Awaiting a miracle
Peter Nichols
, Rome Italy can be divided many ways, and each division has some validity: north and south, Catholic and Liberal, Renaissance and Counter-Reformation, St Francis and Fra' Diavolo, even St Francis and the rest. The latest dividing line is between Christmas and a formidable challenger in the shape of a refurbished Epiphany.
Actually it is a re-drawing of a dividing line which seen*, to have disappeared. The Christmas of pine trees with candles, loads of presents and too much to eat is a quite recent innovation to Italy and can be said to have been part of the post-war process by which Italy sought to become a part of that industrialised society lying to the north and the west. Prince Albert decorated Britain's economic expansion with the Christmas tree: Italians scaled the Alps in search of economic and political stability and found, among other things, that same Christmas tree with the baubles which give it a kind of self-satisfied aura of well-being.
They took it back with them and demoted Epiphany to make room for the acquisition. For most of Italy, Epiphany us- ed to be the time for giving presents, not Christmas, which was left with its more religious significance. Then, with Christmas over, the children would help spend the double salary father was paid — and still is — in December to buy toys and gifts for January.
They were simpler times. The Crib not the Tree was the season's sign. There was little hiding of gifts or packing them in gaudy paper. PeOple chose what they wanted to be given. Epiphany was a na- tional holiday: the schools were closed and, to make up for the lack of a Father Christmas, an ugly witch called the 'Befana' left presents for children. This was more in keeping with a traditionalist Italy because the Epiphany was historically associated with the gifts brought by the Magi. As a Christian feast, it emerged strongly first in the eastern Mediterranean moving westward at the end of the fourth century. In the East the connection is prin- cipally with the baptism of Christ while the Adoration of the Magi prevailed in the West.
It was symbolic that the Italians should have adopted the northern European Christmas, with its full panoply of commer- cialisation, as the foundations of the con- sumer society were being laid. It is equally significant that a return of the old witch should now be taking place as the recession becomes deeper and as Italy has begun to recall more of its Mediterranean heritage than has been the case for years. This pro- cess is not a vague return to origins. Even if the Italians had not wanted to accept the renewed importance of the Mediterranean, it would have been forced on them with the extension of the European Community southward and the heightened strategic ten- sion in the area.
'Every year you know just what I want — I don't know how you do it.'
If the last government had not fallen 5° unexpectedly fast, Parliament would have approved a bill re-establishing EpiPhanY1,85, a full public holiday. Its long period ill IT shadows had led to its extinction as a liewo. day in 1977 when there was agreement t, abolish six public holidays in order to Of' an appearance of higher productivity. In e:0 fect, the six lost feast-days were added as` normal annual holidays so that nothing v'',0 lost except the traditional respect $hown t popular feast-days of which the 0105 popular of all had been Epiphany. „se Parliament was forced to move beca"_A of the signs that Epiphany was still lo° back to with nostalgia by an amalt.li number of people. The Rome newspaPe'of Messaggero proposed the reinstatenlenti the public holiday and received 321,00 'ea; r ters on the subject, most of theut favourable. All parties except the far ig; wing backed the Bill introduced into Parnat ment. It had reached committee hearings
the time the government fell. • or,
Had the committee been a shade tInte the the Bill would have been approved hut 'for discussion was interrupted in Septernber°ras a brief 'period of reflection'. 'flirts the because of another aspect °' Epiphany's meaning in terms of 0-4% Italian society. The abolition of the iti" e public holidays had been made in the of the 'moralisation' of Italian life: Itat; were shocked, or pretended to be, that I'll, were ahead of other countries in it. dustrialised Europe in the number of felt days they observed. And so, it was n°,1„o, thing to re-introduce one of these hollu'lise whatever the popular support. The Pao was agreed on to show everyone no, seriously Parliament was taking its res13" g 00v enrem eohf tf i c i acl osi it ae pp s ewda. s t aTkheen b
ibilities. B°
Minister for Education, Guido ',;,./is took on himself to issue a decree proluft'tilp school holidays so that schools would so. be closed on 6 January and would not the open until the following day. That left to curious situation that parents would haveers go to work while their sons and daught stayed at home. Irate parents then ni,""air on // Messaggero, threatening to leave Pio children in the newspaper's offices as_it ne would otherwise have to stay at home a1 as a result of the imperfect success 01 Epiphany crusade. outi Parliamentarians are showing every g as will to hurry through the Bill as so°,/.10 possible, including the redoubtable Mbar Joni, the presiding officer of the Challithe of Deputies, who is a Communist. But nol time, most people agreed, was sirnPlY ;co there to vote in a new government and t he turn to the Epiphany Bill all before the Christmas break. And that meant that to complete resurrection of Epiphany Where have to await 1984. Unless, of course, t" was a miracle. And if that should laPerr Italy would really be back to its old, P,,e1 industrialised self, without tinsel, no 1°fIs51% gift-wrapped, and once again religion • eating eels on Christmas Eve.
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