Thursday, April 26, 2007
Floriana Granaries 'il-Fosos'
The knights of St.John built underground granaries known in Maltese as 'il-fosos', to store wheat as near possible to their centres of activity in the main harbour. The Floriana granaries are the most famous. These were capable of storing 57328 'salma' (equivalent to around 290,000 litres). These were still in use hundreds of years later, especially during world war II when food supplies brought by escorted convoys were at the mercy of the German and Italian warplane and warships.
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5 comments:
Thats an amazing piece of Maltese history and what an excellent idea to store Wheat and stuff.. thanx 4 that little local history lesson
Oh my, thank you for the explanation. What a marvelous undertaking to build them in the first place and to have them still in use during the war. Wow. Thanks for the post and explanation and enabling me to learn more about Maltese history.
I took some rainy-day photographs, yesterday, that are very unusual. You might be interested in seeing them.
Abraham Lincoln
Brookville Daily Photo
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Dear Dina - found your foto & explanation through Explorer & they were exactly what I was looking for - esp the photo - as an illustration for an English poem of mine, called 'Granary'. I was brought up in Floriana, and was wondering if I could use your photo to illustrate my metaphors till someone snaps a photo for me. I have published 5 collections of poetry, 3 in Maltese and 2 in English, and apart frpm Maltese and English, some have been translated into 9 other languages. My email address is maria.ganado@gmail.com - I could send you the poem if you'd like to see it. Thanks a lot - maria
I've just seen this - fantastic.... just what I needed by way of explanation for my foreign freinds. I was saying we have a hiostory of digging underground or using places beneath the ground; the Hypogeum, wartime shelters, the Catacombs, and this... as well as the pizzeria in Valletta, of course...
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