The Living Crib

B&B Trapani – A Babordo – The Living Crib of Custonaci is considered to be the most important promotional event for the trades and popular traditions of Sicily and for this reason in 2006 it was added to the Register of Intangible Heritage, one of the 100 intangible properties of the Region of Sicily. The event, which is organised by the Cultural Association "The Living Museum" of Custonaci and is in its 30 th edition, is known throughout the whole of Italy for the unusual fascination of its images, as well as its originality, the dignity and the pathos of its characters and its emotive evocations. The place and the event attract a large number of visitors: since its inception, over 400,000 people have come to see it. In addition, no year goes by without the Crib attracting the attention of the major national media, whether television (RAI, Mediaset, etc..) or the press. The "show" takes place in the village of Scurati, a collection of rural houses scattered, as in a crib, against a background of natural caves opening on the walls of high rock faces. The most notable of these is the Mangiapane Cave: an emotive and picturesque place dating back to Upper Palaeolithic times, the cave is a real rarity. It has a very high opening of about 80 metres and is 70 metres deep, while gathered about its walls, unchanged over time, are quaint little houses, stables and a bread oven, built by a family of shepherds between the 19th and the mid 20th centuries. Behind the village is the captivating Gulf of Erice, nestling between the peaks of Pizzo Cofano and Pizzo Lungo. In this magical location, every year for the last almost 30 years an entire local community and the last Sicilian artist-craftsmen come together to stage a "unique and distinctive show": for 7 or 8 days, visitors/spectators can walk through the site, where around seventy everyday activities and scenes are staged, in close contact with over 150 characters, who faithfully depict the old trades and scenes and places which are becoming increasingly rare. "They don’t pretend to make, no, they really do make: pots, straw-bottomed chairs, twisted ironwork, cheeses, stone-pressed olive oil…” (Panorama, 2002).
The event itself is therefore a highly innovative way of managing 2 cultural traditions: the prehistoric Mangiapane Cave that, without the Living Crib, would never have been appreciated; the cultural heritage of the old trades and traditions of Sicily, which, thanks to the Crib, can be "exploited" in an alternative and completely new form compared with cold, static ethno-anthropological museums. The distinctive feature of the event, that is, the faithfulness of the scenes featuring the rich local tradition of craftsmanship and agriculture –grazing, is the fruit of study and meticulous research: in fact the University of Palermo, through the Institute of anthropological and geographical sciences, museum services, of the Faculty of Literature and Philosophy, was involved in recreating the environments, trades and customs. Thanks to this preliminary work it has, in fact, been possible to represent faithfully the period, without falsification, to revive and preserve local traditions, year after year. In a little under thirty years of performances, over 400,000 visitors/spectators have been to see the Living Crib of Custonaci, with annual peaks sometimes in excess of 20,000 visitors.
More Info: http://www.presepeviventedicustonaci.it

 

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