The tradition of the night of St. John in Catanzaro
by NANDO CASTAGNA
June 24 is the day dedicated to St. John the Baptist, preacher and prophet of the first century B.C., mentioned several times in the Holy Gospels for having foretold the coming of the Messiah, and is one of the most important personalities in the history of the Saints. His life and preaching are constantly intertwined with the work of Jesus. Along with the latter, John the Baptist is also present in the Quran, as one of the greatest Prophets who preceded Muhammad. He was born to the old priest Zechariah and Elizabeth, when both parents were of advanced age; the news, not implausible in itself, can be interpreted as emphasizing the exceptional nature of the character.
At the announcement of his birth and the imposition of the name John by the angel Gabriel, old Zechariah lost his speech and regained it only after the circumcision of his son, to intone the "Benedictus." John was the one who leapt in his mother's womb at the meeting of Elizabeth with Mary. For this reason, that is, for having foretold the coming of Jesus before he was born, he is remembered as "the greatest of the Prophets." The episode is dated to the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, which allowed hagiographers to fix the birth of John three months after the conception of Jesus, and six months before his birth, and from St. Augustine we know that the celebration of St. John on June 24 was very ancient in the African Catholic Church, the only Saint, along with the Virgin Mary, whose earthly birth is celebrated as well as death (the dies natalis, that is, birth to eternal life). John's childhood and youth, probably spent in the desert as a nomad, matured in him the desire to spread the faith, so much so that, at a not-so-young age, dressed in a red tunic of camel hair and a leather belt around his waist, he went to live in the desert, feeding on locusts and wild honey and beginning to preach as a prophet of the coming of the Messiah, harshly attacking the Pharisees.
The novelty of John's Baptism, compared to the ritual ablutions already known in Jewish tradition, lies in the precise commitment to "conversion" on the part of those who went to be baptized by him. John the Baptist repeatedly announced that he recognized Jesus as the Messiah foretold by the Prophets, but the culminating moment is when Jesus himself wanted to be baptized by him in the waters of the Jordan. On that occasion, John pointed out Jesus to his followers as "the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world": John preached and did not hide the truth even when it hurt the powerful. Herod Antipas had him arrested for denouncing his incestuous and adulterous marriage to Herodias, who was first the wife of his brother Herod Philip. With Herod Antipas, Herodias had a daughter named Salome, who, prompted by her mother, after dancing for her father at a banquet, asked as a reward for the head of John, it was June 24. John's head was brought to her on a platter and he was still alive. According to the tradition of the Catholic Church, the head of the Saint is now kept in the Church of San Silvestro in Rome. The head kept in Rome is without the jaw, which is kept in the Cathedral of San Lorenzo in Viterbo.
The plate that according to tradition held the head of the Baptist is kept in Genoa, in the treasury of the Cathedral of San Lorenzo, along with the ashes of the Saint. The feast of St. John the Baptist symbolizes the purification of water and the joy for the gifts of nature. These are days of reflection but also of noise and confusion that inspire feelings of brotherhood and unity. This celebration replaces the ancient pagan and Masonic rites linked to the summer solstice and has thus given rise, for centuries, to various manifestations connected with beliefs and popular customs, such as the fires of St. John's night and other propitiatory rituals typical of early season festivals, with clear reference to the symbolism of fire and its purifying and propitiatory functions. On "midsummer day," in Shakespeare's words, "reality and dream are confused." The solstice puts two worlds in communication: the visible and the invisible, which interpenetrate each other and everything becomes possible. The Moon yields to the Sun. All purification and transition rites are connected to this night, which over the centuries have given rise to various manifestations linked to popular beliefs, of which dew, fragrant water, and fire have always been the essential elements. The figure of St. John the Baptist has absorbed many of the meanings of the ancient cults of water and the sun, his religious significance is linked to rebirth through water, and in many places the festival is celebrated precisely with ablutions and immersions. June 24 coincides with a moment of great astronomical importance: the summer solstice, when, in the northern hemisphere, the longest day of the year occurs and the hot season begins. It is the time of harvest, fairs, and village festivals. A collective custom on this occasion is the gathering of herbs, which, on the night preceding the feast of St. John the Baptist, the night between June 23 and 24, were believed to multiply their therapeutic and magical attributes. On this night, in the past, a magical moment was experienced, because it fell on the solstice days when, according to ancient beliefs, the sun married the moon and from their union beneficial energies were poured onto the earth and especially onto the herbs bathed by the dew of that magical night, herbs that turned into powerful medicines, able to cure every kind of disease. It was even believed that being bathed by the dew of that magical night could preserve people from all kinds of corruption, St. John baptized with water so it was easy, in popular belief, to attribute to the dew of the night preceding his feast salutary effects, virtues similar to the water with which the Saint sprinkled.
And it is for this reason that, on that night, basins of water were prepared in which herbs or flowers were immersed, in the belief that the particular positions of the stars and the passage, during the night, of the Saint and the Madonna who would bless it, could charge it with virtue. In short, there was a strange combination of sacred and profane. Countless were the customs linked to the night of St. John, to the use of bathing with dew or prepared water, in the Catanzaro area, the use of "comparaggio" was accompanied, to establish the "comparato," a person would send another, on the eve of the feast, a bundle of three ears of wheat tied together, which the other would reciprocate, if consenting, on the eve of the feast of St. Peter. The collection, moreover, of 24 ears of wheat, to be kept all year round, if jealously guarded served as a formidable amulet against misfortunes. It was also customary, at dawn on the feast of the Saint, to go to the seashore and bathe, farmers would take their animals, oxen and horses, to the Marina of Catanzaro, so they would be reinvigorated. Also, all those who, on the magical night, lit fires and jumped over them, holding hands, became "compari" and "comare."
The custom of lighting fires and bonfires at sunset on the eve was widespread in all regions, with these fires they wanted to drive away the darkness by prolonging the sunlight that began to descend on the horizon so that it would not abandon its protective hand over the fields. But the fires have also been interpreted as a festival in honor of the sun, a manifestation of the Divine in its greatest solstitial splendor. There are numerous rites and beliefs that this night has brought with it over time, fueled by an intense atmosphere of magic and the occult; it seemed, for example, that rolling naked on the grass wet with the dew of that night protected against skin diseases, a very sweet belief, now fallen into disuse, concerned girls of marriageable age: by bathing their eyes with dew, on the night of June 23, they could see the face of their future husband. Let us also remember the custom of drawing omens from the white of a fresh egg which, slipped into a vase filled with water from seven wells and left on the windowsill on the magical night, could predict the future depending on the shape it took. Symbols of the feast of St. John, still present today in the tradition of popular festivals, are garlic used as an antidote against the evil eye, witches and vampires, the very fragrant lavender, and the red sugar whistle in the shape of a little goose, whose color is determined by the fact that it represented a sweet gift for one's beloved.
Even in Calabria, for some time, there has been a flourishing of initiatives aimed at being repeated over the years, an authentically popular search for a popular religiosity, a spontaneous religiosity, capable of combining secular and religious needs. In the Church of St. John the Baptist and Evangelist of Catanzaro, the feast of June 24, the day of the birth of St. John the Baptist, coincides with the investiture, by the Archbishop of Catanzaro, of the new Knights of Malta ad Honorem who come from all over Italy to receive the coveted recognition. A similar ceremony takes place on December 27 each year, on the occasion of the feast of St. John the Evangelist.