Statue of the Virgin Mary carried on an annual procession through the town streets, housed otherwise in the church a few houses away from the house in which my grandmother was born…Santa Maria di Rivoli. She faithfully collected money to send to them well into her late 80’s.
Pool of the River Bufana that originates in the mountain springs of Boiano.
http://arcidiocesicampobasso.it/index.php/category/diocesi-campobasso-bojano/page/6/
https://www.gazzettamolisana.com/boiano-troppa-lacqua-prelevata-dal-sottosuolo-danni-immensi.html
http://www.madeinsouthitalytoday.com/bojano.php
Gypsies as Children Stealers in Italy: A Modern Myth December 24, 2014 “Do the Roma steal children? Rino Monaco (quoted above), Italian Commissioner for the Disappeared in 2008, said that they do, but RM made the important distinction that most cases of stealing took place between Roma clans, particularly when one family moved out of a nomad camp. Monaco uses the word ‘normally’ (‘di solito: in other interviews he has been more circumspect). But, in fact, there has never been a case in Italy where a Roma has been found guilty in a court of law of stealing Italian children.”
The Roma of Campobasso.“The Molise community is part of the oldest and largest community of non-native Roma in central southern Italy. As known, such Roma reached this region in very ancient times, certainly coming from the Yugoslav and Albanian coasts after the Kosovo battle in 1392; they settled in Molise between the end of the 14th Century and the beginning of the 15th Century, and they are Italian citizens for many generations.”
Who Will Save These Dying Italian Towns?: Near-empty villages try to hold on to an endangered way of life — and some of the country’s most important artisanal traditions. By Sept. 7, 2017
Craco: A Ghost Town In Southern Italy. Craco survived volcanic eruptions, malaria outbreaks, the black plague and centuries of war. March 5, 2017
an essay on music, memory, and my grandmother:
https://jasonzuzga.com/distance-and-memory/