europe, 1200-1700 (Manchester , UK, 2003), esp. Mary Laven, “Testifying to the Self: Nuns' Narratives in Early Modern Venice,” 147-58; and Alexandra Shepard, Meanings of Manhood in Early Modern England (Oxford , 2003), 12.
29.
Ronald Bowman and Paul Sultana, “ Marriages between 1627-1650: A Study of the Records Held in the Parish Church of Our Lady of Porto Salvo and St. Dominic at Valletta” (bachelor's diss., Royal University of Malta, 1973); and Alistair P. Borg , “Migration and Mobility in Early Modern Malta: The Harbour City of Valletta as a Case Study, 1575-1650” (master's diss., University of Malta, 2003).
30.
Shepard, Meanings of Manhood , 12.
31.
Maria S. Zaragoza, “Introduction,” in Memory and Testimony in the Child Witness, ed. Maria S. Zaragoza (London, 1995), ix-xii.
32.
National Archives of Malta, Magna Curia Castellaniae, Processi Criminali 92/04 (hereafter, N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04), box 28, doc. 28, fo.1r, 11 March 1590.
33.
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 12, doc. 4, n.p., 23 February 1582; the original text reads, “gettar dicto figliolo In detto gorgo di acqua . . . il detto figlolo essendo gettato in detto gorgo grido.”
34.
Robyn Fivush and Jennifer R. Shukat, “Contest, Consistency, and Coherence of Early Autobiographical Recall,” in Zaragoza, Memory and Testimony in the Child Witness, 23.
35.
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 5, doc. 27, n.p., 9 September 1590. The original text is as follows:
36.
si mese a sedere su una segia piccola et la seggia taberro et lui casco in terra . . . et costui si mese in collera et arrano un poco la sua spada et . . . mi tiro un colpo et mi colse . . . et mi ferri ad mando sanguinis effusione.
Cathedral Archives of Malta, Archives of the Inquisition of Malta, Criminal Proceedings (hereafter C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P.), vol. 23B, case 381, fo.687, 11 April 1604.
41.
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 12, doc. 4, n.p., 23 February 1582; and N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 27, doc. 5, n.p., 9 September 1590.
42.
Urie Bronfenbrenner, The Ecology of Human Development: Experiments by Nature and Design ( Cambridge, Mass., 1979), 16-27; Glenn H. Elder and Janet Z. Giele, Methods of Life Course Research: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches ( London, 1998), 5-27, 264-94; and John W. Santrock, Adolescence (Boston, 1998), 52-53.
43.
Grima, Żmien. il-Kavallieri f'Malta, 116; and Stephen C. Spiteri, The Great Siege: Knights vs. Turks mdlxv (Malta, 2005), 520-21.
44.
Joseph Cassar-Pullicino , Il-Kitba tal-Malti sa 1-1870 ( Malta, 2001), 47.
45.
Grima, Żmien. il-Kavallieri f'Malta, 117.
46.
Inter alia: N.A.M., M.C.C., Cedulae Suppliche et Taxationes (hereafter, C.S.T.), vol. 3, fos.43r, November 1566; N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 27, doc. 26, fos.102v, 14 December 1589; and C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 23a, case 321, fos.323, 18 June 1601.
47.
N.A.M., M.C.C., C.S.T., vol. 3, fos.8v, September 1566; N.A.M., M.C.C., C.S.T., vol. 3, fos.43r, November 1566.
48.
N.A.M., M.C.C., C.S.T., vol. 3, fos.8v, September 1566; the original text reads, “de ben regendo et gubernando.”
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 27, doc. 6, fo.1r, April 1590: the original text reads, “Principe et Protettore di vedove e pupilli.”
52.
Bowman and Sultana, “Marriages between 1627-1650,” 35-48; and Borg, “Migration and Mobility,” 29-37.
53.
Louis Haas, The Renaissance Man and His Children: Childbirth and Early Childhood in Florence 1300-1600 (Basingstoke, UK, 1998), 27; and Heywood , A History of Childhood, 46.
54.
Joseph Zammit Ciantar , “Malta in 1677: An Anonymous Account ,” Studi Magrebini22: 91, fo.9v.
55.
C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 18, case 214, fo.195, 24 May 1599.
56.
Helmut G. Koenigsberger , George L. Mosse, and George Q. Bowler, Europe in the Sixteenth Century (London, 1992 ), 69.
57.
C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 18, case 214, fo.195, 24 May 1599; C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 17, case 105, fo.202v, 5 November 1599; and C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 22d, case 280, fo.1578v, 28 October 1604.
58.
Mabel Quin, ed., Virtueś Catholic Encyclopedia (London, 1965), 11; and James A. Coriden , Thomas J. Green, and Donald E. Heintschel, eds., The Code of Canon Law: A Text and Commentary (London, 1985), 638.
59.
Charles Savona-Ventura , “The Influence of the Roman Catholic Church on Midwifery Practice in Malta,” Medical History39 (Malta, 1995); 26; and Charles Savona-Ventura, The History of Maternity Care in the Maltese Islands ( Malta, 2003), 12-13.
60.
C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 22d, case 280, fo.1578v, 28 October 1604; the original text reads, “se moresse il cappellano la possia spellire in chiesa.”
61.
C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 38a, case 302, fos.43rv, 21 August 1617; and Guido Lanfranco , “Parents' Vows . . . Fulfilled by Their Children!” (Malta) Sunday Times, 8 December 1996, 50-51.
62.
C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 13, case 55, fos.194r, 18 January 1594; the original text reads, “per amore dilli figlioli.”
63.
C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 15a, case 66, fos.251v-252r, 8 May 1597; and C.A.M., A.I.M., C.P., vol. 3a, case 302, fos. 34rv, 21 August 1617.
64.
Charles Cassar , Daughters of Eve: Women, Gender Roles, and the Impact of the Council of Trent in Catholic Malta ( Malta , 2002), 66-67; and Borg , “Migration and Mobility,” 42-44. 64. Jonathan R. Hale, “ Sixteenth-Century Explanations of War and Violence,” Past and Present51 (1971): 3-26; and Robert C. Davis, The War of the Fists: Popular Culture and Public Violence in Late Renaissance Venice (New York, 1994), 70.
65.
Cf. Elizabeth A. Foyster, “Silent Witnesses? Children and the Breakdown of Domestic and Social Order in Early Modern England,” in Childhood in Question: Children, Parents and the State, ed. Anthony Fletcher and Stephen Hussey (Manchester, UK, 1999 ), 58-59.
Julie Gammon , “A Denial of Innocence: Female Juvenile Victims of Rape and the English Legal System in the Eighteenth Century,” in Childhood in Question: Children, Parents and the State, ed. Anthony Fletcher and Stephen Hussey (Manchester, UK, 1999 ), 75, 88.
71.
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 92, doc. 15, fo.2v, 24 July 1621. The original text is as follows:
72.
non mi lascai conoscer da detto cavaliere e feci resistenza quanto ho potuto e mi scapolai . . . mia madre mi maltratto di parole e tanti minalli finche il martedi seguente . . . detta mia madre mi tocho minare per forza in casa del detto cavaliere . . . e detto Cavaliere mi ha sverginato.
Michael Mitterauer , A History of Youth (Oxford , 1992), 68; and Davis Nicholas, “ Child and Adolescent Labour in the Late Medieval City: A Flemish Model in Regional Perspective,” English Historical Review110 (1995): 1103.
75.
Sarah L. Holloway and Gill Valentine, “ Children's Geographies and the New Social Studies of Childhood,” in Children's Geographies: Playing, Living and Learning, ed. Sarah L. Holloway and Gill Valentine (London, 2002), 10.
Francisco Balbi di Correggio, “The Siege of Malta of 1565 [Barcelona, 1568],” in The Siege of Malta of 1565, trans. Earnle Bradford (London, 1965), 49, 55, 105, 131, 135, 178, 181.
78.
Victor Mallia-Milanes , “Introduction to Hospitaller Malta,” in Mallia-Milanes, Hospitaller Malta, 1530-1798, 25.
79.
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 48, doc. 31, fo.1r, 16 May—1 June 1600; the original text reads, “una flotta di pugni.”
80.
Ilana K. Ben-Amos, Adolescence and Youth in Early Modern England (New Haven, Conn., 1994), 1-2.
81.
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 92, doc. 18, n.p., November 1620; the original text reads, “potersi assignar ad'alcun arteggiano per imparare l'arte, et cacciare et vivere.”
82.
Charles Dalli , “Education in Malta before the Knights ,” in Yesterday's Schools: Readings in Maltese Educational History, ed. Ronald Sultana ( Malta, 2001), 1, 12.
Jean Quintin d'Autun , “Insulae Melitae Descriptio [Lyon 1536] ,” in The Earliest Description of Malta, trans. Horatio C. R. Vella (Malta, 1980), 41; Zammit Ciantar, “Malta in 1677,” 91-92; and Jean Du Mont, A New Voyage to the Levant ( London, 1696), 137.
86.
Santrock, Adolescence, 343.
87.
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 26, doc. 4, n.p., December 1590; the original text reads, “sbarbati et giovanetti.”
88.
Will Fisher , “The Renaissance Beard: Masculinity in Early Modern England,” Renaissance Quarterly54 (2001): 155-87.
N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 27, doc. 26, fo.1r, 14 December 1589 (the original text reads, “suono di zampognia et grida frattaria di gesti carnivari”); and Lyndal Roper, Oedipus and the Devil: Witchcraft, Sexuality and Religion in Early Modern Europe (London, 1994), 111.
92.
The term used in the document (N.A.M., M.C.C., P.C. 92/04, box 27, doc. 26, fo.2r, 14 December 1589) was mandractio, which in Sicilian meant a place where beasts of burden were kept. Giuseppe Bundi, Dizionario Siciliano: Italiano (Palermo, Sicily, 1857), 214; and Salvatore Giarizzo, Dizionario Etimologico Siciliano (Palermo, Sicily, 1989), 194.
