Ggantija Temples
The awe-inspiring megalithic compex of Ggantija was erected
in three stages over a period of several hundred years (c. 3600-3000 BC) by the
community of farmers and herders inhabiting the small and isolated island of
Gozo (Malta) at the centre of the Mediterranean.
Ggantija consists of two temple units built side by side
enclosed within a single massive boundary wall, and sharing the same
façade. Both temples have a single and
central doorway, opening onto a common and spacious forecourt that is in turn
raised on a high terrace. Rituals of
life and fertility seem to have been practiced within these precincts, while
the sophisticated architectural achievements reveal that something really
exceptional was taking place in the Maltese Islands more than five thousand
years ago.
The complex stayed in use for about one thousand years, down
to the mid-third millennium BC, when the Maltese Temple Culture disappeared
abruptly and mysteriously. Eventually,
the successive inhabitants of the Early Bronze Age (2500-1500 BC) adopted the
site as a cremation cemetery.
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Way cool
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