Where do the Maltese come from?

It turns out that the Maltese did not descend from the Phoenicians after all, with a large swathe of the country’s DNA confirming that we owe our roots to Sicilian settlers with a strong Arab sub-culture.

This and other striking facts have now come to light thanks to the work of Prof. Alex Felice, Dr Joseph Borg and Clint Mizzi of the University of Malta, who spoke to the University of Malta’s THINK Magazine about a three-year project that aims to trace the intricacies of the Maltese genome. 

But far from the kind of nationalistic jingoism that this kind of research sometimes plays into – which, in light of Brexit, is both a tempting and dangerous meme to tap into – the researchers are basing their work on medical data, whose ultimate aim is not to indulge in some romantic notions of the country’s past, but nitty-gritty concerns like avoiding the spread of diseases. 

Based on 25 years of research but bolstered by new technology, the Maltese Genome Project was launched in 2015, and aims to map the genomes of 1% of the Maltese population – that’s 4,000 people – so as to pin down rare diseases we may have inherited over time, and be in a more informed position to look into new therapies for them. 

One of the more interesting things to emerge from the still-ongoing research is the fact that, contrary to popular belief, the Maltese can boast little to no connection to a long-standing Phoenician heritage. Trumpeted loudly back in 2004 in a National Geographic interview, the claim has seized the public imagination but subsequent research has revealed the methodology to be faulty. 

Taking their cue from early results of a Y chromosome study which suggested that 50% of Maltese men may be of Phoenician origin, researchers then sought equivalents in contemporary places – basing their work on haplogroups in modern-day Lebanese people. Stone Age farmers in Greece, Crete and Southern Italy were discovered to carry the same piece of DNA, as did the Maltese. However, not only was this a small imprint – it could also have been left behind by others, such as Stone Age ancestors. 

Having collaborated on a study published in the Annals of Human Genetics in 2004, Prof. Felice zoned in on Y chromosome haplogroups found across the Mediterranean, and spotted some key commonalities. 

“Data on Mitochondrial DNA [from the ongoing Maltese Genome Project] is also nearly complete but what we have also points in the same direction [as the previous study]: that most contemporary Maltese males and females can trace their ancestry to Sicily and [Southern] Italy around 1,000 years ago,” according to Felice, who added that Middle Eastern DNA – including Lebanese DNA – contributed less than 5% to Maltese DNA. 

Instead, Felice elaborates, it’s the influx of people from Arab-ruled Sicily to Malta at the turn of the first millennium, which proved to be more significant. And while Count Roger II would eventually dispel the Arab invaders and establish Norman rule, Malta’s population would continue to be filled out by Sicilians with strong Arab connections.

“There was still a strong Arab subculture in Sicily and Southern Italy. If you go to the small villages outside Sicilian towns today they speak very differently to modern Italians, not too different from what we call Maltese. These people began to inhabit Malta, although there were only around 20,000 people up to 1500 AD,” Felice said. 

With the arrival of the Order of St John on the island, Felice notes that Malta then underwent a period of unprecedented public hygiene and prosperity, which paved the way to population growth – which in turn led to the mushrooming of a number of rare diseases. He also notes that the various peoples – usually military groups who would stop over for a relatively brief period of time – would all leave various genetic imprints that would deviate from the foundation – for better or worse. 

The research of the Maltese Genome Project grants special attention to this kind of population growth and the variations brought about by these ‘short stay’ foreigners, because tracing them would give us further clues as to how to treat certain diseases. And in fact, the research into these mutations has further proven the Y chromosome and mitochondrial DNA studies in Malta, because the same mutations were also discovered in Sicily and Southern Italy.

Illustration by Sonya Hallett

DNA: Some important facts

Evolutionary genetics that look into our distant past rely on two genetic markers. The first is mitochondrial DNA. This DNA is distinct from the rest of our DNA found in the cell nucleus. Mitochondrial DNA is found in small energy producing factories known as mitochondria – if they stop working, death follows quickly. 

These are inherited only from one’s mother and only transmitted through daughters. By looking at specific parts of the mitochondrial DNA (known as haplogroups, that remain largely unchanged over time so are shared worldwide) researchers are able to trace ancestry through the female lineage. 

The second is the Y chromosome. Human DNA is broken up into 46 chunks known as chromosomes, with each parent contributing half. Gender is determined by two chromosomes known as X and Y. XX makes a female, XY makes a male. The combination depends on one’s father. The Y chromosome also has haplogroups, making it a useful genetic marker for evolutionary studies on men’s origins.

Source: THINK Magazine (April 2016) | University of Malta