The Misteri

The Misteri indicated, according to the medieval sense of the term, the staging or the representation of some mysteries of religion, and in particular the mystery of salvation. It was mostly an explanation of the revelation and the final phase of the life of Jesus Christ, his trial, conviction, execution on the Cross and the Resurrection. The model for the representation with wooden statues, as in Trapani, is only one of the modes of representation. Very popular are the theatrical representations of the mysteries interpreted by actors, or processions in costume representing the passion and Christ with the cross on the shoulder, such as in MarsalaMarsala is the most populous municipality in the province of Trapani and the fifth most populous of entire Sicily. It rises on the ruins of the ancient Punic city of Lilibeo (hence the epithet of lilibetani for its residents), but it owes its name to the period of Arab rule: Mars-Allah means in fact “Port of Allah”. It is famous above all for the landing of Garibaldi and the Thousand occurred on May 11, 1860.. In Savona these representations are called Casse, in Genoa Casazze. Giuseppe Pitrè writes of a sacred representation organized by the Genoese nation in Palermo in 1591. Often these representations were accompanied by flagellants who struck their body with sharp tools or wore hair shirts as a form of penance.