The Middle Ages

The Arabs in Sicily were divided, and taking advantage of the situation, Count Roger the Norman, after a series of compaigns, subdued that island to Norman Rule.
Count Roger had invaded the islands to make sure his southern flank was secure from a possible Arab attack, having reduced the Arabs to a state of vassalage and releasing the foreign Christian slaves, he returned to Sicily without even bothering to garrison his prize.
In Sicily itself the Normans followed the same enlightened policy and although the Christian Faith was regarded as the official religion there, nobody was persecuted because of his race or for his religous beliefs.
In 1127, Roger II the son of Count Roger, led a second invasion of Malta; having overrun the Island he placed it under a more secure Norman domination under the charge of a Norman governor. He also garisoned with Norman soldiers the three castles then on the islands. From about this period the Maltese moved back gradually into the European orbit to which they had belonged for a thousand years prior to the Arab interlude.
Because the last Norman king died without a male heir, the new masters of the Maltese islands came, in turn, from the ruling houses of Germany, France and Spain: the Swabians (1194); the  Angevins (1268); the Aragonese (1283) and finally, the Castillians (1410).
When the Norman Period came to an end, the Fief of Malta was granted to loyal servants of the Sicilian Crown, or Marquises of Malta, as these nobles were styled, looked on the fief simply as an investment - a source for the collection of taxes and something that was bartered or sold when no longer viable.
The last feudal lord of Malta, Don Gonsalvo Monroy, had been expelled from the Island following a revolt and at the Court of Sicily the count demanded that the strongest measures be taken against the insurgents. At the same Court the represantatives of the Maltese offered 30,000 florins originally paid by Monroy for the Fief of Malta; they also asked for the island to be incorporated in the Royal Domains once they had redeemed their homeland. The king, Alphonse V, impressed by their loyalty, called Malta the most notable gem in his crown, thus the capital of Malta came to be called notabile although, then, as now, the Maltese continued to call the town Medina.
By this time, the Maltese were thoroughly Christianized and the houses of the great Religious Orders were being established in the Island: the Franciscans (1370); the Carmelites (1418); the Augustinians (1450); the Dominicans (1466); and the Minor Observants (1492), while the Benedictine Sisters arrived in 1418.In 1429 a determined attempt was made by an army of 18,000 Moors from Tunisia under Kaid Ridavan to capture the Maltese islands with the intention of using them as an advance post for further conquests. The Maltese population then numbered between 16,000 to 18,000 with only some 4,000 men under arms. The invaders were beaten back but not before they had captured over 3,000 of the inhabitants as prisoners.

The Knights of the Order of St.John

The visitor arriving by air will probably first notice it in the livery colours of Air Malta, the national airline; he will see it again and again during his stay on the Island: carved on the facade of Baroque palaces, in the form of exquisite filigree brooches, and embossed on many a kitsch, plastic souvenir. it is the eight-pointed cross, or, as it is better known, the Maltese Cross.
As a military order, the Knights took part in the crusading wars, but when Acre fell 1291, they were driven off from their last stronghold in the Holy Land.
After a short stay in Cyprus, the Knights, with the assistance of the Genoese, occupied Rhodes. This was to be their home for the next two hundred years.
In Rhodes the Knights perfected the base for their orginization that was to make them the most effecient sea-borne warriors of their day.After wandering for seven years the Knights, and the Rhodian refugees that had attached themselves to them, were offered the Island of Malta for a home by the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V.To the relief of the Maltese Nobles, the Knights decided that Medina, the capital city, was too far inland and they set about establishing themselves in the small village that had grown up behind the old Castel a Mare.
In Birgu the Knights organized themselves along the lines they had evolved during their stay in Rhodes. Their philantropic origin was not forgotten and amongst the first building to be set up was a hospital.
The Order be described as a multi-national force divided into Langues according to the nationality of its members; these langues, or tongues, were: Auvergne, Provence, Germany and Italy. Each langue had its own Auberge, or headquarters, as well as a specific duty traditionally assigned to it; each langue was also responsible for the defence of a particular post, such as a section of a bastion or tower.
As if to prove the inadequacy of the defences of the islands, in 1547, and again in 1551, the Turks launched two attacks against the islands, the latter being particularly calamitous. Ravaging the Maltese countryside and ignoring the fortified towns, the Turks then turned their attention to the island of Gozo and carried away the entire population into slavery.
That same year the Turks drove the Knights out of Tripoli. these attacks stung the Knights into feverish activity to improve the islands' defences in anticipation of another, and possibly bigger, attack.

The Great Siege

"Nothing is better known than the siege of Malta" wrote Voltaire two hundred years after the event, and for the Maltese people today the statement still rings true.
The bare bones of the narrative are as follows: On the 18th May, 1565, the Ottoman Turks and their allies pitted 48,000 of their best troops against the islands with the intention of invading them, and afterwards to make a thrust into Southern Europe by way of Sicily and Italy.
Against them were drawn up some 8,000 men: 540 Knights; 4,000 Maltese; and the rest made up of Spanish and Italian mercenaries.
Landing unopposed, the first objective of the Turks was to secure a safe anchorage for their large invasion fleet, and with that in mind, launched their attack on St.Elmo. After a heroic resistance of thirtyone days the fort succumbed to the massive bombardment and continuous attacks of the Turks. After the fort had been reduced, the Ottomans turned their to the two badly fortified towns overlooking the harbour. Subjected to a ceaseless bombardment, and repulsing attack; behind the crumbling walls, the Christian forces, against all odds, kept the enemy at bay until a small relief force of some 8,000 troops arrived from Sicily (a smaller relief force of 600 men had previously landed at about the time that St.Elmo had fallen).
Totally demoralized, as the Turks were, by losses from disease, fire and steel, added to the fact that their supplies were running low, they were in no position to offer an effective resistance, and the Turks retreated never again to attempt another invasion in that part of the Mediterranean.