Genzano it story

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Some hub links

Australian houses in Brisbane, Australia affordable houses

DIY brickwork, Strage in Genzano di Lucania

Normans - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.comune.genzano.pz.it/

www.sportinggenzano.it/

Travel Videos - Fountain cavallina, Genzano, Italy - The Compulsive ...

Most interesting photos from Genzano di Lucania, Basilicata, Italy

Where is Genzano di Lucania in Basilicata, Italy located?

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

The Madonna is found

WELCOME TO FRANK MENCHISE BLOG OF GENZANO DI LUCANIA, YOU ARE INVITED TO BROWSE AS LONG AS YOU LIKE.
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Welcome to our blog, Genzano it story
and this post, the Madonna is found
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This is the real effigy of the Madonna that was found at Capodaqua fountain
in the year 1621, Anyhow this is how we the people of Genzano would see the Madonna effigy that is set high in the wall above the high altar in her own church. This effigy stays there all the time, so when every year we have a feast for this Madionna we use another Madonna statue.

This is the statue of the Madonna that we take around town, ween we celebrate this Madonna feast

The Madonna is found

In our last post of this Madonna story we said that the people that were trying to find the Madonna became tired and decided to build a chapel instead, as they were doing this some rocks fell from the chasm wall above, so, they decided to remove the fallen rocks and sort them out, so that they could use those rocks to build part of the chapel anyhow. And then it happened; it happened the 25^th day of March 1621 late in the afternoon, it was about the time when in the church they say this afternoon prayer called Vespers, at this time of the day most people that are in the country would pack up to go home. But there was a worker working at the fallen stone heap, and although he was tired he felt that he wanted to do just a little bit more before he would turn in, so he kept working just a little bit extra: His name was ‘Giovanni Malatesta’ and he was digging with a pick to get the stones loose from the fallen heap of rocks, when he hit a very hard rock, and a beautiful aroma filled the air: he had struck with his pick the sculpture of the ‘Madonna with Child’. What a shock to this man must have been, when he realised that he struck with his pick the icon of the Madonna over the eye. They say that he never was the same man again from the shock, and it is said that he died early in his life not long after this event took place.

As soon as they realised that they had found the Madonna, somebody ran up the road to town, to let the people of Genzano know that they had finely found the Madonna icon, and the good news spread so fast, and most of the town’s folks went to see for themselves, even though it was already evening and it soon would be dark.

The whole town was in feast for a very long time afterward.

All the religious authorities were in due time advised about the finding of the Madonna icon, and they took part in the prescribed religious events that followed. A Chapel was built on the spot where they had found the Madonna, with the intention that one day they would build a church there. After they found the icon of the Madonna with Child many people came to adore this Madonna, they came from the surrounding towns and also from far away towns and they received so many miracles from this Madonna that would be even hard just to count their number.

Taking the Madonna to town

But there is still an extra story to tell about this Madonna, this story might be a bit out of the ordinary ways that normal things happen, and therefore today many people might not believe it, but then we have to think that here we are talking about Madonnas and therefore also miracles, we also have to keep in mind that the old people believed that it really happened, so let us tell you the story just the way it has been told and retold many times from the elders of the town.

The folklore story of this Madonna goes on to tell us, that while they were taking the Madonna effigy they had found at Capodaqua to the town church, of Maria SS Della Platea, which was the main church of the town, when they reached the entrance of the town, as you know in those times every town had their entrance doors that were shut at night to guard against thieves and assaults from outside, anyhow when they reached the entrance of the town the Madonna effigy became very heavy, it was so heavy that the bears had to stop and set the devise they were carrying the Madonna with on the ground.

Then when they tried to lift her off the ground again they could not lift her; so the priest and the town authorities started to think, why this was happening and what they could do to fix this unseen problem, some wise man started saying that perhaps the Madonna wanted to be recognized that she was a very powerful being, and to recognize her the best thing to do was to give her the keys of the town and hope that this was what the Madonna wanted, so somebody went to fetch the keys and placed the keys beside her effigy, and soon the effigy became light again and they were able to take her through the entrance of the town and then into the church. This is one of the folklore stories of this Madonna.

Now let me add this last bit to the story, I remember when I was young that at this same entrance the Madonna came into Genzano town the first time; sometimes would come some pilgrims to adore this Madonna with child, and they were bringing with them a little statue of a child, I don’t know exactly what all this meant, but there is a phrase in the Genzanese dialect “U bambnid d Frenz” meaning the little baby Jesus of Forenza; Forenza is a town that would take several hours to walk to reach Genzano, and they did all this walking to come and adore this Madonna, there were really believers in those old days.

The people of Genzano celebrate the feast of this Madonna every year and here is a link of the procession in the very old part of Genzano, I hope it works for you:

Genzano di Lucania Festa Madonna 2011 (Paese Vecchio) - YouTube

We will continue to tell the story of this Madonna in our next post, The Madonna church, see you soon.

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Genzano it story

The Madonna is found

IS GOING TO BE CONTINUED;

Next time with, The Madonna church

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Some useful links

http://myreligioustheory.yolasite.com

Some hub links

Australian houses in Brisbane, Australia affordable houses

DIY brickwork, Strage in Genzano di Lucania

Normans - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.comune.genzano.pz.it/

www.sportinggenzano.it/

Travel Videos - Fountain cavallina, Genzano, Italy - The Compulsive ...

Most interesting photos from Genzano di Lucania, Basilicata, Italy

Where is Genzano di Lucania in Basilicata, Italy located?

Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Madonna story

WELCOME TO FRANK MENCHISE BLOG OF GENZANO DI LUCANIA, YOU ARE INVITED TO BROWSE AS LONG AS YOU LIKE.
-
Welcome to our blog, Genzano it story
and to our post, The Madonna story
-

This is the statue of the Madonna that Genzano,' people take around town when they have a procession

Madonna story of Genzano

This is part one of the Madonna story of Genzano di Lucania.

Here under are two or three links that are a must see for those that come from Genzano town and also everyone else: I hope they work, as they also brink up more interesting links to see.

Travel Videos - Fountain cavallina,Genzano, Italy - The Compulsive ...

Dear readers, in our last article called, The heritage chapter, we have explained and accepted that indeed in Genzano di Lucania a long time ago there lived some Greek people in one of the chasms, well this might seem strange today that people used to live in caves dug in the walls of a chasm, but we think it is strange just because we don’t live in caves any more. Anyhow, I would like to go back to talk about the Greek people; because, there are reasons to believe that before the Greek people left their caves in the chasm for the last time, here we are saying the last time because, they seemed to have been forced to run away, so, they hid their Madonna effigy at the lower end of the chasm; as you can see this is another very important story to tell about the Greek community that lived in Genzano territory a very long time ago, at the beginning of the Christian Era. Here we have to admit that what we are telling here is only folklore stories and some logic human explanations when we try to put all what is known together.

We have also to admit that what follows here is mostly guess work, because nobody knows for sure what happened to the Greek people, it is known that they were there and then they were not there anymore, but the facts are not really known and perhaps it is not important to know exactly what happened to them, because here we want only to tell you the story of the Madonna that is going to follow here-under. But for sure there must have been an upheaval of some sort early in the Christian era because; because, they (the Greek people) seem to have been persecuted and had to run away, and when they left they had to hide away their most precious religious things. So they left behind buried in a secret spot in a little known cave, an effigy of a Madonna, which was to be found much later by the people of Genzano.

How they came about to find this Madonna icon later on just about everybody in Genzano knows the story, and they could tell you their own version easily. So, I had only to find a few names and a few dates to write my own version down, which I would like to tell you here and now.

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The Madonna story as we know it begins

One day in the year of our Lord 1619 there was this fourteen years old youth, whose parents were of a good and honourable family, his name was; Pietro di Giovan Filippo, and he happened to mind some oxen in the fields at that time, he was in the zone that we call Strippara which is near Genzano town where this event took place, in fact it seems to me that he was at the very beginning of the chasm called ‘Del Monte’. So, while he was browsing his oxen there; a Lady all dressed in white appeared to him; and she told him that he should go and tell the people of Genzano that, they should go into the chasm near the fountain of Capo d’aqua, and dig in the cave that was once known to have been in the vineyard of ‘Don Fabio’ and they would find her image there. The youth went to town and told the people and the priest of the apparition of this great Lady, but they were not sure whether to believe him or not; so nothing was done about it at that point of time. But after a few days or a week or two, the Lady in white appeared to the youth again; But this time she asked the youth to open his hand, and she wrote in his hand a message to the priest, she closed the youth hand and told him to go to the priest and show him that writing. The youth now with his closed fist that he could not or would not open for fear ran into the town and found the priest, and told him about the second apparition of the Lady in white, and that the Lady had written on his hand in his closed fist something; the priest took his hand to see and there in front of the priest he could open his hand again; and in his hand the priest could see the message which read (I am Maria Santissima Delle Grazie, and come to find me).

So, now the priest had no doubt in his mind from where that message was coming, and he assembled the people of Genzano and told them the facts. A search was organized, and they dug in and around the said cave for a very long time, and not knowing exactly where else to dig, they also dug farther up the mountain, where they found some human remains and other object as evidence that there once lived eremites. The search went on for about two long years and therefore they became tired of it. And it seemed to them at that time, that there was not a real Madonna image to be found, because the only image of a Madonna that they had found there was a Madonna traced over the sand which was slowly disappearing. And thinking that this would be all that they could find, they decided to give up the search, but at the same time they would build a small chapel in honour of this Madonna. But while they were digging the foundation for this chapel, a whole heap of very hard rock fell from the chasm’s wall above, which showed them that there was a smaller cave near the old cave higher up in the chasm’s wall, and in this small cave they found a few religious items, including a small image of St. Peter on a brick, but there was no Madonna.

I believe that we have said enough in this post, one of the reasons we are saying this it is because, today most of the readers like short stories, as they have several things to look about; anyhow we will continue to write about this Madonna story in our next post, The Madonna is found. See you soon.

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Genzano it story

Madonna story

IS GOING TO BE CONTINUED;

Next time with, The Madonna is found

-------------------------------------------

Some useful links

http://myreligioustheory.yolasite.com

Some hub links

Australian houses in Brisbane, Australia affordable houses

DIY brickwork, Strage in Genzano di Lucania

Normans - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.comune.genzano.pz.it/

www.sportinggenzano.it/

Travel Videos - Fountain cavallina, Genzano, Italy - The Compulsive ...

Most interesting photos from Genzano di Lucania, Basilicata, Italy

Where is Genzano di Lucania in Basilicata, Italy located?

Sunday, November 2, 2014

Town heritage

WELCOME TO FRANK MENCHISE BLOG OF GENZANO DI LUCANIA, YOU ARE INVITED TO BROWSE AS LONG AS YOU LIKE.
-
Welcome to our blog, Genzano it story
and our post, Town heritage, or Genzano heritage chapter.
-

The Cavallina fountain, in the foreground the large trough where the horses and other large animals would be taken to water, in the background the fountain with several spouts.

This is one of the feasts at the town's fountain

The heritage chapter

In this post we are going to discuss about some history of Genzano di Lucania, therefore we are going to mention what sort of heritage we inherited in Genzano di Lucania.

So, let us talk about our heritage; in Genzano there is a chasm called the Greek chasm, and perhaps we should have called this article, Genzano Greek chasm heritage, but anyhow, let us discuss here and now about this chasm, which is the other chasm on the other side of Genzano; for the readers that have not read our previous hubs I repeat here that the old town of Genzano was built between two chasms and in our last article we have talked about (Sant Antun) chasm where the Genzanesi make wine in the caves dug in the walls of the chasm below the town, but here today we are going to talk about what the local call the Greek chasm.

So, let us try to explain the name of this Greek chasm; some writers that have written about Genzano history lately all seem to admit that a very long time ago the Greek were living here in this part of southern Italy, and therefore in the chasm that we are going to talk about as well, and that is the reason why it is called the Greek chasm even today from the elders of Genzano.

There are reasons to believe that it is so if one keeps in mind how the human race migrated from the Middle East to Europe; and also history tells us that 700 BC or there about Greece had colonies in southern Italy, which might have lasted until the Romans took over. So let us assume that the Greeks were there anyhow, because what is going to follow later on is only going to reinforce this assumption. As there is also another story about this Madonna of Genzano that we are going to tell you in our future posts, we can only say here that this Madonna effigy is very much the effigies that the Greek were making about the Roman times.

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The town history and heritage

Looking at old history books, we have to admit that there is not much written about Genzano town history in the distant past. However the myth says that Genzano is very old and it was named from a legend that tells us that a young guy called Iens (yens) fell in love and eloped with a young princes called San, they went to live in the caves that were in the chasm below Genzano and later on started to build the town above the caves a small castle, the name is virtually the two name of the lovers put together Iens-san (yensan, or jenzan) I am saying this because I know that in strict dialect of the town even today it is pronounced Yenzan with no G at the beginning and no O at the end.

Now let us talk for a moment about more recent history that a recent write has discovered in the archive of Potenza; one of the first times that Genzano is mentioned in the archives is that of two brothers Secondo and Donato who were Christian martyr in the year 258 AD, as they were beheaded in Genzano ordered from council Valeriano, which I guess was a Roman council for that part of Italy. This seems to be the oldest record found written in Genzano history and not much else; so, let us go back to the Greek chasm story.

Because in this post we would like to tell or describe to you the chasm on the other side of Genzano that we call the Greek chasm, we have to say that this chasm starts about fifty meter from the fountain Cavallina, or perhaps I should say that at the beginning of the Greek chasm is where the fountain Cavallina is, then suddenly the chasm becomes very deep and a real chasm; this part of Genzano is called the Greek chasm, so, by this very name it is understood that a very long time ago there must have been a colony of Greek people living there, and perhaps also in the surrounding country side.

About the Greek people and whatever happened to them nobody seems to know today, as there is no trace of them and there are no records to check with. So one is forced to assume that very likely that there was a war, or something of that sort and they were driven out. Or perhaps they just mixed with the rest of the inhabitants of Genzano and nobody remembers; or perhaps, as time went by things changed and it became impossible for them to live in the chasm, because of the erosion and other natural factors which slowly changed the shape of the chasm, and the use of the chasm.

However nowadays the Greek chasm has been deserted from the people of Genzano for a long while, because most of the people would be afraid to go into this chasm, and there are good reasons for it: Apart that it can be dangerous because of the abrupt drops in the level of the land, it can also be unsanitary as lots of rubbish used to be dumped into this chasm, and this would include also the human excrement that used to come out at the bottom of the chasm, when there was no proper sewer laid in town; and plus most of the men that lived in the old town when they had to go, they used to go and squat on the shoulders of the chasm and do it there, in order to save their women folks the extra sanitary work that they had to carry out: And this unpleasant task I am going to explain later on how it was done.

In the Greek chasm nowadays there are only a few good caves that can still be used, and most of the rest have been abandoned because it is impossible to get at them, since the erosion has made the chasm deeper, so now some caves are left exposed halfway up the vertical cliff of the chasm.

I believe that the erosion became worse in this chasm because: there is the fountain Cavallina upstream at the very beginning of the chasm, and also because, as the town grew larger most of the town’s storm water drainage was diverted into this chasm, and together with this drainage they built also a simple and effective sewerage system for the town of those days. The dunghill masonry was built all underground, except for the opening where they used to drop the dung, and it was connected through a drain which came out at the bottom of the chasm. All this may seem ridiculous today, but I am sure that in those times was seen as a great improvement.

Now at this point I would like to point out to you that there are some large masonry works in this chasm, because across the chasm there are two massive masonry walls, and one of them is so massive that seems as if it wants to hold the banks of the chasm apart. These two walls have been built for several purposes in mind, and the most important one would be to prevent any landslide which would endanger this part of the town, and to stop the erosion that could undermine this part of the town, and also to hide the drainage and sewer system. So the only thing that could be seen of the sewer system was only a large barred opening about three feet square at ground level, which was situated a short walking distance from the town’s fountain Cavallina; and this archaic but effective old sewer system was still being used when I was young. Not from my family, because we were lucky enough as we were connected to the modern sewer system long before I was born. But it still was used only from those less fortunate people in the community, which for some reasons of their own had not been able to connect to the modern town’s sewer yet, so they had to use the old system as it was done in the old days and this was the most hated job of them all.

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The most hated job of them all

Before we start to tell you about the most hated job of them all, we would like to point out to the modern generation to compare those times and the ways that even the best people had to make do, in order to live a decent life then; today all this may seem crazy even to talk about it, but in those times that was how most things were done.

Now looking back at the time when I was young, I still remember how the unspeakable job was done, from the women folks of those last unfortunate families that were still using the old sewer system, they had to do this horrible job two or three times a week, and they would feel so ashamed while they were doing it, and what a shame it was compared to nowadays living standard.

Now that I am older and wiser I would have felt sorry for those women that had to use the old sewer system: But them as a young man; I and my teenager male friends thought that it was very funny, when we would see in the evening just before dusk, a couple of women per household come out of their houses with their own dung balanced on their head so to speak. One of them would carry this round and wide rimmed ceramic container balanced on her head, the other would be carrying a bucket and a sort of little broom which was a sort of brush with a long handle.

They would be coming out of their houses, and they would try to go the back ways as much as they could, and try to be invisible if they could as they didn’t want to be seen. Can you just imagine some teenager girls doing this low and unspeakable service, while some teenager boys would be prying on them from a distance? What a shame! Those girls must have felt terrible to say the least, only because they were doing the most hated job of them all, which was to dispose of their own human excrement; but, it was necessary and inevitable. Anyhow when they reached the square opening of the sewer, they would help each other to bring the contains down from their heads and would throw the dung down the square hole; and then the one with the bucket would go to the fountain and bring a bucket of water to wash the ceramic container. And finally return to their homes relieved that their dirty job was done, and they would be all right for a few more days.

Can you just imagine any young girls that are living today to do such a shameful job, I have nothing else to say but just compare. So, when old people say that today generations are better off and lucky to be born now and not then, they are telling us the truth, because I am pretty sure that there is no one that would volunteer to do that job.

See you next time, where we are going to tell you about the Madonna story

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Genzano it story

Historic events in brief

IS GOING TO BE CONTINUED;

Next time with, another post about the castle

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Some useful links