In the name of Jesus and Saint Peter, may the sty go away

Witches, fears and sacral magical practices that have survived

ONCE UPON  A TIME, the days of my grandparents and my parents as well as that of my childhood (less than twenty-five years ago), witches, “fears” and healing magic-sacral practices were part of everyday culture. The latter were probably more practiced than the first. Even if only few believed it , at every swelled eye or aching belly, almost in every family of Poggio, Carmignano or elsewhere, the inevitable aunt “sewed” the sty or maybe the grandmother marked the bugs.
It can be assumed that the belief in witches and fears stemmed from the need to give an explanation for the otherwise unexplained phenomena; fears justify disturbing noises and night shadows. As for the healing practices, they found fertile soil in poor health results from the previous year. But there was an undisputed link that bound, and even mixed, a widespread religiosity and these beliefs. The most typical ingredients of this sort of folk medicine were  wine and bread, water and salt, garlic and sulphur, and blessed olive oil. Even if the materials were easy to find (and thus perhaps preferred), they became charged with a strong symbolic meaning. Several were the references to religion and the “contamination” of the concept. In the oral formulas recited in a subdued tone and accompanied by seemingly meaningless gestures, the word “holy” or the names of Jesus and Mary often appeared. Also the number three was frequent.
A pot of water on the head was how you took care of those who claimed to have been victim of the “evil eye”. Inside the pot, people poured three times three drops of oil. If this scattered, the patient had to dip his or her fingers in the pot and wet his temples. For the animals, hanging a picture of St. Anthony in the stables or, for the Vineyard, a bunch of blessed olive twigs tied at the beginning of each row would normally be enough. The fright was normally treated with the “grass of fear.” Preferably collected in the woods because it was more powerful than the one in the fields, it was dried and stored. To prepare the infusion people added a crust of bread, three blessed leaves of olive tree and a handful of salt on top of the cover (or even myrtle grass).The patient then with this water washed three times his or her face and joints of the legs and arms, sliding the hands downwards.

There was a cure for every illness. For the sty, people “pretended” to stich the affected eye with a sewing needle and a thread that had a knot at the end. The formula to be invoked: “In the name of Jesus and Saint Peter, may the sty go away.” For the warts, oil and chamomile seeds were heated in a spoon and poured three times on the diseased part. Some blessed olive leaves, also in   this case, were often used. Finally, Garlic was the cure for all “bugs”. A tremor in the sleep, caused by rubbing against the nose, was a sign of their presence. The smell of garlic was the treatment. But you could mark them with water in which diluted sulphur had been poured. Or maybe enchant them. Many were the formulas to use: “Return the Mistral, may he return to his channel” or “…San Job had bugs, Jesus enchanted them”,” … Easter Sunday, all the bugs are in the water. “And the person who “dispensed the cure” was usually a woman, who had learnt the older formulas and the rituals from another older woman. She then verified if her powers worked. (Wf)

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