This evening the traditional fires of San Giuseppe. Many appointments in San Marino after two years of hiatus
The fires of San Giuseppe are a deeply felt tradition in Romagna and this evening they will once again become a moment of meeting and socializing for people after two years of being stopped due to the pandemic.
Different locations have made different choices. A Rimini for example, the Municipality has foreseen only three public fireplaces to reduce atmospheric pollution. Riccione has chosen to cancel all of them “out of respect for what is happening in Ukraine”. No fires either Cesena, where the Municipality justified itself with “dangers and risks for the safety of people, as well as a particular impact in terms of polluting emissions over a large area “.
San Marino, on the other hand, has no limited places and so practically in all the castles the councils and committees of citizens organized their own convivial moment around the bonfire.
HISTORY
In the different localities they are known come fogheracce or focheracce or focarina it is a popular ritual typical of the Romagna folklore which takes place every year on the evening of March 18th. Today the event coincides with the eve of the feast of St. Joseph but it has its roots in the pagan era. This date is in fact on the eve ofspring equinoxwhen the bacchanals were held, the Dionysian rites to propitiate fertility as well as the beginning of the new Roman year. In fact, this tradition can be included in the bonfire rites at the beginning of the year and in the rites of agricultural purification.
But the rite of fire purifier it is one of the most arcane traditions spread among various populations. In some areas of the Romagna hinterland the symbolism of the fogheraccia intersected with the rite said from the “ségavecia“Or the” old woman “, held on Thursday in mid-Lent, during which a puppet with the appearance of an old woman, was trained on a masked chariot among the sounds of trumpets, battles with fruit and cries, to be then torn apart and burned in square.
An allegorical rite that intersects with the culture agricultural which in this phase of the year sees the accumulation of large quantities of branches deriving from the pruning of trees, especially olive trees.