Museum of the Order of Saint John

The building you are approaching, St John's Gate, is the last remaining entrance to what was once a sprawling, ten-acre medieval monastic precinct. Built in 1504 by Prior Thomas Docwra, it served as the grand southern gateway for the Knights Hospitaller, a powerful religious and military order that managed hospitals for pilgrims in Jerusalem and later defended Mediterranean trade routes from their base in Malta. The gatehouse was the administrative heart of their English operations until the Reformation, when the crown seized the property and scattered the knights.