Mourning clothes

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"The wearing of special mourning clothes was general in the fourteenth century, but became less marked by the year 1700. Women used to wear woollen trailing skirts and dark shawls over their heads. Some better-class people wore one black transparent veil over the head and another veil of black silk taffeta over the gown, reaching to the waist. A sort of Majorca woollen cloth is prescribed for mourning wear to the heirs under a will of A.D. 1543.

The Grand Master's suite wore a special garment called Scoto, of thin light serge. Although it is nowadays customary with some families to put on as little mourning as possible and to shorten its period, a full mourning dress is worn by others for two full years after the death of parents. The simplest style of mourning, a black necktie and a crape arm band, is in general use after the death of a distant relative".

Old Maltese practices



Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson



"The following are the most characteristic features of existing Maltese practices, many of which are comparable to those of Sicily, while a few show some Eastern influence :-

(a) The washing of the dead body before shrouding. This is not a religious rite, and has no connection with that of Islam.

(b) The shutting of the eyelids, if open, and the raising of the chin by means of a band, usually a white kerchief, tied on the head.

(c) The removal of door knockers and knobs; house doors are kept closed for several days; neighbours half-shut their own".

Lamps and lights

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"An oil lamp is often lit and left for forty days before the Crucifix or image of the Madonna in the death chamber. This is supposed to please the soul of the departed, whose ghost is in this way prevented from haunting the house. In some of the Gozo villages the persons attending the corpse to the burial- ground return in procession after the funeral mass to the room of the deceased, where they kneel down and say the rosary before the Crucifix, placed on a chest covered with white cloth, and between two lighted candles which are afterwards replaced by the devotional oil lamps".

Borma tal-Fqdr

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"Some families give the poor bread. The love-feasts of the primitive Christians were in mediaeval times replaced in both Malta and Sicily by the distribution of cakes and of boiled wheat mixed with sesame. Distributions of meat and bread to the poor came also to be a custom at some festas, but were continued in Sicily mainly by the giving of beans and bread on All Souls' Day. In Malta on that day, however, the old custom has been replaced by the free kitchens or the "Potage for the Poor" (Borma tal-Fqdr)".

Vistu

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"Mourning customs in Malta have during the last century passed through wide changes and, as in other European coun- tries, have reverted to a more simple type. Some are purely mediaeval, and are influenced by the prolonged intercourse with Sicily and Italy during the rule of the Grand Masters. The vernacular term for mourning is vistu, corresponding to the Sicilian visitusu (" to be in mourning ")".

Mourning dinners

Maltese Death, Mourning, and Funeral Customs
A. Cremona
"Folklore"  Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec. 31, 1923)

© Godric Godricson

"Old custom prohibited cooking for three days, and the family of the deceased was provided with meals by friends or distant relatives. This rule was, and perhaps is still, followed in some districts of Sicily and amongst Arab tribes of Northern Africa. While meals were being served the bereaved family sat with folded legs on the floor, which was covered with a straw mat. The historian Ciantar relates in 1772 that these mourning dinners still took place in his early days. This custom has now been discontinued, and our village people merely abstain from having their pastry and other food prepared in a public oven for a period of some months after the death of a member of the family".