Gozo's largest watchtower, built 110 years after the Ottomans shipped 5000 people from here. Cost 857 scudi and has a drawbridge.
Brothers, we stand before a tower that was built from shame.
110 Years Too Late
In 1551, the Ottomans took five thousand people from Gozo. They loaded them onto ships in the cove at our feet and sailed away. No one stopped them, because there was nothing to stop them with.
It took 110 years for someone to decide that perhaps a watchtower here might be prudent.
In June 1661 — after over a century of deliberation, which the Order considers "exceptionally swift administrative tempo" — the Mġarr ix-Xini Tower was erected. Designed by Mederico Blondel. Cost: 857 scudi, allocated by the Università di Gozo from its budget. We do not know how long the budget vote took, but we suspect longer than the 1551 siege itself.
The Architecture of Fear
The tower is the largest coastal watchtower on Gozo. Square-planned, two floors, thick defensive walls. But its real innovation? A drawbridge.
Other towers of the Order had rope ladders that the garrison pulled up. Here: a full drawbridge. The Order proudly notes that someone finally understood that a front door should be retractable.*
Garrison: a castellan and a professional bombardier. Two men to guard a canyon that once swallowed five thousand. The Order declines to comment on the ratio.
Four That Survived
Of the dozen-odd watchtowers on Gozo, four survived: this one, Xlendi, Dwejra, and Isopu. The Mġarr ix-Xini Tower was restored by Wirt Għawdex — an organization the Order regards as modern-day knights. Without armor, but with grant application forms.
Today the tower is open to the public. The view from the top encompasses the entire canyon — from clifftop to pebble beach. The same view the bombardier was supposed to watch, scanning for Ottoman sails.
He never saw a single one. The Ottomans never returned.
Does that mean the tower worked? Or that 857 scudi were spent on the most expensive viewpoint on Gozo? The Order declines to answer.
*The Admiral suggests the drawbridge was "an excessive investment." The Order reminds the Admiral about 1551. The Admiral goes quiet.