Melite was located on a strategically important plateau on high ground in the western part of the island of Malta.

[2] The Phoenicians founded the city of Ann[3][4][page needed] soon after they colonized the island, which shared its name,[5] around the 8th century BC.

In 218 BC, Roman consul Tiberius Sempronius Longus sailed with his fleet from Sicily to Ann, and the Carthaginian commander Hamilcar surrendered without offering much resistance.

The Greek and Roman names for the island had been taken from its chief port at Maleth, present-day Cospicua on the Grand Harbor.

According to tradition, the Mdina Cathedral was built on the site of the governor's residence, where Saint Paul cured Publius' father.

The temple had a tetrastyle portico, and a wall forming part of its podium still exists beneath present-day Villegaignon Street.

[20] According to Al-Himyarī's account, the island remained almost uninhabited until it was resettled in around 1048 or 1049 by a Muslim community and their slaves, who built a settlement called Medina on the site of Melite, making it "a finer place than it was before."

[20] However, archaeological evidence suggests that the city was already a thriving Muslim settlement by the beginning of the 11th century, so Al-Himyarī's account might be unreliable in this aspect.

[26] Very few remains of Melite still exist today, and no significant ruins of the city's temples, basilicas or triumphal arches have survived.

[29] The remains of a city gate or tower within the walls of Melite were discovered in Saqqajja in modern Rabat, about 5 m (16 ft) below the current street level.

[30] The lower foundations of some Punico-Roman ramparts, consisting of rusticated ashlar blocks three courses high still in situ, were unearthed in 2010 in excavations near the Magazine Curtain in the western part of Mdina.

These include a wall around Greeks Gate, and some stones which were discovered in excavations at Inguanez Street and the Xara Palace.

[32] Sections of a Roman road, cisterns, canals and other archaeological remains were discovered beneath Palazzo Castelletti in Rabat.

[17] The remains of other ancient buildings, as well as pottery, coins or other artifacts from the Bronze Age or Punico-Roman period, are still occasionally discovered in excavations or during construction projects in Mdina or Rabat.