Comino

Comino (Maltese: Kemmuna) is a small island of the Maltese archipelago between the islands of Malta and Gozo in the Mediterranean Sea, measuring 3.5 square kilometres (1.4 sq mi) in area. Named after the cumin seed, the island has a permanent population of only two residents and is part of the municipality of Għajnsielem, in southeastern Gozo, from where one priest and one policeman commute. The island is a bird sanctuary and nature reserve (Natura 2000 marine protected area).

The island has a karst landscape supporting sclerophyllous shrubland. Some limited afforestation with pine trees has been carried out. The sand-dunes at Santa Maria bay retain some native vegetation, including Vitex and Tamarix trees. The island has been identified as an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International because it supports fifty to eighty breeding pairs of yelkouan shearwaters.

Formerly called Ephaestia (Ἡφαιστεία in Ancient Greek), Comino is known to have been inhabited by farmers during Roman times, but for long periods in its history it has been sparsely populated, privately owned, or abandoned entirely. Its rugged coastline is delineated by sheer limestone cliffs, and dotted with deep caves which were popular with pirates and marauders in the Middle Ages. The caves and coves of Comino were frequently used as staging posts for raids on hapless boats crossing between Malta and Gozo. From 1285 until some time after 1290, Comino was the home of exiled Jewish prophet and Kabbalist Abraham Abulafia. It was on Comino that Abulafia composed his Sefer ha-Ot (The Book of the Sign), and his last work, Imre Shefer (Words of Beauty).

In later years, the Knights of Malta used this island as hunting and recreational grounds. The Knights were fiercely protective of the local game, which consisted of wild boar and hares (Maltese: fenek tal-grixti): upon conviction, poachers were liable to a penalty of three years as a galley slave. In the 16th and 17th centuries, Comino served as a place of imprisonment or exile for errant knights. Knights who were convicted of minor crimes were occasionally sentenced to the lonely and dangerous task of manning St. Mary's Tower.

During the French occupation of Malta, Comino served as a quarantine and existing buildings served as an isolation hospital. The island served as a temporary prison site before a decision on the accused was taken.

On 6 March 1889 the British battleship HMS Sultan grounded on an uncharted rock in the Comino Channel, ripping her bottom open. She slowly flooded and, in a gale on 14 March 1889 she slipped off the rock and sank. The Italian firm of Baghino & Co raised her in August 1889 for a fee of £50,000. On 27 August, Sultan was brought into Malta.

In the 1920s, the island was leased by the British colonial government to the Zammit Cutajar family, which established the Comino Farming Company. Around 162 hectares (400 acres) of land were brought under cultivation, growing various crops and fruit orchards as well as snails which were exported to Italy. The island's population peaked at around 80 people in the late 1940s, including a number of migrants from Sicily. The island had no electricity and the population largely engaged in subsistence farming, as well as fishing and bird-hunting.

Among the interconnected farming families who sustained this community were the Said, Buttigieg, and Vella lines, originating from northern Malta and Gozo, who cultivated terraced fields (*rdumien*) of onions, potatoes, figs, and barley, raised pigs, and maintained rainwater wells and the island's chapel. Notable figures included Joseph "San Pawl" Said (b. 1889, d. after 1939), a tenant farmer under the Comino Farming Company, and his wife Vangelista Calleja (b. 1886, d. 1939); their daughter Carmela (Maria Dolores) Said (b. 1915, d. 1969) married Salvu Buttigieg (b. 1920, d. 1985) from Nadur, Gozo. Their children, including Evangelista "Veggie" Buttigieg (b. c. 1940s),Francis Buttigieg and Joseph Buttigieg, carried on these traditions, with Veggie remaining one of Comino's two permanent residents as of 2025, alongside Salvu Vella. These families, numbering around 17 in the early 20th century, dwindled to three by the 2010s due to emigration and tourism, preserving Comino's isolated way of life without electricity until the 1950s.