7 Best Sights in Malta

What appears a rather functional-looking building from the outside is deceiving. Inside, this is one of the world's most lavishly decorated Baroque cathedrals. The discrepancy between its exterior and interior reflect the different eras through which it has stood. It was completed in 1578 by the Knights of St. John as their own church. In the 17th century, the order's mounting treasures from the Holy Land and the desire to build a cathedral to rival those of Rome saw it get a spectacular makeover. A floor made up of a patchwork of colored-marble tombstones (the final resting place of some 375 knights and officers of the order) shines beneath a breathtakingly intricate arched ceiling largely decorated by the Calabrian artist and knight Mattia Preti. In the Oratory is Caravaggio's only signed work, the dramatic and unsparing Beheading of John the Baptist (1607), which hangs above the very spot where the rogue artist was defrocked and deknighted following a brawl (he had already fled to Malta to escape punishment for murder). Also hanging here is another of the artist's works, the touchingly frail image of Saint Jerome Writing (1606), which found infamy after it was stolen from the Co-Cathedral in 1984 and held hostage. The cathedral museum is currently being extended (work is set to be completed in 2021) to include a special area dedicated to Caravaggio and its collections of silver, tapestries, and vestments, set to be completed in 2021. The entrance fee includes an audio guide. Public access (main ticket office) is on Republic St.

Narrow heeled shoes such as stilettos are not allowed, but slippers can be purchased at reception; women in short skirts will be given coverings.

Below Vittoriosa's main square, the Church of St. Lawrenz served as the Order of St. John's conventual church when the Knights landed in 1530, long before they relocated to Valletta. The present building dates from 1697, though its interior is scattered with artworks by 17th-century painter Mattia Pretti. A visit to the neighboring museum (open 9–noon) reveals a curious array of items, including Grand Master Jean de la Valette's kneeling prayer mat.

The Rotunda (Church of St. Mary) has one of the biggest domes in Europe—after St. Peter's in Rome and Hagia Sophia in Istanbul—and took 27 years to build. Towering above the center of Mosta, a town with a population of less than 20,000, it's a striking sight. Remarkably, a German bomb fell through the roof during World War II while the town held mass; it failed to detonate, sparing the lives of 300 people.

Mdina's St. Paul's Cathedral is famed for Mattia Preti's intricate 17th-century apse mural The Shipwreck of St. Paul. It along with the 900-year-old Irish bogwood sacristy doors were among the few surviving relics of the 1693 earthquake, which destroyed the Norman-era church that stood previously on this site. Rebuilt in the Baroque style in 1703, its interior is second only in Malta to Valletta's Co-Cathedral in terms of grandeur, its floor similarly lined with the marble tombstones of Maltese nobles. Across the square lies the CathedralMuseum, set inside a former seminary. It is home to an excellent art collection, the highlight of which are a series of Dürer woodcuts and illuminated manuscripts.

The importance of St. Paul to the Maltese explains the work lavished on this Baroque marvel, with its raised central vault, oval dome, and marble columns. The os brachii (arm bone) relic of the saint is housed in a chapel on the right, a splendid gated chapel is on the left, and a baptismal font stands by the entrance.