ABSTRACT
The medical aspects of the death-bed scenes are valuable because although the medical work of the order was so important, the records are poor in the respect for both the Rhodes and the Malta periods. The second valuable aspect of these death-bed scenes is the increasing light they shed on the secular position both in Rhodes and Malta, as the rituals surrounding the death and burial of the head of state were worked out. The Council scribes frequently give accounts of last illnesses, events surrounding the last days of the Masters, and funerary ritual. The acquisition of Rhodes by the Order of St. John gave the grand master a small state to govern as well as a religious order to administer. Giovanni Battista Orsini's successor, Pierre d'Aubusson, was one of the longest serving grand masters in the order's history.
