Daritama, atop the ancient steps of Matty Grima Street, was originally built by a knight at around 1570 as a hunting lodge in the prairie land around Bormla – which had replaced the newly deforested l-Isla as a hunting ground. The lodge possessed unique 16th Century architectural features that still survive to the present day. Excavation works in the 1990’s revealed a horizontal passageway some two-storeys below street level that connected the seafront with St Helen’s Lines. This passageway probably dates from the seventeenth or eighteenth century.
Extensive renovations at around the 1770’s were accompanied by a series of 18th Century graffiti that portrayed demi-galleys, Maltese galleys, fishing boats as well as some sort of geometric designs.
The lodge was acquired by Daritama in 1995 and a long process of scrupulous structural renovation was begun. This organisation intends not only to restore the lodge to its original splendour but above all to bring out the long-abandoned richness of the people of Cottonera – thus enabling them to regain the confidence, pride, courage, and ability that they once enjoyed. |
