"Comes, the Befana comes from a very distant land, so far away that there is no ... Do you know who the Befana is? ...". The writer and poet Gianni Rodari asks this at the beginning of a beautiful nursery rhyme dedicated to the Befana. And it is all too easy to give an image to this nice old woman who populates the dreams of so many children every year on the night between 5 and 6 January. There it is. Riding a broom, cap and pointy shoes, he crosses the blue of the night full of toys, sweets and socks to leave under the fireplace for every child. Full, the socks, of sweets and / or coal. This is what tradition would like. But it seems that sweets always win in the end and that, after all, the famous sock contains only a few pieces of coal.

Death and rebirth of nature in the ancient rural rites recalled on the night of the Befana

La Befana, a beautiful image entirely and exclusively Italian, has very ancient origins linked to distant rural traditions. They wanted to identify the death and rebirth of nature in these days of the year. According to pagan rites already from the Roman era, in fact, mysterious female figures (which probably referred to the goddess Diana) were believed to be used, at this time of the year, to fly over the fields to free them from the residues of the past and propitiate future harvests. Even today we remember that the Befana "all party takes away". Indeed it is true that the day dedicated to the nice old lady closes a concentration of festive days and in a certain sense introduces a new season. Precisely in this perspective we can identify still alive, albeit with a more current reading, those distant rural traditions of closing the old to open the doors to the new.

Pan e vin (ph credit: Municipality of Venice)

Traditions that are still present, for example, throughout the north east of Italy. Where on the night of the Befana large fires have always been lit which, according to the localities, take different names. Pan e vin, Berolòn (in Veneto the Befana is also called Beròla), the old woman, the Pìrola, the Casera, the Vecchione, the Foghèra… These are large bonfires that burn piles of wood and branches. Sometimes with a puppet on top that somehow means the old (in a broad sense) that must be burned to make room for the new.

"Sparks to the west cobs nothing, sparks to the east lots of cobs"

In popular tradition, the direction taken by the sparks pushed by the wind indicates whether the year that has just begun will be propitious and lucky. "Faville to the west - recites one of the best known nursery rhymes - no cobs, sparks in the east, many cobs". In this ancient but still current rite of purification and propitiatory, every year - not this year or last due to the pandemic - adults and children participate. Eating the pinza (typical dessert made with a mixture of soft wheat and corn flour enriched with sugar and dried fruit) and drinking an aromatic mulled wine.

"La Befana ... with the Roman dress"

We cannot speak of Befana in central Italy without mentioning the great Roman tradition. In Rome, the figure of the Befana was already very popular in the nineteenth century. At the time, the nice old lady "landed" in Piazza Sant'Eustachio, not far from Piazza Navona. Today, but for over a century now, the famous market of Navona Square is the reference point for young and old. You buy sweets, toys, special objects, in a triumph of joy that infects anyone who takes part in this collective ritual. That this year, needless to say, as already in 2021 will skip due to the pandemic. This Roman "paternity" of the Befana is also well remembered in one of her most famous nursery rhymes: "La Befana comes at night with her shoes all broken with the Roman-style dress (or hat, ed), long live the Befana".

Giotto, Adoration of the Magi

Orphan of most of the events dedicated to the Befana also the south of our peninsula. Where once again this year you will have to be satisfied with tasting the typical sweets, cartellate in Puglia, stuffoli and the first pastiera of the year in Campania, waiting for the old woman, astride her broom, to be seen again as the protagonist of many events and demonstrations. But they will be the traditional and very Italian nativity scenes to give us back the religious style of this festival. Between legend and biblical story, the day of the Befana coincides with the arrival of the Magi in Bethlehem. There is that the Befana brings gifts, as well as gold, frankincense and myrrh were the gifts of the three Magi to the Child Jesus. And it is the etymology of the word Befana itself that recalls that of the Greek word Epiphany, the name of the religious festival that reminds us when God, through the Child Jesus, manifested his divinity to the Magi. That the Western Church, according to the Gregorian calendar, has set precisely January 6.

The feast of the Befana between history and tradition last edit: 2022-01-06T15:30:00+01:00 da Cristina Campolonghi

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