San Procopio

San Procopio lies on the Tyrrhenian slopes of the Aspromonte, between two torrent beds, looking out over the plain of Gioia Tauro. The name suggests Greek, and some have derived it from Aghios Prokopiòs, but the first reliable notices of the village come after the year one thousand and that origin is held to be groundless. It was a hamlet of Sinopoli until 1811, when it became a comune of its own, and the earthquake of 28 December 1908, the one that levelled Reggio and Messina, hit it full on.

In 1930 a fire that broke out in the town hall burned all the registry records of the comune: the families, the births, the deaths. The register was rebuilt from scratch by copying it out of the parish books, which had remained the only written memory of the village. The economy here has always been the olive, with the presses where the men worked and the women pickers who from October to May filled the fields: that trade is over, replaced by nets spread under the trees and pulled up by a few labourers when the time comes.