St George's Basilica is a Baroque parish church located in the heart of Victoria in a small square surrounded by a maze of old narrow streets and alleys. The present church building was built between 1672 and 1678. The local parish appeared much earlier - during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Theodosius I. On the site of the present basilica then stood the main pagan temple of the island of Gozo, which was transformed by a Greek missionary into a Christian church, named in honour of St. George. During the Middle Ages, the church was rebuilt several times as it could no longer accommodate all the worshippers. In the documents of 1511 this church is considered to be the parish church of the whole island of Gozo. In the middle of the 16th century, the local priest Lorenzo de Apapis was captured by the Ottomans, who severely damaged the church. The priest managed to return home a few years later and rebuild St George's Church.
The Grand Master of the Order of Malta, Alof de Vignacourt, in 1603 ordered Vittorio Cassar to demolish all the buildings in Victoria that could serve as an outpost for the enemy to attack the local citadel. St George's Church also made the list. It began to be rebuilt in 1672. At that time it was the largest Christian church on the island and the first local church built in the shape of a Latin cross.
The new church had a rich exterior and interior decoration, which is why it is often referred to as marble or gold. The artist Gian Battista Conti worked on the painting of the ceiling and dome. The interior of the church is decorated with paintings and sculptures by Mattia Preti, Giuseppe d`Arena, Stefano Erardi, Alessio Erardi, Francesco V. Zahra, and Giuseppe Cali.
