The Passion of Sordevolo
Since about two centuries, the entire community of Sordevolo has been representing the Passion of Christ, in a complete organizing and artistic autonomy.
The next appointment with the public is foreseen for June-September 2010.
Sordevolo, 650 metres above sea level, is situated on the first hills north of Biella, protected by the next Mt Mombarone and Mt Mucrone, more than 2,000 metres high. The village may take its name either from super Elvum, the brook which flows close to it, or from surdibulum, a vulgar Latin word indicating a spring waters site, or else from the idiom Solo riverir Deo volo, written on the front façade of an ancient pilgrims hospice.
In this natural setting of hills, woods and mountains, for over two centuries from the beginning of '800, the representation of the Passion takes place every five years. Expression of the ancient popular theatre, the event actively involves the entire community of Sordevolo, about 1,300 inhabitants.
The ancient Popular Theatre Committee of Sordevolo Passion, founded in 1816, has been replaced in 1991 by Sordevolo Popular Theatre Association, an independent non-profit organization, aiming to preserve, to perpetuate and to hand down this tradition, which dates back to the origins of this small community, expression of an olden-day subalpine culture.
Special focus has to be placed on the deeply free and independent spirit of this genuine local culture and on the great involvement of the modern heirs of this tradition, who face the various aspects of the staging merely through local human resources and techniques: overall organization, costumes and setting making, scenery plan, direction, drama school, stage setting...
The Passion of Sordevolo is certainly the greatest choral play never performed in Italy by amateur actors, young and older, who work and prepare themselves for this big event in all seriousness and devotion. The performance takes place in a 4,000 square metres open space, a reconstructed corner of Jerusalem, dating back to 33 A.D.: Herod's Palace, Synedrium, Pontius Pilate's Praetorium, the Garden of Gethsemane, the cenacle, the Calvary.
The 3-hours performance consists of a prologue and 29 scenes, with an overall participation of about 400 actors and walk-on characters.
The representation is based on a late 15th century text, written in lines by the Florentine Giuliano Dati, chaplain of the church of Santi Martiri in Trastevere, in Rome.
Since about 1490, the play was performed on Good Friday in the Colosseum, by the Roman Company of Gonfalon Confraternity, with a large attendance of people, pilgrims, travellers and notables. This tradition was interrupted in 1539 by Pope Paul III 's prohibition of such representations, due to the dramatic Reformation period and the subsequent Luther's, Calvino's and other religious movements detachment from the Roman Catholic Church.
The "Roman" passion text reached Sordevolo through still mysterious ways. The first hypothesis is that the original text may be arrived in Piedmont thanks to the relationships existing between the Roman Gonfalon Confraternity and Sordevolo St Lucy Confraternity, its direct affiliate. A second hypothesis takes into consideration the commercial contacts between the family Ambrosetti, weavers and merchants of Sordevolo "fine cloth", and its own buyers in Rome.
Over the years, the Passion of Sordevolo achieved a general consent and interest in cultural and artistic environments. In 1892, Delfino Orsi, editor of the "Gazzetta del Popolo", expert in popular traditions and Professor of Literature at Turin University, published an essay on Sordevolo Passion. Moreover, Professor Alessandro D'Ancona of Pisa University, devoted a wide section to our Passion in his prestigious work titled "On the origins of Italian theatre".
In 1934, Renato Simone, a "prince" of Italian drama critics, wrote about the Passion on "Corriere della Sera" and "Domenica del Corriere", as well as Alighiero Chiusano, the most outstanding and qualified drama critic from the 1960s to the 1980s, dedicated a number of articles on "Il dramma" and on other important national daily newspapers.
At present, the community of Sordevolo, with an ever-new team spirit, is undertaking the setting up of 2010 Edition of the Passion: a popular work which will let revive in gestures, songs and words the historical event which upset the whole mankind and is still living in Sordevolo.
