Easter Sunday in Sardinia

In Oliena, the pitch-note of Easter Sunday is given by the young men – and recently also women –, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of ancient bandits, who since the early morning are continuously firing from the rooftops. Wherever we go down there, lead, shot and shell casings are continuously falling on our heads.


Oliena, Wild West. Recording by Lloyd Dunn, 27 March 2016

A procession starts from the church of St. Francis, with the statue of the Virgin Mary, who wanders the streets of the old town in search of her son. Meanwhile, in the church of the Holy Cross, amid polyphonic Sardinian folk songs, they decorate the statue of the Risen Christ, and then also another procession starts from the door of the church to the main square.

I turn back to the Holy Cross church for a photo of the empty square. A young woman in an apron stands on the corner, looking anxiously back and forth. “Has Christ already gone?” “Five minutes ago”. “Oh, Madonna. Every year I’m late.”


On the main square, along a path bestudded with rosemary branches, the two processions are approaching each other. The encounter takes place, s’incontru, which gives name to the whole festival. Christ bows before her mother, the Sardinian men before the Sardinian women carrying her. Then all the participants, and the entire public dressed in traditional costume, retires in double row to the St. Ignatius church for the Easter high mass. Along the main street, every bar has already put out the tables and chairs. The locals – and with them we, too – go from place to place, tasting the almond cakes offered for free at this time in every bar. Friends meet, groups condense and disperse, like colorful flocks of bird they are swirling in the maze of the aviary of the town.

Domingo de Pascua en Cerdeña

En Oliena, el pistoletazo del domingo de Pascua lo dan, literalmente, los hombres jóvenes del pueblo –y solo recientemente también la mujeres–, nietos y bisnietos de antiguos bandoleros, que desde primeras horas se dedican a disparar sin pausa en lo alto de los tejados. Por allá donde pasamos, plomo, proyectiles y cartuchos caen continuamente sobre nuestras cabezas.


Oliena, El Salvaje Oeste. Grabación de Lloyd Dunn, 27 de marzo de 2016

Una procesión parte de la iglesia de San Francisco con la estatua de la Virgen y recorrerá las calles de la ciudad vieja en busca de su hijo. Mientras, en la iglesia de la Santa Cruz, entre los tradicionales cantos polifónicos sardos, han decorado la estatua de Cristo Resucitado para también partir luego en procesión desde el portal mayor hasta la plaza principal.

Volvemos a la iglesia de la Santa Cruz para tomar una foto de la plazoleta vacía. Una joven en delantal dobla la esquina mirando nerviosa atrás y adelante. «¿Ya ha salido el Cristo?» «Hace cinco minutos». «Oh, Madonna. Cada año llego tarde.»


En la plaza del pueblo, sobre un lecho de ramas de romero van acercándose las dos procesiones. Tiene lugar el encuentro, s’incontru, que da el nombre a la fiesta. El Cristo se inclina ante su madre, los hombres sardos ante las mujeres que la llevan. Luego, todos los participantes y el público, todos vestidos con trajes tradicionales, se retiran en doble fila a la iglesia de San Ignacio para el solemne oficio de Pascua. A lo largo de la calle mayor, los bares ya han dispuesto las sillas y las mesas. La gente –y nosotros con ellos– vamos de local en local probando el pastel de almendra que regalan por cortesía. Los amigos se juntan, se forman y se dispersan los grupos girando como bandadas de pájaros de colores en la pajarera laberíntica de las calles del pueblo.

Holy Saturday in Sardinia • Sábado Santo en Cerdeña

On Holy Saturday, time stops in Sardinia, as the soccer ball in the air. In the valley of Ogliastra, in the towns of Gàiro, Ulassai, Osini, from the Descent from the Cross on Friday night to the Resurrection in Sunday morning, the churches are empty, the streets deserted, only an old woman passes along them with a pint of water brought from the public well. Heavy, drowsy sunlight trickles down the side of the valley, blending with the scent of the fresh green grass, rosemary and wild thyme, lizards and old men are basking in it. If the clouds did not fly up from the sea in the late afternoon to curtain off the sun like the purple shroud the stripped-down crucifixes of the churches, this day would never end.

El tiempo se detiene el Sábado Santo en Cerdeña como el balón de fútbol lanzado al aire. En el valle de Ogliastra, en los pueblos de Gàiro, Ulassai, Osini, desde el Descendimiento de la noche del Viernes hasta la Resurrección del Domingo por la mañana, las iglesias están vacías, las calles desiertas. Tan solo una anciana pasa con un cubo de agua del pozo. Un sol perezoso, dormido, se deja caer por la ladera del valle arrastrando olor a hierba, romero y tomillo; las lagartijas y los jubilados salen a aspirarlo. Si a la tarde no subieran las nubes desde el mar para ocultar el sol, como el velo púrpura que echan sobre los crucifijos sacados de las iglesias, el día no tendría fin.

A fizzu meu so coro (The heart of my son / El corazón de mi hijo). Religious song from the Barbagia, arranged by the great Sardinian singer Maria Carta, 1984 / Canto religioso de Barbagia, arreglos de la gran cantante sarda Maria Carta, 1984

Good Friday in Sardinia • Viernes Santo en Cerdeña

The church of St. Ignatius is covered in complete darkness, only the lanterns of the male and female ministrants are lit, as the procession starts from the sanctuary through the aisle and the medieval streets of Oliena. They visit seven churches in memory of the seven sorrows of Mary, they are lined with their lanterns in the front gate, while the members of the local confraternities – the religious associations who organize the Holy Week rites, which you see below in the the mosaic tiles – walk out and join them. The procession, which grew into a large crowd, returns in an hour to the church of St. Ignatius. Here in the sanctuary they have already set up the monumental medieval crucifix with movable arms, and the choir is assembled, dressed in Baroque folk costume, sings polyphonic religious songs. It is the beginning of s’iscravamentu, the tradition of the Descent from the Cross, preserved from the Middle Ages.

La Iglesia de San Ignacio está inmersa en una completa oscuridad, solo los faroles de los oficiantes iluminan al iniciarse la procesión desde el santuario, por el corredor y las calles medievales de Oliena. Visitarán siete iglesias en memoria de los siete dolores de la Virgen. Alineados con sus faroles ante la puerta principal, aguardan a que los miembros de las cofradías locales —como se ve en las fotos del mosaico de abajo— salgan y se reúnan con ellos. La procesión, que va creciendo hasta ser numerosa, volverá en una hora a la iglesia de San Ignacio. Aquí en el santuario ya han dispuesto el monumental crucifijo medieval de brazos articulados, y el coro se junta, con sus barrocos atavíos tradicionales, para entonar los cantos religiosos polifónicos. Es el principio de s’iscravamentu, el Descendimiento, tal como se ha transmitido desde la Edad Media.

Tenores di Bitti: Deus te salvet, Maria

Dissolving: The tempest

The church fortress and town of Ardara (Sardinia) after tempest, at sunset

El Greco: Toledo, or Tempest above Toledo, ca. 1599, the first Spanish landscape. Art historical analysis explains in many ways the stormy sky, from the artist’s troubled state of mind through his relationship to God to a presentiment of a threatening future. Is it not possible that he only painted what he saw?

Dissolving: Brave new world

Arzara, Sardinia, late 1920s

Tarquinio Sini (Sardinia): Mondanità, 1928, tempera, paper

Desulo, Sardinia, 1974

Disolución: Revelaciones • Dissolving: Revelations

“Wanderer, come nearer to see, what hides in the shadow. For though he lies buried,
the letters indicated by the combination of numbers will clearly reveal
who rests in this coffin, who Memphis is preparing
a new celestial sphere for.” *

Lágrimas amantes de la excelentísima Ciudad de Barcelona [...] en las Magníficas Exequias que celebró a las Amadas y Venerables Memorias de su difunto Rey y Señor don Carlos II [...] Descríbelas Joseph Rocaberti. Barcelona: Juan Pablo Martí, 1701, p. 263. El texto debe completarse siguiendo la secuencia numérica. Para la muerte de Carlos II, sin descendencia y desencadenadora de la larga guerra mundial conocida como Guerra de Sucesión, la generalidad de las imprentas hispanas ofrecieron de manera exagerada —reveladora de una necesidad de saturar, de colmatar la superficie gráfica cuando tan poco bueno se podía augurar— todo tipo de muestras de poesía visual, enigmática o «metamétrica».

Tears of Love, shed by the eminent City of Barcelona […] in the magnificent mourning rituals dedicated to the beloved and venerated memory of her deceased King and Lord, don Carlos II […] Described by Joseph Rocaberti. Barcelona: Juan Pablo Martí, 1701, p. 263. The text is to be supplemented according to the numeric combinations. Charles II died without a heir, and his death ignitd the long world war known as the War of the Spanish Succession. Most of the Spanish printers paid a tribute to the memory of the deceased ruler with a variety of exaggerated visual, enigmatic and “metametric” poems, which clearly reveal, what an effort it was to fill the blank pages when there was so little good to say.

Letra A (alfa). Folio 6 del Comentario del Apocalipsis, encargado por el rey Fernando I al beato Facundo. Lo acabó en 1047 (Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid). Cristo, de pie bajo la inicial y apuntando hacia ella, tiene la letra Omega en la mano: «Yo soy el Alfa y Omega, el Principio y el Fin, dice el Señor» (Ap 1:8)

Initial A (alfa) on fol. 6 of the Commentary to John’s Revelations, illuminated by Beatus Facundus (see the history of these codex) for Ferdinand I of Castille and León (completed in 1047, Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional). Christ, standing under the initial and pointing to it, holds the letter omega in His hand: “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, says the Lord” (Rev 1:8)

In the stonemasons’ yard

The Sotoportego del Tagiapiera, the Gateway and Courtyard of the Stonemasons in Venice, opens with two elegant neo-classical columns from the Campielo del Sol, the Little Square of the Sun, which in the Middle Ages was called Campielo de la Scoazera, the Square of the Refuse Dump. In fact, since the 15th century here was the walled dumping-ground of the Rialto quarter, from where the burchieri, the freight haulers, on behalf of the Magistrato alle Acque, regularly carried the garbage out of the city on gondolas. In 1617, the refuse dump was ended, the walls pulled down, and later the transport route of the gondolas, the Rio Terà San Silvestro – Rio Terà Sant’Aponal channel also filled (this is referred to by the word Terà = terrato, buried) and converted into a pedestrian road. Thereby the stonemasons’ yard also became accessible by land. Nevertheless they continued to bring here through the back gate, along Rio de le Becarie, the Istrian stone and carry away the stone carvings intended to decorate the city’s many buildings.


In Venice they begin to massively build in stone instead of wood in the 14th century. Then in 1307 they founded the stonemasons guild, whose scuola, the seat of their religious and corporate life, was on the top floor of the three-level building next to the nearby church of Sant’Aponal. This is recalled in the relief dated 1603 with the inscription “SCOLA DEL TAGIAPIERA”, the Scuola of the Stonemasons, and with the figures of the Quattro Santi Coronati, that is the four Christian stonemasons of ancient Rome, crowned with the wreath of martyrs. The first depiction of the stonemasons yard survived from 1545 in a manuscript.


I got this far in my lecture to the group, when two young men, who were talking in front of one of the courtyard’s workshops, ask me with a smile: “What is so interesting in this yard?” “That this was the first stonemason yard of Venice,” I reply. And that it is very nice anyway. The whole court, the pillars, the blacksmith’s work, the knockers,” I point at the door behind them. “Yes, now a blacksmith works here,” says one of them. “But earlier there was a carpenter’s workshop there, that of my grandfather. Back there, through the riverside gate they brought in the raw wood from the boats, there they unloaded it in the courtyard, here he processed it and made tables and cabinets out of it.

“Where do you come from?” the other asks. “From Hungary.” “Oh yes? Do you know that the Serenissima and Hungary fought for a long time for Dalmatia, until it passed to Venice?” he asks proudly. “Of course. And do you know,” I riposte, “where the agreement about it was signed between the two states?” “No.” “Well, across the street, in the church of San Silvestro, in 1409.” “Seriously?” they asks in astonishment. “We have grown up here, but never heard about it.” “Yes, there’s a plaque on the wall of the church,” I say. Having spoken of it, we go there with the group, so they can also see, after the previous one, this second Hungarian memorial place in Venice.

“On 9 July 1409 was signed in this church the document by which the Kingdom of Hungary renounced all rights over Zara and Dalmatia in favor of Venice, thus consolidating for centuries the ancient ties between Dalmatia and Venice. Erected by the Dalmatian Society of the History of the Homeland on 29 November 2013.”

Dissolving: From sea to sea

Bird in Byzantine ornamental frame. Venice, St. Mark’s Square, 12-13th century

Bird in Armenian ornamental frame. Venice, St. Lazarus Island, Armenian monastery, MS 1159, 12-13th century