late August 1608
Arrest in Malta and escape from prison
Probably after yet another brawl — this time with an aristocratic knight, who was seriously wounded after the door of a house was battered down — the Knights imprisoned Caravaggio in Valletta, but he managed to escape.
October 1608
Escapes to Syracuse and Mario Minniti
Having escaped from the Maltese prison, Caravaggio sailed to Sicily, to Syracuse, where he was helped by his old friend Mario Minniti, who years before had quarrelled with the artist, married and left for Sicily.
by December 1608
Expelled from the Order of Malta
The Order expelled the fugitive 'as a foul and rotten member', the formal phrase used in all such cases.
October 1609
Attempt on his life in Naples
Caravaggio was attacked — perhaps by men in the pay of the knight he had wounded in Malta or of another faction of the Order; his face was seriously disfigured, and rumours of his death circulated in Rome.
July 1610
A last voyage, towards a pardon
On learning that Cardinal Gonzaga had begun negotiating his pardon with Pope Paul V, Caravaggio hired a felucca and sailed from Naples to await it closer to Rome. According to the papal nuncio's letters, which not all scholars trust, he was detained at the fortress of Palo, the felucca sailed on, and he set off on foot for Porto Ercole, where he died on 18 July, reportedly of fever.
18 July 1610
Died