Castellinaria, and Other Sicilian Diversions

by Henry Festing Jones

“Good night, Buffo. You will forgive me if I do not see you off in the morning; I do not want to get up at half-past five. I wish you Buon viaggio. Give my love to papa and Gildo and my respectful compliments to the sisters. Have you got your lump of lava and all your other goods? That’s right. Sleep well and do not dream of Rosina and the good young man.”

“Arrivederci.”

TRAPANI

CHAPTER VIII
THE NASCITA

Once I was at Trapani in September, and observed in a small shop in a back street some queer little dolls’ heads made of wax. They seemed to form a set, some women and some men, and there were hands of wax to match. I did not think much about them, one cannot very well investigate everything one notices in a Sicilian town, and, as I turned away, these little heads were driven out of mine by Ignazio Giacalone, who was coming down the street. He is a young avvocato whom I have known since he was a student. He told me that he was going to be married next day, and invited me to his wedding.

In the evening another friend of mine, also an avvocato, Alberto Scalisi, came to the albergo to take his coffee and, as we all sat smoking and talking, something was said about an article on the Nascita written by him and recently published in L’Amico, a Trapanese Sunday newspaper. I knew nothing about the Nascita, but I knew something about the avvocato whose acquaintance I had made a few years previously at the house of my friend Signor Decio D’Ali, with whom I had been dining. After dinner many guests, including the avvocato Scalisi, came to the house to rehearse a play they were preparing for a charity performance; they were all amateurs, and I never saw amateurs act so well. The Signora Decio D’Ali and the Avvocato Scalisi were the best; his was a comic part, and he did it with so much natural humour that I was anxious to read his article whatever the Nascita might be, as to which they gave me some preliminary information. They reminded me of the Presepio, the representation of

the Natività at Bethlehem, which it is the custom in many places to make at Christmas; there is a most elaborate one, treated as though the event had happened in modern times, preserved in the convent of S. Martino, in Naples; there is one in the Musée de Cluny in Paris, L’Adoration des Rois et des Bergers, Art Napolitain XVIII siècle. I was most familiar with such things in the chapels on the Sacro Monte at Varallo-Sesia, where the figures are the size of life. When they saw I had got hold of the idea, they told me that in Trapani it is the custom in the homes of the sailors to celebrate the 8th September by making a representation of the house of S. Joachim as it appeared on the occasion of the birth of his daughter, the Madonna, and to keep it on view for three weeks, till S. Michael’s day. They do not do this in any other town, and the avvocato’s article was about one he had seen.

Next morning about 7.30 Ignazio’s father most politely called for me in a carriage and pair and, accompanied by two other guests, we drove to the house of the bride’s family, where there was a crowd of people, and we were all presented; then we proceeded to the Municipio, where the civil part of the marriage was performed; after which we returned to the bride’s house and went through the religious service at an altar that had been erected in one of the rooms. We admired the presents and the flowers, partook of refreshments and exchanged compliments till it was time to go, and I carried away with me a copy of L’Amico given me by the Avvocato Scalisi, who was one of the guests.

While reading his article I recognised that the little waxen heads and hands must be part of the raw material for a Nascita, and in my mind I identified certain figures in the museum which Conte Pepoli was then arranging in the disused convent of the Annunziata as remains of old examples of the Nascita and of the Natività. Nothing would do for it then but I must see a Nascita, and the difficulty was how to proceed. One cannot very well go

round knocking at all the doors in a Sicilian town and asking if they have made a Nascita; the Avvocato Scalisi had gone off to another wedding or to defend a mafioso, or to transact whatever business falls to the lot of a Trapanese avvocato. Mario, my coachman, takes no interest in anything to do with religion in any shape, so he was no use, and everyone else I spoke to was very kind about it but evidently did not know how to help me.