L'Italo-Americano

L'Italo-Americano THURSDAY, JUNE 26, 2025 www.italoamericano.org 4 A s s u m m e r arrives in Italy, t h e r h y t h m o f daily life begins t o s h i f t , e s p e - cially outside the cities. In towns and villages across the country, the signs are unmis- takable: plastic chairs appear in the piazza, parish banners are unfurled, and the smell of frying food drifts through side streets. Loudspeakers crackle to life in the early evening, children rehearse their roles for the procession, and kitchens begin their quiet preparations. Headlines may focus on coastal tourism or crowded city centers, but the heart of Italian summers lies e l s e w h e r e , i n t h e s t e a d y return of local rituals that transform even the smallest community into a place of celebration. I t a l y h o s t s b e t w e e n 20,000 and 30,000 local festivals each year, with the m a j o r i t y c o n c e n t r a t e d between June and Septem- b e r : s o m e l a s t a s i n g l e evening, others fill an entire week. Certain events grew into large-scale affairs and draw visitors from different p a r t s o f I t a l y , b u t m o s t remain very much local – gatherings that bring togeth- er neighbors, friends, return- i n g r e l a t i v e s , a n d , s o m e - times, curious passersby. F o o d c e l e b r a t i o n s , o u r beloved sagre, are among the most common of these events, and they are often tied to a specific ingredient or seasonal product: wild boar in Tuscany, polenta in Piedmont, snails in Sicily, just to name a few. In Can- nara, a town in Umbria, the annual Festa della Cipolla honors the local onion crop with a full week of meals, concerts, and community gatherings; on the Ligurian coast, Camogli's famous fish festival involves frying fresh catch in an enormous pan built for the occasion. What these festivals share is not just their link to food but to place, because they are expressions of local identity and they are shaped by the surrounding land. Religious festivals are just as essential: often held in honor of a town's patron saint, they merge solemnity and celebration, the sacred and the profane, spirituality and tradition. Statues are carried through the streets in s l o w p r o c e s s i o n s , b r a s s bands in tow and, later, fire- works light up church towers a n d b e l l r o o f s ; i n s o m e coastal towns, from Liguria to Sicily, statues are placed on boats and carried out to sea, escorted by flotillas of decorated fishing vessels. Inland, beautiful Gubbio gives us the Festa dei Ceri, a spectacle where veneration of three saints turns into a dramatic race up the moun- tainside, with massive wood- e n s t r u c t u r e s h o i s t e d o n s h o u l d e r s a n d p a r a d e d through cheering crowds. In these events, the lines b e t w e e n f a i t h , f o o d , a n d community blur: young peo- ple take on organizational roles, help set up tents, or s e r v e b e h i n d m a k e s h i f t counters, while older genera- t i o n s p r e p a r e r e c i p e s b y hand or coordinate musical performances; each celebra- tion is a date on a collective calendar, a moment people remember not only for what is celebrated but for who was there, what was cooked, and how the weather felt that year. That's how, quite liter- ally, small-town Italy mea- s u r e s t h e p a s s i n g o f time. Even in places where population shrank over the years, these festivals remain remarkably intact; in fact, the smaller the place, the more vital the celebration tends to be. Where schools have closed and shops have disappeared, the summer festival endures as one of the few occasions when everyone r e t u r n s , i f o n l y f o r a f e w days. The event becomes a moment of reunion, it gives p e o p l e a r e a s o n t o c o m e home, and it offers those who stayed a way to mark time and hold the communi- ty together. Crucially, sagre and feste patronali also serve a very practical purpose. In a country where many rural areas struggle with depopu- lation and economic uncer- tainty, they became a form of resistance: they bring in visi- tors, support small produc- ers, and keep the local econ- omy ticking, if only for a w e e k e n d . D u r i n g t h e already-mentioned Festa della Cipolla in Cannara, for e x a m p l e , a n e s t i m a t e d 10,000 people – more than triple the town's population – attend over the course of the week, creating consider- able benefits for local farm- ers, caterers, artisans, and even temporary workers. Events like this thrive not just on tradition, but on the willingness of communities to adapt and evolve: menus c h a n g e , s o u n d s y s t e m s improve, and roles pass from one generation to the next. The soul of Summer in Italy: festivals, food, and footsteps through time FRANCESCA BEZZONE NEWS & FEATURES TOP STORIES PEOPLE EVENTS CONTINUED TO PAGE 6 Traditional celebrations in an Italian town square (Photo: Beto/IStock)

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