GOZO – GGANTIJA TEMPLES

Only 3.5km (2.1 miles) from Gozo’s capital city Victoria, is the ancient Ggantija Temples – awesome for its age, its engineering and for the mystery of its builders.

A model of the temple site at the Archaeological Museum in Victoria (which we’ve visited earlier)

Experts say the Ggantija temples were built between 3600 and 3200 BC. Ggantija is claimed to be the world’s oldest free-standing structure – older even than the Egyptian pyramids and Stonehenge in Britain.

At first, the site looks like just another heap of stones

The Ggantija or, as it was commonly known in the past, “The Giant’s Tower”, is the largest, the best preserved and by far the most impressive prehistoric temple. It was unearthed in 1827 and comprises two temples, built several centuries apart with a forecourt.

The walls were constructed with ‘talquwwi’ – a harder type of limestone. The space between the inner and outer walls are filled with rubble and earth
The wooden walkway inside the temple
Each temple has five lobe-shaped apses leading off a central corridor

According to legend, the massive blocks of Ggantija were carried from the south side of the island by a female giant between 3600 and 3000 BC – some of these slabs are as much as 6m (20ft) high and weigh many tons.

I was wondering about this statement … in the first place, so there were giants? And secondly, why would it be a female giant? I guess this is a story to figure out at another time …

One of the big stone slabs at the Ggantija temples
The alter blocks were almost certainly used for the sacrifice of animals
Another huge stone
The remains of the ancient structures at Ggantija
One of the outer walls – the stones fit like puzzle pieces
The Ggantija Temples as seen from a distance
Another lobe-shaped apses
Walkways in the central corridor
I was captivated with these huge single stone slabs
The Ggantija Temples are the earliest of the Megalithic Temples and is a UNESCO World Heritage site
Glass in the wooden walkways provides a closer look at the floor which is partly covered with soft stone slabs and partly with turf or beaten earth

The huge megaliths forming the outer wall (the largest weighing several tons) were built alternately – one horizontally and one upright.

The outer walls of Ggantija Temples
A close-up of the outer wall

It was fascinating to walk around these ancient temple sites, while life (as we know it today) a few steps further, were carrying on as normal. There was a farmer just on the other side of the wall busy harvesting his onions … it was actually quite weird to witness.

A farmer’s onion harvest on the wall next to the ancient temple site
The Ggantija Temples are surrounded by farms
Victoria, Gozo’s capital, is just a stone throw away from the temples

While walking around at the site of the Ggantija Temples, you can’t help but have your imagination stimulated by the thought of the ancient age of this place and what type of people lived here centuries ago.

A schematic of the Ggantija Temples is displayed at the site

Well, I suppose sometimes a heap of stones could be the representation of something with much more meaning and history than I could have ever thought.

In our next post about Gozo – yes, there are still more to show – we will visit the delightful little seaside village of Xlendi where we’ve stayed for our weekend on Gozo.

We have done these trips in 2011 & 2013