The papers reprinted in this volume focus on the extraordinary and multifaceted relationship between two Christian States: the Republic of Venice and the Island Order State on Hospitaller Malta between 1530 and the late 1790s. It was marked by three distinct phenomena – military cooperation along with other Western allies against the Ottoman Empire; direct mutual confrontation, at times even leading to war; and commercial cooperation. A fourth phenomenon, this time involving the wider Mediterranean context within which the two interacted, concerns the idea of decline. Some of the papers that follow question the validity of the traditional view that the Mediterranean and Venice were in decline by the sixteenth century and that the Hospitaller Order, claimed to be in decline by the eighteenth, had given up Malta to the French as a result. This book will appeal to all those interested in Crusading Orders and the history of the Crusades, as well as the history of Venice, Malta, and the Mediterranean in the early modern period.

The book is a dedicated account of the history of medicine practiced in Early Modern Malta when the Islands were managed by the Order of Saint John of Jerusalem. The changing patterns of disease throughout the 16th to 18th centuries and the response to managing these conditions are reviewed. The nook further looks at the legislative efforts introduced to control disease, the educational endeavors undertaken to improve the standards of care, and the social welfare systems adopted to better the lives of the population.

The Maltese Dialogue is the first comprehensive treatise of the history, institutions, and political projects of the Order of the Knights of Saint John of the Hospital, commonly known as the Maltese Order. It was written during the tenure of Grand Master Fra Claude de la Sengle (1553-1557), although the conversation between Commendator Fra Giuseppe Cambiano, one of the Order’s most prominent sixteenth-century functionaries, and three Venetian patricians, on which the Dialogue is based, may have taken place even earlier. The contents of the Dialogue fall in three categories: the opening section is the first detailed precis of the Hospitallers’ history; then comes the bulk of the treatise, presenting a concise summary of the Order’s constitution, institutional and legal organization, election procedures, recruitment of knights, rituals of instalment, and financial matters. The remaining section is a polemical expose arguing for the benefit of the Order’s abandoning of Malta and the recapturing of Tripoli. The Dialogue offers a hitherto unexplored, first-rate source on the Maltese knights’ self-projection as a unique transnational institution of early modern Europe in the era of nation-states, on the power plays of the major political agents in the sixteenth-century Mediterranean, and on Western Christian strategies of engagement of Ottoman imperialism at the peak of its expansion in the region. Those interested in the history of Christian-Muslim interaction, the evolution of crusading practices in the era of early modern predatory warfare, and the construction of historical memory on the case study of the longest-lasting, and still extant, knightly order, will find it to be a highly intriguing and informative reading.

Modern study of the Hospitallers, of other military-religious orders, and of their activities both in the Mediterranean and in Europe has been deeply influenced by the work of Anthony Luttrell. To mark his 75th birthday in October 2007 twenty-three colleagues from ten different countries have contributed to this volume. The first section focuses on the crusading period in the Holy Land, considering the Hospital in Jerusalem, relations with the Assassins, finances, indulgences, transportation and the careers of the brothers and knights. The second and third sections move to the later Middle Ages, when the Hospitallers had their centre on Rhodes, and military and charitable activities in the East had to be supported with men and money from the West. The papers in the second section consider the Hospitallers on Rhodes, relations between Rhodes and the West and plans for crusades, while the third section includes papers on the Hospitallers in the Iberian Peninsula and in Hungary, the territorial administration of the Order of Montesa in Valencia, a plan to transfer the headquarters of the Teutonic Order from Prussia to Frisia, and a Hospitaller reconsideration of warfare and learning on the eve of the council of Trent. The final paper proposes new definitions and guidelines for future work on the military-religious orders. The authors include both well-known experts and younger scholars who promise to follow in the footsteps of Anthony Luttrell and to continue research into the Hospitallers and their fellow orders, these peculiar European communities avant la lettre.

This short study of the history of the Order of St John of Jerusalem, Rhodes and Malta, also known as the Knights Hospitaller, is intended as an introduction to the Order for academics working in other fields, as well as the interested general reader. Beginning with a consideration of the origins of the Order as a hospice for pilgrims in Jerusalem in the eleventh century, it traces the Hospitaller's development into a military order during the first part of the 12th century, and its military activities on the frontiers of Christendom in the eastern Mediterranean, Spain and eastern Europe during the middle ages and into early modern period: its role in crusades and in wars against non-Christians on land and at sea, as well as its role in building and maintaining fortresses.