Malta occupies 316 square kilometers in the center of the Mediterranean, and its cultural density per square kilometer is extraordinary even by Mediterranean standards. The temples at Ħaġar Qim predate the Egyptian pyramids. Caravaggio painted his largest canvas in a Valletta chapel. The Grand Harbour has been fought over by every Mediterranean power that has ever existed.
The layers do not succeed each other in Malta — Phoenician, Roman, Arab, Norman, Knights of St John, British — they coexist, visible simultaneously in the architecture, the language, and the food. Valletta, the smallest European capital, was planned in its entirety in the 1560s and remains one of the most architecturally concentrated cities in Europe. Gozo, the quieter island across a 25-minute ferry, adds red-sand beaches, the oldest of the Megalithic temples, and the specific agricultural pace that Malta's size does not always allow.
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