San Luca: the story and traditions

San Luca is a town of over 4,000 inhabitants of the province of Reggio Calabria, located on the Ionian side. A few kilometers from the beautiful Ionian sea, situated on the eastern slopes of Aspromonte, on a hillside on the left side of the valley of Fiumara Bonamico, San Luca was founded in 1590 by the will of Sigismund Loffredo, refugees from the city of Potamia, hit hard from landslides.

 

 

 

The center was so named because it opened the day of St. Luke. Become common in 1811, was struck by repeated natural disasters, including floods of 1951 and 1973. To see the ruins of the medieval castle and those of the four monasteries of S. Stephen S. Constantine, St. George and St. John. Near St. Luke you can visit the ruins of the Norman abbey of St. Nicholas of Butramo.

 

Birthplace of Corrado Alvaro, journalist and writer, considered by critics one of the most authoritative exponents of Italian literature of the twentieth century. The San Luca birthplace is located a few steps from the square of the Church of Holy Mary of piety, in the historic center. Inside there are still many personal belongings of the writer, the work is the great cultural and artistic heritage, is supported by a foundation that bears his name. The Fondazione Corrado Alvaro, ensure the dissemination and promotion of the work of the writer Sanluchesi around the world. There are numerous initiatives, events and literary prizes for the promising young Italian fiction. But San Luca also gave birth to her grandfather Steve and Jeff Porcaro, keyboardist and drummer, respectively, Toto, extraordinary american pop band of 80' who did fall in love with dancing and generations, and still on tour around the world.



 

The biggest attraction is still exercised by the Shrine of the wrists, well-known center of Marian devotion, a pilgrimage destination for thousands of faithful from all parts of the world. Located about 10 kilometers from the town, about 820 mt. sea level, the origins Basilian but enriched by donations of Count Roger the Norman in 1114, the sanctuary was abandoned by Byzantine monks in 1481 when it was abolished greek rite.

 

It was destroyed by an earthquake in 1682 and rebuilt in the period between 1730 and 1737. Keeps inside the statue of Our Lady of the Mountain and numerous works of art. The flow of tourists and pilgrims is focused, in particular, in the period from 24 August to 3 September, the days of the festival dedicated to the Madonna. The rite of pilgrimage to the shrine is celebrated by the faithful in an atmosphere particularly intense emotional pilgrims walk the route in bare feet or knees, singing songs dedicated to Our Lady of the Mountain.

 

Legend has it that the Virgin of cuffs in the ninth century some monks from nearby Sicily because of the Saracen invasions, pushed in the heart of Aspromonte, at the foot of Montalto, where they founded a tiny colony, creating a small church.

 

In the eleventh century, a shepherd named Italian, a native of the town of Santa Cristina d'Aspromonte, intent to seek a lost bull saw the animal that dug up a cross of iron, followed an apparition of the Blessed Virgin and Child in her arms who said, "I want to erect a church ... to spread my thanks above all other devotees who come to visit me here." To this was then built a shrine where the inside, so far, have kept the statue of Our Lady of the Mountain Wrist, tuff sculpture of great beauty and luster, the Holy Cross and a number of relics including the coffin of the Prince of Roccella.

 

 

 

 

 

"The old part of the country resembles a small crib that you can not help but fall in love. Everything you speak of a timeless time. We hear stories of people who lived in these little houses that seem made of paper mache. Stories women and men who have invested a lifetime in that little roof in those four walls. Mothers who have grown children, many of them. In the sweat of the bitter fruits of a land poor but generous with the blessings of every mother, who returns home with a broken back to make the branches, to bake bread scented holy, hunger and fatigue. Anyone who knows these people come true, and who never stopped his life, a moment a moment, trying to understand, and perhaps then understand ... "