Sardinia in flames – in the name of the Church

All of Sardinia is ablaze, because that's the tradition! In Budoni alone, there are 15 bonfires burning on 17 January when the Antonius fire is lit.
Across Sardinia, that adds up to thousands of burning pyres, with which Saint Anthony is asked to keep illness away from people and livestock. A church festival, then. But its roots go back to ancient times, and this is also evident in the ritual. I must admit that the pagan, archaic character of the burning pyre makes me feel uneasy every time I see it.

Immediately after Epiphany, people begin collecting wood. Even today, in some parts of the island, no work is done until the Antoniusfeuer, with all energy devoted to the festival and the fire. This shows how important it is to the Sardinians.

It is traditional to place bundles of brushwood in all the places where food is produced, months before the festival. This means in stables, gardens, vineyards and at the edge of fields. These bundles of rods*, which were also significant in ancient Rome and are still present in the word ‘fascism’ today, are said to attract all the misfortune that can befall humans and animals. When they were burned, the fire destroyed the evil attached to them. This is the origin of the festival, as explained to me almost 40 years ago by the then over 100-year-old, blind Davide, who was revered in his village as a seer and sage. In modern terms, he would probably be called a ‘shaman’.

In the Middle Ages, the Church Christianised the festival and placed a cross on the pyre. However, the evil is still burned and the fire is blessed. The pagan origin is evident in the fact that the fire is not only lit on the saint's feast day, but also on days shortly before or after.

Every farmer and every shepherd carries their ‘bundle of misfortune’ to the place of execution near a church or chapel and piles it up there. To ensure that a lot of misfortune is burned, many ‘unburdened’ bundles of brushwood are added. A cross decorated with oranges is placed on top of the woodpile. ‘Why is that?’ I asked. ‘The oranges are supposed to represent a disease,’ I was told. No one, not even old Davide, could tell me what that disease was. For a long time, I didn't believe it. Why on earth should oranges symbolise a disease?

It was only while researching this blog that I stumbled upon the solution to the mystery while Googling ‘Antoniusfeuer’. The ‘unknown’ disease is an epidemic called ergotism! From ancient times to modern times, it has played a similarly nasty role as plague and cholera, so it must be classified as one of the great epidemics. Its symptoms include inflammation and rashes. Because the disease was so widespread at the time, Matthias Grünewald painted a sufferer in the Isenheim Altarpiece. Looking at him, the oranges suddenly became clear to me: that was it! I would have thought that blackberries and raspberries bore a greater resemblance to ulcers, but they are not available at the feast of St. Anthony. Only citrus fruits are ripe at that time of year. That is why the cross is ‘infected’ with oranges, probably due to seasonal circumstances.

On the day of the festival, after dark, the pyre is set alight. While it burns, the priest leads a prayer procession. He circles the fire three times and blesses it so that illness may be removed from humans and animals.

Meanwhile, the women of the village distribute St. Anthony's pastries to the participants, which were previously baked by the families. These are a kind of pretzel, not very tasty, symbolising the feeding of the poor. You have to accept it and say thank you with a formula if you don't want to be plagued by illness in the future. After a few minutes, I had had to say thank you so many times that I no longer knew how to cope with feeding the poor. I discreetly disposed of everything in my car and decided to use it later to bless my neighbour's chickens.

When the fire reaches and engulfs the cross with its oranges, loud applause breaks out. That's almost the end of the official part. Almost, but not quite; because what would a Sardinian festival be without feasting, wine and singing? And so everyone gathers here afterwards for a merry get-together.

Traditionally, ‘favelardo’ is served. This is a dish I knew from English lessons as ‘pork and beans’. Suddenly, I encountered this traditional Canadian lumberjack meal! Were the first lumberjacks in the New World perhaps Sardinians? I didn't have time to pursue this question. Broad beans with bacon! Delicious! This is accompanied not only by heavy red wine, but of course also by a glass or two of ‘filu e ferro’*, which builds another bridge to America, namely to the 1920s and Prohibition*.

As always in Sardinia, I really enjoyed myself at the feast of St. Anthony.

With a Sardinian ‘Adiosu’, I bid you farewell for today.

Joachim Waßmann

*A bundle of rods, Latin fascis, helped the privileged servants (lictors) of high dignitaries in ancient Rome to clear away anything that stood in their way. This elevated the lictors themselves to powerful officials, and the fascis, combined with the axe as a sign of power over life and death, became a symbol of power invoking Rome. (Mussolini used it, but so did the USA and France.) The parallel to my topic: in ancient Rome and Sardinia, fasces removed undesirable elements, either through the lictors or through fire.

*Filu e ferru is a wire noose. The distillation of alcohol is also subject to licensing in Sardinia, which grappa specialists who are unable to read or write naturally cannot apply for and, for this reason alone, cannot obtain. What to do? Should one let the beautiful grape marc go to waste just because of a piece of paper? No, of course not! So distillation took place without a licence, and to hide the moonshine from the eyes and noses of snooping officials, the bottles of schnapps were simply... buried! This is where filu e ferru comes in: to make them easier to find, the bottles were fitted with a noose, the end of which protruded inconspicuously from the ground. Once the danger had passed, a quick tug was all it took. Pop the cork, and you had a tax-free way to aid your digestion! This custom has survived to this day. There is probably not a single winegrower in Sardinia who has not buried a few wire slings.

*Prohibition: A law in force in the USA from 1920 to 1933. It prohibited the production and distribution of alcohol. It can be seen as a golden opportunity for the American Mafia, who knew how to creatively ‘fill’ the resulting market gap and earned so much from it that their rise became unstoppable.

*Rutenbündel, lat. fascis, half den privilegierten Dienern (Liktoren) hoher Würdenträger im antiken Rom, alles aus dem Weg zu räumen, was denen unterwegs im Wege war. Damit stiegen die Liktoren selber zu mächtigen Beamten auf, und die Fascis, verbunden mit dem Beil als Zeichen der Macht über Leben und Tod, avancierte zum Symbol sich auf Rom berufender Macht. (Mussolini hat es verwendet, aber auch die USA und Frankreich.) Die Parallele zu meinem Thema: Rutenbündel beseitigten im alten Rom und in Sardinien Unliebsames, entweder durch die Liktoren oder das Feuer.

*Filu e ferru“ ist eine Drahtschlinge. Das Brennen von Alkohol ist auch in Sardinien an Lizenzen gebunden, die des Schreibens und Lesens unkundige Grappa-Spezialisten natürlich nicht beantragen und schon aus diesem Grunde nicht bekommen konnten. Was tun? – Sollte man nur wegen eines Papierwischs den schönen Traubentrester verkommen lassen? Nein natürlich nicht! Also wurde lizenzfrei gebrannt, und um das Schwarzbrennprodukt vor Augen und Nasen schnüffelnder Beamter zu verbergen, wurden die Schnapsbuddeln einfach … verbuddelt! Hier kommt filu e ferru ins Spiel: Um das Wiederauffinden zu erleichtern, bekamen die Flaschen eine Schlinge verpasst, deren Ende ganz unauffällig aus dem Erdreich ragte. War die Gefahr gebannt, reichte ein kurzer Ruck. Korken ab, und schon konnte man steuerfrei etwas für die Verdauung tun! Dieser Brauch hat sich bis heute erhalten. Es gibt wohl keinen Winzer in Sardinien, der nicht ein paar Drahtschlingen vergraben hat.

*Prohibition: Ein in den USA wirksames Gesetz von 1920 – 1933. Es verbot die Produktion und den Vertrieb von Alkohol. Man kann es als Steilvorlage für die amerikanische Mafia betrachten, die die sich ergebende Marktlücke kreativ „abzufüllen“ verstand und daran so gut verdiente, dass ihr Aufstieg unaufhaltsam wurde.