At age 9, Silvio Falato, now a retired professor of classics from Guardia Sanframondi, wrote an essay on his village that sounds like a love letter. The intro says: “There, it clings to the ruins of an ancient castle almost as a look-out on the great valley. It is like an eagle that dominates the whole plain below.”
No doubt, Guardia Sanframondi is Campania’s hidden gem in the Benevento province. It offers magnificent views of the entire Telesina Valley, its soft emerald hills undulating with vineyards, olive groves, and orchards.
Away from Naples – from where life can be a frenzy, especially behind the wheel of a car – Guardia Sanframondi moves pleasantly at a slow pace.
The road snakes through countless olive groves towards the hilltop where a majestic 6th century Lombard castle, fortified in 1100 by the Normans, lords over the village of 5,000.
In the last decades, Guardia Sanframondi has attracted an international community of engaged citizens involved in local life. “Some 200 Americans have chosen the borgo as their permanent home,” says Professor Falato. “They are mostly visual artists and professionals who work remote.”
Professor Falato points out that they bought old houses for shockingly rock bottom prices and refurbished them using their inventiveness and ability.
But how did they discover the borgo?
“They were attracted to it by the reports on American TV channels about our penitential rites,” he says.
Sure, because Guardia hosts the riti settenali di penitenza, unique penitential rites held every seven years in the third week of August– after August 15, the day dedicated to the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The seven days culminate with a Sunday procession, including hundreds of hooded battenti — penitents who flagellate themselves.
“A medieval legend has it that a farmer was plowing his field in the emerald hills 10 km away from Guardia when he suddenly heard bells ringing under the ground,” says Falato. “The terrified man ran to the neighboring villages asking for help.”
The nearby inhabitants immediately came and dug right where the sounds came from. And what emerged? A wooden statue of Our Lady of the Assumption – an earthquake had probably buried it. “But the statue was immovable,” says Falato. “They could not lift it as it was too heavy. It didn’t want to break away from the ground.”Falato continues his storytelling: “Then people from other bordering villages came. They all tried to lift the sacred statue in vain as it became heavier and heavier.”
Yet when the Guardiesi came, things changed. “The Guardiesi noticed that the holy child in Madonna’s arms was holding a circular piece of cork stuck with 33 pins- the years of Christ. The Guardiesi soon understood that they needed to wear sackcloth and scourge themself. Only by doing that could the statue have come off the ground.”And the exact moment they turned into flagellants, the Madonna statue got lighter, very light. “So, they could pick it up and carry it to Guardia very easily.”
Today visitors admire her golden beauty; pilgrims venerate her at the Marian Shrine of the Assumption- the Basilica of Guardia Sanframondi. The Madonna sits behind the main altar. Her light shines in your heart- she shines her light on anyone who looks at her.
Until 1984, visitors could experience the Silver Museum of the Basilica of the Assumption. Inaugurated on July 28, 1979, for only five years, the Museo degli Argenti housed a collection of fantastic silver art pieces, ranging from large-scale sacred sculptures to small ones.
On November 14, 1984, the parish priest reported the overnight theft of the entire collection.
The 1984 theft of the substantial collection of precious silvers at The Museo degli Argenti at Guardia Sanframondi remains unsolved. However, the village’s commitment to resolving the crime has never diminished since its occurrence 37 years ago.
Criminals had managed to turn off the alarm systems before taking action in the night.
Recently a famous Italian mystery show called Chi l’ha Visto? reported that the community of Guardia Sandramondi is still seeking viable leads that could result in a safe return of their artworks.
The most valuable art pieces looted from the museum were three silver reliquary busts from the 1700s. The first is a masterpiece of Neapolitan silver sculpture, depicting St. Sebastian in embossed silver and gilded copper — About 130 cm high, it is the work of Paolo De Matteis and Gaetano Starace. It belongs to the history of the church of San Sebastiano Martire located in Rione Croce.“In the early 1500s, it was a rural chapel where a diaspora Jewish community found protection. The sovereign allowed them to stay, later to settle outside the town walls, in the Portella district, in the proximity of the Carbonaro stream where they started working as leather tanners,” says Falato.
For centuries, the local leather production was highly appreciated in the East. “It was our most valuable asset,” Falato says.
In the 1600s, the owners of the tanneries converted to catholicism, formed an association of tanners, opened a bank, and established a Mount of Piety, an institutional pawnbroker run as a charity, widespread in Italy since Renaissance times. The Monte di Pietà gave poor people access to loans with reasonable interest rates to avoid exploitative lenders.
The other two extremely valuable busts looted from the Silver Museum in 1984 portray a St. Domenico and a St. Rocco (1751), both made by the artist Nicola De Biasio.
“Spes Ultima Dea,” says Falato in Latin – Hope is the last goddess, meaning hope is the latest to die.
Professor Falato is an expert on ancient languages. The local dialect, he stresses, does reflect the Samnite origins of Guardia.“It is evident in the phonetics of our dialect that uses the two vowels U,” says Falato. “It resembles Oscan, the native idiom of the Samnites.” Those ancient Italic people lived in the central mountainous region of southern Italy, in Samnium. They became involved in several wars with the Roman Republic until the 1st century BC. “In Guardia, the Samnites took strategic decisions. They would spy the Roman troops’ movements in the plains below,” says Falato.
The Samnites were eventually assimilated by the Romans and ceased to exist as distinct people as the Romans began to fully control the territory. After the fall of Rome, the Lombards ruled in Guardia Sanframondi. Later, it was the turn of the Normans, then the Angevins and the Aragonese.
Art looting smugglers targeted the beautiful baroque churches of Guardia in the 1980s and 1990s. They took advantage of closures following the devastating Irpinia earthquakes in 1980 and 1981.
Guardia Sanframondi went through even worst times in 1688 when the Sannio earthquake destroyed the entire village killing 1,200 inhabitants.
But now some good news: Last July, the Carabinieri for the Protection of Cultural Heritage recovered two altarpieces of the Neapolitan Baroque School– two beautiful white marble angel heads ripped away from the church of St. Sebastian, rich in frescoes and canvases by the great Neapolitan painter Paolo De Matteis. They were stolen on December 13, 1989. The Carabinieri Art Squad found them in France. An English expatriate and collector had purchased them from a Neapolitan antique dealer twenty years ago during his stay in Italy.
The Carabinieri Art Squad also recently recovered two other sculptures, cherubs of the 17th century Neapolitan School. The splendid putti were found in Milan. In 1999, they were looted from their original site: the Church of the Convent of Saint Francis.
So a few weeks ago, the Guardia community felt the joy of receiving four of its many still missing art pieces during a heartfelt ceremony.
The residents are proud of Guardia Sanframondi that today produces stunning white wines and excellent extra-virgin olive oil.
A local saying goes: “God created the world, and the Guardiesi chose where to live.”
“Guardia is the best place in the world,” says Falato, ending his love letter to his hometown. “It is l’America piccirella, little America because it has been giving work to the olive pickers coming from all the region since the 1800s.”
Donate