The Kitchen

The kitchen had a double stove and baking oven, though the presence of other ovens under the staircase is not excluded. An overlying butler’s room helped the servants to receive orders and be scrutinised. This section was partially rebuilt in 2010. It also aids to understand that the house back in time had its own hierarchy: servants, the butler as a middle man and the noble and his family.

MORE: The house is also known as ‘the house of conspiracies’. Local legend has it that during the 1565 Great Siege, the Knights ordered the demolition of the Bormla houses which stood overlooking the Birgu ditch and landfront fortifications. The demolition brought the house on the edge of the buffer zone created, and subsequently it enjoyed unobstructed views of the other two cities and the harbour. As Bormla was not fortified and after heavy fighting, on June 30, 1565, the Ottomans occupied the house and used it as a strategic point of observation on the movements within Birgu, Senglea and the sea between them. The house was used for negotiations between the Ottoman Janissary command and envoys of the Knights. The Ottoman envoys sent to request the surrender of the Order proved futile and at times fatal. On their retreat on September 8, 1565 the Ottomans set fire to the house at the site of the kitchen but the damage was small and on the walls it left a light layer of sooth. Some years after the Siege, the house was frequented by Grand Master La Valette himself, who wished to observe unobstructed the progress of the Valletta fortifications from the look-out post. After the Knights moved to Valletta in 1571 the house became a venue for pre-conclave secret meetings among those eligible to vote for the best candidate to Grand Mastership, as it was fundamental to choose the right person who enjoyed the support of the Papal States and the stronger powers. Between 1798 and 1799, during the Napoleonic occupation of the Islands, the house became a place of conspiracy against the French troops. The residents and others who opposed the Napoleonic creed, met to conspire and observe the movements of the French within the other two cities. This led to the ransacking of the house, the expulsion of its residents and its setting on fire on September 13, 1799. Since at this time the house was lived in, in contrast to the retreating Ottomans the French troops found enough items to feed the fire started once more at the kitchen stove. This time, the fire raged so strong that it damaged the stove, the oven and collapsed the butler’s room, leaving a thick layer of sooth still visible on the plastered walls. At the start of World War II, the arched farmhouse was recommended as a safe shelter against Axis air raids, but when the strength of the first bombs was experienced, people were told to abandon the place. Luckily the house was not damaged. Only a small shrapnel came to rest on the façade’s cornice, where it remained till restoration.

Now return to the entrance hall through the door. Go back to the point No. 9 and start ascending the first flight of steps.

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