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Marking European Archeology Days with three exciting events
Photo: miro.medium.com
Heritage Malta is marking European Archeology Days, which are held in the 47 member countries of the Council of Europe, with three exciting events between the 18 and 21 of June.
What’s on the schedule, we hear you ask? There’ll be guided tours to celebrate the Summer Solstice, informal question and answer sessions with a senior curator and to top it all of, a special opening of the St Augustine’s Catacombs.
The Summer Solstice guided tours will be taking place at sunrise, at Mnajdra and Ħaġar Qim, with tours at the former being held on the 19, 20 and 21 of June and tours at the latter on the 20 and 21 of June. Both sets of tours will give visitors the opportunity to watch the annual spectacle of the first rays of the rising sun, heralding the start of a new summer.
Tickets for Mnajdra are €30 a pop, but €20 for Heritage Malta members. For the Ħaġar Qim event, tickets are €25 each, with a reduced price of €15 for members. Ticket holders are invited to meet at 5:30am outside the Ħaġar Qim and Mnajdra visitor centre.
Moving on to the question and answer sessions, which will be held on Friday 18 June, at the National Museum of Archeology. During the sessions, called Ask the Curator, senior curator Sharon Sultana will be answering questions posed by participants, as they view select artefacts from the Maltese Neolithic period, and visit the intriguing Alien Headaches exhibition, which is displaying the Ħal Saflieni Hypogeum skulls. There will be two sessions, one in maltese at 10am and another in English at 2pm. Tickets are selling at €5 per person for this event.
Next up: the special opening of the St Augustine’s Catacombs, which will be taking place on Sunday 20 June. This should definitely not be missed, as the site is usually closed off to the public. The catacombs, just a stone’s throw away from St Paul’s Catacombs in Rabat, are a group of small, interconnected hypogea, each with its own distinct features. There will be two tours of the catacombs taking place, one in Maltese at 10am and another in English at noon, at €5 per person.
Photo: Heritage Malta
Photo: Heritage Malta
Tickets for the European Archeology Days events can be bought from all heritage Malta sites and museums, as well as from the Heritage Malta website here.
Due to COVID-19 restrictions, ticket numbers are limited and pre-booking is essential. All attendees must wear a face mask and respect social distancing measures.
