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[The Jesuit Father Caspar] had learned of the Specula leafing through the papers of a deceased brother, who in turn had learnt of it from another brother who during a voyage to the most noble island of Malta ... had heard praise of this instrument constructed by order of the Most Eminent Prince Johannes Paulus Lascaris, Grand Master of the famous Knights.
What the Specula was like, no one had ever seen. 1
The reference to the mysterious Specula is how Umberto Eco introduces yet another twist in his novel L'isola del giorno prima (1994). The tale relates to a young seventeenth-century Italian shipwrecked at a point where he straddles the date meridian. The novel is interspersed with references to the knights of Malta and the Jesuits. 2 The fictitious and multi-talented Father Caspar is an echo of Father Athanasius Kircher SJ who was in Malta between May 1637 and early 1638. During his stay, Kircher is reputed to have built this wonderful machine called the Specula Melitensis Encyclica (variously translated as 'the Maltese Observatory' or 'the circular Maltese mirror'), which had 125 different uses. 3 It is easy to see how such an invention captured Eco's imagination in a novel where the characters were seeking the means for more precise calculation of, and possibly control over, time itself. The Kircherian moment in Malta was but one side of a multi-faceted relationship between the Society of Jesus and the military-religious Order of Malta (whose members were known as the hospitallers); a relationship characterized by shared aims and extensive co-operation, as well as by highly critical voices from within the Order of Malta at the perceived over-bearing influence of the Jesuits. This is a case-study highlighting the workings of the Society of Jesus, before and after its temporary expulsion from Malta during the dramatic Carnival of 1639. Although the main theatre of action to be discussed here will be the small and particular setting of the island of Malta during the seventeenth century, the international dimension of both the Society and the Order, and the issues dealt with here, have a wider resonance for early modern Europe. The aim of this contribution is to move away from the dominant...