L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017 www.italoamericano.org 16 L'Italo-Americano FRANCESCA BEZZONE F all is my favorite season. Yes, I love chestnuts, truf- f l e s , c a r d i g a n s , c h u n k y scarves and pumpkin pies. But the real reason I love the fall is another, it's the dark. The dark brings about hints of wintry chill, mixed with the cinnamon tang of cookies. It calls for the first hot chocolate of the season, thick and sweet, topped with whipped cream, with a side of paste di meliga. Autumnal dark is also filled with ghosts: we head towards the night of All Hallows, the night of All Souls and those more inclined towards these things really feel it. Even those not particularly attracted by the idea of entertaining a candle-lit conversation with spirits are likely to appreciate a ghost story or two, this time of the year: it must be the chill and the dark falling earlier. For me, it's all about the dark, its ghosts and where I can find them. So I went on an expedition and came out w i t h a f e w p l a c e s t o v i s i t . Rigorously at night time, rigor- ously dressed in black. We'll start from the North West of the country, in the pic- t u r e s q u e r e g i o n o f V a l l e d'Aosta. Here, on the banks of the Dora Baltea river, lies the q u a i n t m o u n t a i n t o w n o f Issogne, along with its castle, probably built during the Middle A g e s t o r e a c h i t s a p o g e e o f power and wealth sometimes during the Renaissance. Alas, what would its walls say, could they speak, about Bianca Maria d i C h a l l a n t w h o , y o u n g a n d already a widow, joined in sec- ond marriage count Renato di Challant, the lord of the manor. They'd say Bianca was charm- ing and prone to seek the atten- tion of men other than her hus- band. They would also tell you she enjoyed to lose herself in the embrace of her many lovers, but feared to be discovered greatly. What did she do to avoid it? She killed them all. In a twist worthy of the best Hitchcock, B i a n c a w o u l d g e t r i d o f h e r lovers straight after having... consummated their union. She was eventually put to death and executed, but her ghost is still, apparently, roaming the rooms of her castle in Issogne: many saw her, beautiful and young, bestowing kisses to the people around her, seeking a new prey. Not too far from lady Bianca, always in the North West of Italy is the Vercelli province of Piedmont and the old cistercian a b b e y o f S a n t a M a r i a d i Lucedio. Founded in the 12th century, the abbey no longer serves spiritual purposes today (it became an organic farm) and, man, there are good reasons why it is so. Its very name, some say, has diabolic origins, the asso- nance between "Lucedio" and "Lucifer" too strong not to rise some brows. And it was the con- nection between the Prince of Darkness and the monks of the abbey that, it appears, brought to its closure, in the 18th century: far from being a place of holi- ness, Lucedio had apparently turned into the home of a bunch of Satan-worshipping monks. What's even more eerie is that the legend wants Satan himself to have chosen the abbey as its own enclosure when, a century earlier, after being summoned during a Sabbath in the nearby - and now abandoned - cemetery of Darola, it set eye on the place and decided to make it its own. It was the beginning of a time of sin and evil among the monks, which also involved the rest of the surrounding community. In the end, or so we are told, the e v i l e n t i t y t h a t p o s s e s s e d L u c e d i o w a s c a p t u r e d a n d imprisoned in one of the abbey's crypts, four monks sitting by its door to guard it. Their mummi- fied bodies, along with their spir- its, are said to be still in the abbey.   Bitter, and quite frankly terri- fying, is the story of Villa Clara, i n B o l o g n a . T h e a b a n d o n e d building is believed to be home to the ghost of a young girl - Clara, of course- who lived in its rooms with her family in the early 20th century. Clara was a special little darling, as she could predict the future. Her father was so incredibly terrified by her, he decided to bury her alive in the house, her soul forever trapped in the beautiful villa bearing her own name. Let's move South now, to the crystal clear waters of Apulia and to a place particularly dear t o a l l E n g l i s h m a j o r s i n t h e world, the castle of Otranto. If you thought Horace Walpole made up the whole shebang for his seminal novel, by many con- sidered the first of the Gothic genre, you'd be seriously mis- t a k e n , b e c a u s e O t r a n t o d o e s have a haunted castle for real. O r i g i n a l l y b u i l t i n t h e e a r l y M i d d l e A g e s , r a z e d t o t h e ground and rebuilt in the 11th , 13th and 15th centuries, the place is filled to the brim with paranormal activity, even though not many are aware of it. Among the castle of Otranto's guests, a young Spanish woman buried in its chapel and, above all, the headless ghost of  Count Giulio A n t o n i o A c q u a v i v a d i C o n v e r s a n o , c o u r a g e o u s Christian knight who fought the Turkish invasion of 1480, got b e h e a d e d i n b a t t l e a n d k e p t killing enemies even without a head. O n e l a s t s t o p b e f o r e m i d - night, the most unsettling of t h e m a l l : A l i s t a i r C r o w l e y ' s Abbey of Thelema. Crowley was a creepy late Victorian lad risen in a wealthy British family, who had a life long interest in the occult and became the head of his own cult. By many consid- ered the first modern Satanist, Crowley had a penchant for Italy a n d m o v e d t o o u r b e a u t i f u l Sicily in the 1910s. Already a well known figure in Britain for his eccentric ways and purported ties with the Devil, Crowley sought quiet in a small country- s i d e c o t t a g e n e a r C e f a l ù h e c a l l e d A b b a z i a d i T h e l e m a . Here, he professed his own reli- gion, surrounded by a gang of acolytes and friends who consid- ered him a true messiah: pagan rituals, group sex and drugs were at the centre of the Thelema creed. Crowley may have not been dangerous, but he and his people were creepy enough that Mussolini ordered them out of the country in the mid 20s. S i n c e t h e n , t h e a b b e y remained empty. Mind, no one says Thelema is haunted. Yet, there is something inherently eerie with the place. Maybe it's b e c a u s e s o m e o f C r o w l e y ' s paintings are still visible on its w a l l s , o r b e c a u s e i t ' s b e e n k n o w n t o a t t r a c t s a t a n i s t s . Whichever the reason, Thelema is not a place for the faint heart- ed. And neither are the other in this article: you may not believe in ghosts and the occult, but can you be certain there's really nothing hiding within the walls and shadows of these haunted dwellings? The Castle of Otranto, home to the spirits of a Spanish lady and a headless knight ALL AROUND ITALY TRAVEL TIPS DESTINATIONS ACTIVITIES Fear in Italy: a trip through the country's most haunted locations

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