Birgu

Birgu — officially Vittoriosa — is a compact fortified peninsula on the Grand Harbour, facing Valletta, and one of Malta's oldest continuously inhabited settlements. The Knights of St John made it their first Maltese headquarters in the 1530s, fortifying Fort Sant'Angelo as their convent; during the Great Siege of 1565 they held off the Ottoman fleet from these very walls, a defining moment in both Maltese and European history. Narrow cobblestone alleys wind past the Inquisitor's Palace, the only intact Inquisition tribunal building surviving anywhere in the world, now open as a museum. The waterfront promenade offers one of the Mediterranean's most dramatic harbour panoramas, with the baroque skyline of Valletta directly across the water.