Caltanissetta, Sicily
—
The countdown to the vacations has begun. Christmas markets, mulled wine, ice skating — around the globe, on each continent, individuals are beginning to gear as much as get into the festive spirit.
But one Sicilian city is already specializing in what comes subsequent: Easter.
Caltanissetta, useless within the middle of the Mediterranean’s largest island, is famend throughout Italy for its Easter celebrations and parades.
Forget chocolate egg hunts and cute bunnies; suppose lifesize figures narrating the Passion of Christ in lacerating element, religious worshippers tramping barefoot by way of town streets, and the keys to town being handed over to a member of the general public. In the previous, the celebrations even entailed setting a convict free from jail. Sadly, for these at present banged up in Caltanissetta, that is one custom that has remained firmly prior to now.
The Easter traditions — that are nonetheless so deeply felt that Caltanissetta emigrés return every year to rejoice of their hundreds — date again centuries.
The most spectacular takes place each Maundy Thursday, with the procession of the vare: lifesize tableaus of scenes from the Via Crucis, that are wheeled across the metropolis from the second the solar goes down until the early hours of the morning.
The well-known Easter parades of Caltanissetta
The vare scenes have been made by father-and-son artist duo, Francesco and Vincenzo Biangardi, between 1883 and 1902. Originally from Naples, the duo had moved south to work as artists in Calabria and Sicily, earlier than transferring to Caltanissetta to create these figures — which might change into their masterpiece.
On shoulder-height, wheeled platforms, they stand, looming over the crowds. Each depicts in usually harrowing element Christ’s journey to the cross.
There he’s in entrance of the excessive priest Caiaphas, having been whipped; stumbling in entrance of Veronica, who will wipe his face together with her veil; and praying within the backyard of Gethsemane.
There’s the Last Supper, an unlimited tableau during which the disciples activate one another to work out who has betrayed their grasp. In its personal means, it’s as spectacular as Leonardo Da Vinci’s well-known “Last Supper” fresco in Milan.
And there may be Mary and the younger St. John embracing him as he’s taken down from the cross in a “Pietà” scene as tender as Michelangelo’s well-known sculpture in St. Peter’s Basilica.
Together, there are 16 vare, 15 of which have been made by the Biangardi duo, utilizing papier maché, plaster and wooden.
“They’re very important for the city,” says Salvatore Petrantoni, Caltanissetta’s councillor who’s chargeable for occasions, together with Holy Week. “One vara alone wouldn’t be very valuable, but as a group, within the tradition, they become important.”
Certainly, as they’re wheeled round Caltanissetta in a single nice procession, they pack a punch. They’re large, for starters: every determine is at the very least lifesize, with some a lot bigger. And they’re set on rolling platforms that begin roughly at shoulder top for the groups of strongmen that should push them.
Setting off at 8 p.m. sharp, every group is accompanied by a marching band. Each band’s music competes in opposition to these on both facet, making the slender streets of Caltanissetta echo with dirges and solemn marches.
And in addition to the folks pushing every tableau — it may possibly take as much as six folks to maneuver them, though today additionally they get assist with motorized wheels underneath the carts — there are others accompanying them. Members of the general public comply with “their” vara in a procession, whereas guild members pave the best way, setting off flares within the streets to announce the arrival of the carts.
Meanwhile, every vara has a pacesetter, impeccably wearing a tailcoat, who conducts the motion of the tableau with a metallic baton, clinking it on the cart’s pulley to inform these pushing from the again when to cease and when to begin once more.
Ahead of all of them goes the cuntastoria, or “story-teller,” a lady crying out the story of the gospels in Sicilian.
It’s a ballet delivered with precision that drops the onlookers straight into the emotion of the Easter story on this deeply Catholic half of Italy. Thousands converge in town’s principal sq. outdoors the cathedral to observe the procession take off, blessed by the bishop; to comply with the carts up, down and across the hilly city; or to emerge from their homes within the wee hours to observe the carts make their means by way of the slender residential streets.
Wherever the procession goes, there are tons of of folks ready for it. They half silently just like the Red Sea because the carts come in the direction of them.
The scenes aren’t simply artistically stunning; they’ve which means for the group. Each was assigned to a unique group, or guild, of employees within the metropolis, from bakers to blacksmiths, carpenters to plumbers. Several have been assigned to miners — the world round Caltanissetta was well-known for its sulfur mines within the nineteenth century. “It was a way of giving thanks for there being no disasters in the mines,” says Petrantoni. One was commissioned by a gaggle of miners who survived an explosion that tragically killed their co-workers.
The procession of the vare, which units off on Maundy Thursday, is essentially the most spectacular of Caltanissetta’s Easter rituals, however it’s removed from the one one. Here, the custom continues for the entire of Easter week.
Wednesday is the day of the Real Maestranza — basically a set of the historic artisans of town. The group dates again to the medieval interval, when Caltanissetta’s rulers put collectively a non-public military to defend town in case of Saracen invasion. Today, it’s a civilian group divided into subsets, like guilds, every representing a occupation: painters and interior decorators, pastry-makers, carpenters, hairdressers and so forth.
These civilians take over town on the Wednesday earlier than Easter, when the “captain” of the Real Maestranza — chosen from one of the subgroups every year — goes to the city corridor with a symbolic sword, and is handed the important thing to town on a cushion.
The mayor says goodbye to his energy; for the remainder of Holy Week, this captain is the “padrono della città,” or lord of town, in cost of Caltanissetta. In the previous, he (it’s at all times a he) may choose one prisoner from the native jail to be launched. Unfortunately for in the present day’s malfeasants, the captain is now longer given the facility of reprieval; nonetheless he nonetheless will get to put on the bombastic conventional costume of a tailcoat, breeches and white stockings, as he goes about his enterprise, lording it up over the residents for the week. The members of the Real Maestranza additionally take out a procession of varicedde — little vare — on the Wednesday night.
But for the really religious nisseni (as Caltanissetta natives are identified), Good Friday is crucial night. This is when, led once more by the Real Maestranza, they course of round city with the Cristo Nero, or Black Christ: a picket sculpture of the crucifix that’s believed to be miraculous, and is so beloved that it’s often called the Signore della Città, or Lord of the City. In a spectacular procession, the Cristo Nero is faraway from its residence within the Santuario Signore della Città church; outdoors, it’s topped with a golden globe and paraded up the steep hill into the middle of city, earlier than following the procession route across the metropolis.
The carving is beloved by the nisseni not solely as a result of it’s mentioned to be miraculous, however as a result of it’s linked to the very poorest in society, explains Tony Gangitano, an Italian film director initially from Caltanissetta. It is claimed to have been found by fogliamari — individuals who scraped a residing by foraging for wild herbs and leaves within the countryside to then promote in cities — in 1618. Out selecting (fogliamari means “bitter leaves”) within the countryside outdoors Caltanissetta, they’re mentioned to have entered a cave, the place they discovered two candles burning both facet of the carving. When they washed the crucifix clear of grime, the colour instantly darkened once more, giving rise to its Cristo Nero identify.
Modern analysis suggests the carving is of Byzantine origin, making it one of the oldest crucifixion sculptures in Sicily. To today, no person is aware of the place it got here from, or the way it ended up in that cave outdoors Caltanissetta.
“I was always fascinated by the processions,” says Gangitano, who now lives between Sicily and the mainland. He deliberate to make a brief movie concerning the ritual, however turned it right into a feature-length movie, mixing documentary and historic re-enactment. Starring celebrated Italian actor Gaetano Aronica and filmed within the medieval half of city constructed by the Arab conquerors, who dominated right here within the medieval interval, “U Cristu Truvatu” took the highest prize on the Taipei Golden Horse International Film Festival in 2022.
Today, the fogliamari nonetheless exist — stroll by way of Caltanissetta within the daytime and also you’ll usually see vans and vehicles pulled up roadside with freshly picked wild herbs and salad leaves on the bonnet on the market. Members of their affiliation head up the Good Friday procession, forward of the native clergymen. They’re adopted by nisseni strolling barefoot by way of town — those that have made a vow to the Cristo Nero — and the suited and booted members of the Real Maestranza, every carrying a lantern. Some carry swords, lances or shields, too.
“It’s the most silent of the processions with the most people attending,” says Petrantoni of the Good Friday occasion. As they stroll by way of the quiet streets, the fogliamari lead chants and lamentations in a combination of Sicilian and Latin, what Gangitano calls “an extremely tight dialect.”
It’s a rare, nearly biblical sight — and for believers it’s one of essentially the most transferring occasions of Easter right here in Sicily. “People cry because they know they have to wait another year,” says Petrantoni, who says that of the 60,000 inhabitants of Caltanissetta, round half attend, whereas round 1,000 kind the official core of the procession, strolling barefoot round city for a number of hours.
“The traditions are felt more in Sicily because from childhood we live them,” says Petrantoni, who walks barefoot alongside the Cristo Nero himself, and who feels the significance of the processions so deeply that the place of councillor for occasions was created for him. His affect continues all year long — home windows of closed-down shopfronts show photos of the vare and the opposite processions, reminding Caltanissetta year-round of its Easter traditions.
You’ll even be reminded should you set foot in Pasticceria de Fraia, one of Caltanissetta’s famed pastry outlets: It’s right here they make the spina santa, a pastry modelled on the crown of thorns, with blueberry jam inside. It was created for the go to of Pope John Paul II in 1993. “He said it was the best thing he ever ate,” says Gangitano, proudly.
For Petrantoni, “The vare remind us what we have always been. There’s so much history — that’s why we take such good care of them.” Rather than being a once-a-year procession, he’s attempting to make use of them for different occasions, bringing out some varicedde in September for an occasion. Although the vare are at all times in his thoughts — and at all times on show on these shopfronts round city — in February the planning for 2026’s Holy Week will begin in earnest.
Gangitano, who makes a speciality of making movies about Sicily, says that even in a altering world, retaining these traditions is essential.
“They’re at the root of the identity of every town, every person,” he says.
“If we don’t know the past, we can’t face the present.”