page_title: St Paul's Cathedral, Mdina
section_title: Interior
hierarchical_section_title: St Paul's Cathedral, Mdina / Architecture / Interior
caption_attribution_description: St. Paul's Cathedral in Mdina
context_page_description: The Metropolitan Cathedral of Saint Paul, commonly known as St Paul's Cathedral or the Mdina Cathedral, is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Mdina, Malta, dedicated to St. Paul the Apostle. The cathedral was founded in the 12th century, and according to tradition it stands on the site of where Roman governor Publius met St. Paul following his shipwreck on Malta. The original cathedral was severely damaged in the 1693 Sicily earthquake, so it was dismantled and rebuilt in the Baroque style to a design of the Maltese architect Lorenzo Gafà between 1696 and 1705. The cathedral is regarded as Gafà's masterpiece.
  The cathedral is the seat of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Malta, and since the 19th century this function has been shared with St. John's Co-Cathedral in Valletta.
context_section_description: The cathedral has a Latin cross plan consisting of a vaulted nave, two aisles and two side chapels. Most of the cathedral's floor consists of inlaid tombstones or commemorative marble slabs, similar to those found at St. John's Co-Cathedral in Valletta and the Cathedral of the Assumption in Victoria, Gozo. The remains of several bishops and canons, as well as laymen from noble families, are buried in the cathedral.
  The ceiling contains frescoes depicting the life of St. Paul which were painted by the Sicilian painters Vincenzo, Antonio and Francesco Manno in 1794. The Manno brothers also painted frescoes on the dome, but these were destroyed during repair works after an earthquake in 1856. A new fresco was painted on the dome by Giuseppe Gallucci in 1860, and it was later restored by Giuseppe Calì. Gallucci's and Calì's paintings were destroyed due to urgent repair works in 1927, and they were later replaced by a fresco depicting The Glory of St Peter and St Paul by Mario Caffaro Rore. The ceiling was restored by Samuel Bugeja in 1956. The church is lit up by three stained glass windows which were produced in Victor Gesta's workshop in the late 19th century.
  Many artifacts from the pre-1693 cathedral survived the earthquake and were reused to decorate the new cathedral. These include a late Gothic–early Renaissance baptismal font dating back to 1495, the old cathedral's main door which was made in 1530, some 15th-century choir stalls, as well as a number of paintings.
  The cathedral's aisles, chapels and sacristy contain several paintings and frescoes, including works by Mattia Preti and his bottega, Francesco Grandi, Domenico Bruschi, Pietro Gagliardi, Bartolomeo Garagona, Francesco Zahra, Luigi Moglia and Alessio Erardi. The titular altarpiece depicts the Conversion of St Paul on the Road to Damascus, and it is the work of Mattia Preti.
  Some of the marble used to decorate the cathedral was taken from the Roman ruins of Carthage and Melite. Sculptors and other artists whose work decorates the cathedral include Giuseppe Valenti, Claudio Durante, Alessandro Algardi and Vincent Apap.
caption: The cathedral's frescoed interior
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