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HISTORICAL NOTE
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Gozo's history is twined up in the general story of its sister Island of Malta. As a result, Gozo shared the same influences of cultures bestowed on by the number of dominators and events that touched the Maltese Islands during the last seven thousand years.
 Until now, pre-historic archaeological remains in the Maltese Islands date back to some 5000 B.C. and the oldest ones were discovered in Gozo. This makes sense when one considers that man first arrived in Malta from Sicily, being the closest land, just over 88 kilometres to the North of Gozo. In this early age, man had enough skill and courage to construct the Ġgantija temples that we find in Xagħra, and other Neolithic temples dating between 4100-2500 BC.
 History starts with the Phoenicians, the famous Mediterranean traders from today's Lebanon who introduced cloth dyeing and maritime trade. Their close relatives, the Carthaginians, superseded them and, after the three Punic Wars, our islands became part of the Roman Empire. The Roman era had also followed a brief period of Greek influence. The Romans introduced the code of law and used our islands as a hub for honey and olive oil exports.
 Christianity was brought to Malta and Gozo in 60 A.D. by St. Paul, but was consolidated under the Byzantines, from the Eastern Roman Empire. In the late 9th Century A.D. the Arabs after taking Sicily took control of the Maltese Islands. They introduced the Water Mill and the cotton plant that proved to be the mainstay of the islands' economy for centuries to come. The Arabs influenced our present language, gave us the present names of Malta and Ghawdex (Gozo), together with the oldest village and family names.
The Normans re-established Christianity in Malta and Gozo in 1090. Then followed a period when the new masters of the  Maltese islands came, in turn, from the aristocracy of Germany, France and Spain: the Swabians (1194); the Angouvins (1268); the Aragonese (1283) and finally, the Castilians (1410). The two islands were often leased in fiefdoms, the same as the contemporary feudal system practised throughout Europe. There are few records about this feudal period, but in Gozo, the Angouvins had a cemetery in today's Victoria, where various French nobles and crusader casualties were believed to be buried. Several tombstones and artefacts from the period were saved from destruction and could still be found at the Museum of Archaeology in Victoria.
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