Strange Survivals: Some Chapters in the History of Man

by S. Baring-Gould

The curious festival of the Car of Fire observed on Easter Eve every year at Florence carries us back to a remote period when fire was a sacred and mysterious thing. As is well known, in the Eastern Church, also in the Roman Catholic Church, all fires are extinguished before Easter; and in the Cathedral, the Bishop, on Easter morning, strikes new fire, blesses it, and all the hearths in the city receive the new fire from this blessed spark. It is vulgarly supposed that the old fire has got worn out, and has lost its full vigour by use throughout the year, and that the new fire is full of restless and youthful energy. There can be little doubt that this idea goes back to a remote and Pagan time, and the Church accepted what was a common custom, and gave it, or tried to give it, a new and Christian idea, connecting it with the resurrection of Him who is the Light of the World. The same custom of striking and blessing new fire exists in many parts of the West as well as the East, and is sanctioned by the Roman Church. But nowhere does this ancient usage assume so quaint and picturesque a form as at Florence. There, however, the primitive significance is completely forgotten, and the people have endeavoured to explain the ceremony which I will now describe in various mutually contradictory ways.

On Easter Eve, four magnificent white oxen, their huge horns wreathed with flowers, and with garlands about them, as though they were being conveyed to sacrifice, draw a huge car, painted black, some twenty-five feet high, pyramidal in shape, and crowned with a mural coronet, into the piazza before the west doors of the white marble cathedral. The car is itself wreathed with flowers to its highest pinnacle, and with the flowers various fireworks are interspersed. As soon as this great trophy is in place, and the oxen unyoked, the west doors of the cathedral are thrown open, and a rope is strained from the top of the car to a pillar that is erected in front of the high altar, a distance of some two hundred yards. On this cord is seen perched a white dove, composed of some white substance, probably plaster. For two hours before the event of the day takes place the great piazza and the nave of the vast cathedral are crowded. Villagers from all the country round have arrived; but there are also present plenty of townsfolk, and strangers from foreign lands. At half-past eleven, the archbishop and all his clergy come in procession down the body of the church, pass out of the west doors, and make the circuit of the cathedral. Before twelve o’clock strikes they are again in their places in the choir. At the stroke of noon the newly-blessed fire is applied to a train of gunpowder at the foot of the pillar. In another moment the pigeon skims down the nave, pouring out a shower of fire, sweeps out of the west door of the cathedral, reaches the trophy in the square, sets fire to a fusee there, then turns and flies back along the rope, still discharging a rain of fire, till it has reached its pillar before the altar, and there is still.

Fig. 32.—THE CARRO, FLORENCE.

But in the meantime the fusee at the car has set fire to various squibs and petards and crackers there, and the whole structure is speedily enveloped in fire and smoke, from which explosions issue every few moments. As soon as the last firework has expired, the white oxen are again yoked to the car, and it is drawn away.

The flight of the dove is watched by the peasants with breathless anxiety, for the course it takes indicates, in their idea, the sort of weather that is likely to ensue during the year. If the bird moves slowly, halts, then goes on again, halts, and is sluggish in its flight, they conclude the year will be tempestuous and the harvest bad. If the dove skims along to the car and back without a hitch, they calculate on a splendid summer and autumn, on a rich yield of corn, and overflowing presses of grapes.

And now for the legends whereby the people explain this curious custom. According to one, a certain Florentine named Pazzino went to Jerusalem in the twelfth century, kindled a torch there at the Holy Sepulchre on Easter Eve, and resolved to bring this same sacred fire with him back to Florence. But as he rode along, the wind blew in his face and well-nigh extinguished his torch, so he sat his steed with his face to the tail, screening the flame with his body, and so rode all the way home! The people along his route, seeing him thus ride reversed, shouted out, “Pazzi! Pazzi!” (“O fool! fool!”) and that name of “fool” he and his family assumed; and the family is still represented in Florence.

There is another version of the story; one Pazzino, seeing the Holy Sepulchre in the hands of the infidels, broke off as much of it as he could carry to convey home to his dear Florence. As he was pursued by the Saracens, he reversed the shoes of his horse to avoid being tracked. On reaching Florence it was resolved that the new Easter fire should always be kindled on the stone of the Holy Sepulchre he had brought home. In honour of his achievement, moreover, the municipality ordered that the ceremony of the Car of Fire and the fiery dove should be maintained every year. For many centuries the expenses were borne by the Pazzi family; but of late years they have been relieved of these by the municipality.

The third version of the story is, that Pazzino was a knight with Godfrey de Bouillon in the first Crusade, and that he was the first of the besiegers to mount the walls and plant on them the banner of the cross. Moreover, he sent the tidings of the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre home to Florence by a carrier-pigeon, and thus the news reached Florence long before it could have arrived in any other way.