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🔔 The Italian Almanac

September 20

Stories and curiosities for September 20, from the Italy of a thousand bell towers.

Vanished Italy 📅 1870

A thirty-metre breach to end eleven centuries

At dawn on 20 September 1870 Italian artillery opened fire on the walls of Rome; by about 9.35, next to Porta Pia, a breach some thirty metres wide had opened, and the 12th Bersaglieri battalion was the first unit through. Within hours the Papal States, in existence since 756, were finished: more than eleven centuries of the popes' temporal power, closed at the cost of 32 Italian and 15 papal soldiers killed. Pius IX declared himself a prisoner and withdrew behind the Vatican walls, refusing to recognise the new kingdom; a few months later, on 3 February 1871, Rome officially became the capital of Italy.

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Today's tidbits

It started here

America's most perfectly developed man was born in Acri

Angelo Siciliano was born in Acri, a hill town in Calabria at the southern tip of Italy, on 30 October 1892, and emigrated to Brooklyn in 1903, where he started out working in a leather factory. In 1922, after a contest at Madison Square Garden, Physical Culture magazine crowned him America's Most Perfectly Developed Man, and that same year he legally became Charles Atlas. In the 1920s he perfected Dynamic Tension, a twelve-lesson mail-order fitness course, and its comic-strip advert — the skinny kid who gets sand kicked in his face by a beach bully, trains, and comes back to settle the score — became his trademark.

📍 Acri →
Place names

Italy has both a Purgatory and a Paradise on the map

Among the hamlets of Custonaci, in the province of Trapani in western Sicily, road signs point to Purgatorio — Purgatory — right next to Sperone, Scurati and the town's other villages. Paradise lies at the opposite end of the country: Paradiso is a hamlet of Pocenia, in Friuli in Italy's far north-east, some seventy souls gathered around two historic villas and a circular seventeenth-century church; in the Friulian language it is called Paravîs. The whole of Italy stretches between the two realms, and for once the journey from Purgatory to Paradise can be done by car.

📍 Custonaci →

🎉 Celebrations today in… 8

8 towns with a guide celebrate their patron saint on September 20

Sant'Eustachio 6

MordanoEmilia-Romagna Tocco da CasauriaAbruzzo PoliLazio Torella dei LombardiCampania ScannoAbruzzo Campo di GioveAbruzzo

Other saints of the day 2

Ventotene · Lazio Moncucco Torinesesan Bernardino da Siena · Piedmont
Patron saint festival 📍 Ventotene

Feast of Saint Candida

📅 Every year, on 20 September

On 20 September Ventotene celebrates its patron Saint Candida, killed according to tradition by the Romans, her body found on the island's coast; the feast closes with the procession of her boat and a paper hot-air balloon contest.

Patron saint festival 📍 Campo di Giove

Feast of Saint Eustace

📅 Every year, on 20 and 21 September

On 20 September Campo di Giove celebrates Saint Eustace with a procession; the evening of the next day brings the "ballo della pupa", an ancient farming ritual for a good harvest.

Patron saint festival 📍 Mordano

Feast of Saint Eustace

📅 Every year, on 20 September

On 20 September Mordano celebrates Saint Eustace; the parish church also preserves a sacred image that remained miraculously intact under the bombing of the Second World War.

Patron saint festival 📍 Poli

Feast of Saint Eustace

📅 Every year, on 20 September

On 20 September Poli celebrates Saint Eustace; legend holds that the apparition of the stag with the luminous cross between its antlers took place on Monte Guadagnolo, where a chapel was built to the saint.

Patron saint festival 📍 Scanno

Feast of Saint Eustace

📅 Every year, on 20 September

On 20 September Scanno celebrates Saint Eustace; in the village's traditional women's costume, the red silk cords once braided into the hair were reserved for his feast.

Patron saint festival 📍 Tocco da Casauria

Feast of Saint Eustace

📅 Every year, on 20 September

On 20 September Tocco da Casauria celebrates Saint Eustace; the medieval church of Sant'Eustachio Martire is dedicated to him, standing beside the Caracciolo Castle.

Patron saint festival 📍 Triggiano

Holy Mary of the Cross, patron alongside co-patron Saint Roch

📅 Every year, on the third Sunday of September; Saint Roch, co-patron, is celebrated on the third Sunday of August, with the solemnity fixed on 16 August

Triggiano celebrates Holy Mary of the Cross on the third Sunday of September; the town's co-patron is Saint Roch, celebrated on the third Sunday of August, with the solemnity fixed on 16 August.

Patron saint festival In 328 days 📍 Sardara

Maria SS. Assunta and Santa Maria de is Aquas

📅 Every year, on the second-to-last Monday of September, for four days

Sardara celebrates Our Lady of the Assumption, with co-patron Santa Maria de is Aquas, on the second-to-last Monday of September: one of the island's largest and most striking feasts.

Patron saint festival 📍 Guidonia Montecelio

Our Lady of Loreto, patron of the town founded around the military airfield

📅 The feast day falls on 10 December, but is celebrated on the third Sunday of September

Guidonia Montecelio celebrates Our Lady of Loreto on the third Sunday of September, in the hillside church built in 1938 together with the plan for the new town; Guidonia, merged with the old municipality of Montecelio in 1937, was born around the aeronautical hub willed by the Fascist regime.

Patron saint festival 📍 Cesano Boscone

Our Lady of the Rosary, at the centre of the September patronal feast

📅 Every year, on the third Sunday of September, feast of Our Lady of the Rosary; Saint John the Baptist remains the liturgical patron, on 24 June

In Cesano Boscone the patronal feast is celebrated on the third Sunday of September, for Our Lady of the Rosary, with the Palio del Cinghiale; the town's liturgical patron remains Saint John the Baptist, whose day, 24 June, is nonetheless a town holiday.

Patron saint festival 📍 Monterosso Almo

Saint John the Baptist and Our Lady of Sorrows, patrons of a town rebuilt after the earthquake

📅 Every year, on the first Sunday of September (Saint John the Baptist) and the third (Our Lady of Sorrows)

Monterosso Almo celebrates Saint John the Baptist, patron and protector of the town, on the first Sunday of September, and Our Lady of Sorrows, main patroness, on the third Sunday of the same month; the earthquake of 11 January 1693 caused around 200 deaths and razed almost the whole town.

Patron saint festival 📍 Ciserano

Saint Julian, patron of the square festivities

📅 Every year, on the third Sunday of September, with festivities starting the preceding Thursday

Ciserano celebrates Saint Julian on the third Sunday of September. The feast draws many people and generally begins on the preceding Thursday, with shows in the square, tastings and a procession.

Patron saint festival 📍 Lusciano

Saint Lucian of Antioch, patron celebrated three times a year

📅 Every year, three times: 7 January (liturgical feast), the third Sunday of September, and a third occasion

Lusciano celebrates its patron Saint Lucian of Antioch three times a year: on 7 January, the liturgical feast, with religious services attended en masse by citizens, and on the third Sunday of September.

Patron saint festival 📍 Andria

Saint Richard and the Madonna dei Miracoli

📅 Every year, on the third Sunday of September; the April Fair in spring

Andria celebrates its patrons on the third Sunday of September. The second feast, the April Fair, recalls 1438: the year the body of Saint Richard, lost during a siege, was found again.

Patron saint festival 📍 Soragna

The Addolorata, patron of the third September weekend

📅 Every year, on the third weekend of September, with markets and concerts

Soragna celebrates the patronal feast of the Addolorata on the third weekend of September, with markets, concerts and open-air lunches in the town centre. The town's other patron, Saint James, is celebrated on 25 July.

Patron saint festival 📍 Turbigo

The Assumption of Mary, patron of the Saint Vincent Ferrer feast

📅 Every year, on the third Sunday of September (15 August is the liturgical feast day)

Turbigo celebrates the Assumption of Mary on the third Sunday of September, even though her liturgical feast falls on 15 August. By an 18th-century tradition, Saint Vincent Ferrer, though his day falls on 5 April, is celebrated on the first Sunday of May with a classic village feast.

Patron saint festival 📍 Pozzo d'Adda

The Sorrowful Virgin, co-patron of the living biblical re-enactment

📅 Every year, on the third Sunday of September, with a procession and a living biblical re-enactment

Pozzo d'Adda celebrates its co-patron, the Sorrowful Virgin, on the third Sunday of September: after the evening Mass, a procession is held with the band and the statue of the Madonna, together with a living re-enactment of a biblical event.