Il-Gardjola Guard Tower

From when the Knights of St. John controlled the islands of Malta in 1530 to after they were removed by Napoleonic forces in 1798, they embarked on multiple construction projects across the archipelago. Some of these projects focused on municipal buildings for the general populace, while others were defensive fortifications.

The Knights of St. John initially settled in and worked to fortify the area around two peninsulas known as the Three Cities on the south side of the Grand Harbor in Malta. In the 1550s, Grand Master Claude de la Sengle oversaw the foundation of a town on the peninsula called Isla (now also commonly called Senglea) on one of these peninsulas.  This included laying out the streets in a grid pattern and constructing fortifications around the peninsula, which were quite important during the 1565 siege of Malta by the Ottoman Empire.

At the northwesternmost tip of Senglea, the Grand Master laid out a small garden area at the top of the walls. At the very tip of the gardens, he built a guard tower (or vedette) that overlooks the harbor. This tower included depictions of eyes, ears, and cranes representing guardianship and watchfulness.

While the tower originally served as a useful military lookout point, the tower today is an underrated tourist destination offering excellent views of the harbor. The eyes and ears of this tower make it one of the most easily identifiable parts of Malta’s fortifications, so it is often pointed out during tours of the area, and the tower has also now become a symbolic landmark for the Three Cities.