St Paul's Catacombs

About this place

Malta's largest underground burial complex: the Rabat catacombs are a network of some thirty Roman cemeteries cut into the limestone between the third and eighth centuries — outside Mdina's walls, because Roman law forbade burial inside a city, so this whole underground field became the city's graveyard. What distinguishes them is the coexistence they record: pagan, Christian and Jewish burials side by side in the same complex, told apart by their carved symbols (the seven-branched menorah in the Jewish tombs) — rare evidence of a multi-faith society in Roman Malta. Their most famous feature is the agape tables: circular tables cut from the rock where families sat to eat the memorial meal beside their dead. The route is lit and fitted with walkways, and the underground temperature is a relief in summer — with an audio guide included to explain what you are seeing.