Malta
Malta (/ˈmɒltə/ ⓘ MOL-tə, /ˈmɔːltə/ MAWL-tə, Maltese: [ˈmɐːltɐ]), officially the Republic of Malta,[14] is an island country in southern Europe, located in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago between Italy, Tunisia and Libya.[15] It lies 80 km (50 mi) south of Sicily and Italy, 284 km (176 mi) east of Tunisia,[16] and 333 km (207 mi) north of Libya.[17] The two official languages are Maltese, the only Semitic language in Europe and the European Union, and English. The nation's capital is Valletta.
This article is about the country. For other uses, see Malta (disambiguation).
Republic of MaltaRepubblika ta' Malta (Maltese)
Maltese Sign Language[3]
Italian (66% conversational)
- 88.5% Christianity
- 82.6% Catholicism (official)
- 5.9% other Christian
- 88.5% Christianity
- 5.1% no religion
- 3.9% Islam
- 1.4% Hinduism
- 1.1% other
21 September 1964
13 December 1974
1 May 2004
0.001
519,562[8]
1,649/km2 (4,270.9/sq mi) (8th)
2023 estimate
2023 estimate
28.0[10]
low
UTC+1 (Central European Time)
UTC+2 (Central European Summer Time)
dd/mm/yyyy[b]
left
With a population of about 519,000[8] over an area of 316 km2 (122 sq mi),[7] Malta is the tenth-smallest country by area[18][19] and the fifth most densely populated sovereign country. Its capital is Valletta, the smallest national capital in the European Union by area and population. According to 2020 data by Eurostat, the Functional Urban Area and metropolitan region covered the whole island and has a population of 480,134.[20][21] According to the United Nations, ESPON and EU Commission, "the whole territory of Malta constitutes a single urban region".[22][23] Malta increasingly is referred to as a city-state.[24][25][26]
Malta has been inhabited since approximately 5900 BC.[27] Its location in the centre of the Mediterranean[28] has historically given it great strategic importance as a naval base, with a succession of powers having contested and ruled the islands, including the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Normans, Aragonese, Knights of St. John, French, and British.[29] While Christianity has been present since the time of the early Christians, Malta was predominantly a Muslim country under Arab rule during the early Middle Ages. Muslim rule ended with the Norman invasion of Malta by Roger I in 1091. Malta became a British colony in 1813, serving as the headquarters for the British Mediterranean Fleet. It was besieged by the Axis powers during World War II and was an important Allied base for operations in North Africa and the Mediterranean.[30][31] The British parliament passed the Malta Independence Act in 1964, giving Malta independence, with Elizabeth II as its queen.[32] The country became a republic in 1974. It has been a member state of the Commonwealth of Nations and the United Nations since independence, and joined the European Union in 2004; it became part of the eurozone monetary union in 2008. Malta is also closely tied historically and culturally to Italy and especially Sicily, with between 62 and 66 percent of Maltese people speaking or having significant knowledge of the Italian language, which was one of the official languages of Malta until 1934.[33][34]
Catholicism is the state religion, but the Constitution of Malta guarantees freedom of conscience and religious worship.[35][36] The economy of Malta is heavily reliant on tourism, and the country promotes itself as a Mediterranean tourist destination with its warmer climate compared to the rest of Europe, numerous recreational areas, and architectural and historical monuments, including three UNESCO World Heritage Sites: Ħal Saflieni Hypogeum,[37] Valletta,[38] and seven megalithic temples which are some of the oldest free-standing structures in the world.[39][40][41]
Name[edit]
The English name Malta derives from Italian and Maltese Malta, from medieval Arabic Māliṭā (مَالِطَا), from classical Latin Melita,[42] from latinised or Doric forms[43] of the ancient Greek Melítē (Μελίτη) of uncertain origin. The name Melítē—shared by the Croatian island Mljet in antiquity—literally means "place of honey" or "sweetness", derived from the combining form of méli (μέλι, "honey" or any similarly sweet thing)[44] and the suffix -ē (-η). The ancient Greeks may have given the island this name after Malta's endemic subspecies of bees.[45] Alternatively, other scholars argue for derivation of the Greek name from a transcription of an original Phoenician or Punic Maleth (𐤌𐤋𐤈, mlṭ), meaning "haven"[46] or "port"[47] in reference to the Grand Harbour and its primary settlement at Cospicua following the sea level rise that separated the Maltese islands and flooded its original coastal settlements in the 10th century BC.[48] The name was then applied to all of Malta by the Greeks and to its ancient capital at Mdina by the Romans.[48]
Malta and its demonym Maltese are attested in English from the late 16th century.[49] The Greek name appears in the Book of Acts in the Bible's New Testament.[50] English translations including the 1611 King James Version long used the Vulgate Latin form Melita, although William Tyndale's 1525 translation from Greek sources used the transliteration Melite instead. Malta is widely used in more recent versions. The name is attested earlier in other languages, however, including some medieval manuscripts of the Latin Antonine Itinerary.[51]
