What is it about?
Rafts with as many as 19 people on board are incised on uprights in the South Temple at Hal Tarxien faced by a huge stone cult figure standing on a raft of lashed saplings. Newly discovered rubbings of the graffiti will allow a reassessment of the ships represented.
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Why is it important?
Evidence of early seafaring in the Western and Central Mediterranean is scanty. Inevitably archaeologists look to surviving evidence in the East and implied contacts. The obsidian trade shows that seafaring developed early in the Western Mediterranean, but the type of water transport employed has hitherto been a matter of conjecture.
Perspectives
Due to lack of archaeological evidence for imported ceramics, the contact of Neolithic Malta with the outside world is difficult to discern, but the density of megalithic temples on the two islands suggests that they were sacred pilgrimage destinations.
valerie fenwick
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Robert Newall's Primary Record of the Prehistoric Ship Graffiti at Hal Tarxien, Malta: new thoughts on their significance, The International Journal of Nautical Archaeology, August 2017, Wiley,
DOI: 10.1111/1095-9270.12239.
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