the all seeing eye Serramonacesca

 

 

http://www.luoghimisteriosi.it/abruzzo/serramonacesca-smariaassunta.html

 

Last year I attended the service and procession in Serramonacesca but I totally failed to notice this up in the roof !

 

 

Knights Templar

What was the relationship between the knights Templar and Pietro da Morrone ?  Did they act to protect him during his mountain rambles in a time where he would have been vulnerable both to attacks by wild animals and local brigands?

During this time there were roads across the region One road known as VIA DEGLI ABRUZZI from Naples to Popoli where it divided into 2 branches; one along the Aterno river towards L'Aqulia then Umbria and Tuscany and the other along the Pescara Valley to the Adriatic.

Pligrim Sandal carved into the stone entrance to many churches in Abruzzo - representing a symbol of the journey of faith that led to a particular place of worship.

If the Knights Templar did arrive in Abruzzo by ship from The Holy Land where did they land and what made them choose to visit such an inaccessible and unpopulated region?

 

A church now on the edge of the new cemetery in Turrivalignano

 

 

 

The Maiella Mountains above Manoppello with path leading to the ruins of Pietro di Morrone's Monastry

 In the film I uploaded the hypothesis put forward is the Aquila was built to resemble Jerusalem and that the Basilica of Collemaggio 'hides' in some corner The Treasure of the Temple of King Solomon which was brought to Italy by the Knights Templar.

mysterious stone carvings?

Well maybe not so mysterious but I find this simple carvings incredibly moving. They are such a strong connection between the past and present . I have even thought about adding my own carving in 2015 but what symbol should I choose? As an atheist it wont be anything religious but it could be spiritual? I'll need to think it over.

 

 

This cross is carved on the entry to Santa Maria Arrabona- sadly the local limestone is easily affected by the weather so many of the lightly incised line are very hard to see however the criss crossing pattern of many different carvings can just be made out and is very similar to our stones in Contrada Foce

One of the strangest of these symbols must be these weird foot shapes! Actually they were carved by pilgrims as a sign pilgrims were welcome (?) or as a form of early graffiti 'I was here'?

The Flower of Life is found carved in many local churches including The Santa Maria Di Arrabona and San Liberatore in Serramonacesco. There is a significance to the number of petals in the flower: They represent the 6 days of Christ.
http://www.luoghimisteriosi.it/argomenti/fioredellavita.html

The Knights Templar in Abruuzo Voyager - Puntata 12 maggio 2008

Ever since we discovered some very early Christian symbols carved into the stones of our house I have been interested in investigating the early Christians in Abruzzo.

This 30 min film (in Italian) presents a fascinating, if far fetched scenario where some Knights Templar bought a sacred ark from the Holy Land to Abruzzo and handed it to Pietro da Morrone who was at that time living in various remote hermitages in the Abruzzo mountains including one only a mile from our house.

from Wikipedia

According to tradition, Pietro Angelerio was born to parents Angelo Angelerio and Maria Leone in a town called Sant'Angelo Limosano, in the Kingdom of Sicilia (Sicily). Sant'Angelo Limosano is now part of Provincia di Campobasso, in Molise, Italy.
After his father's death he began working in the fields. His mother Maria was a key figure in Pietro's spiritual development: she imagined a different future for her deeply beloved son than becoming just a farmer or a shepherd. From the time he was a child, he showed great intelligence and love for others. He became a Benedictine monk at Faifoli in the Diocese of Benevento when he was 17. He showed an extraordinary disposition toward asceticism and solitude, and in 1239 retired to a solitary cavern on the mountain Morrone, hence his name (Peter of Morrone). Five years later he left this retreat, and went with two companions to a similar cave on the even more remote Mountain of Maiella in the Abruzzi region of central Italy, where he lived as strictly as possible according to the example of St. John the Baptist. Accounts exist of the severity of his penitential practices.

Washboard

 

 

We thought this was a bread board but it turns out to be a washboard used for hand washing.I might give it a try!

 

Its amazing the difference in the areas of bricks left un cleaned and oiled with the area on the right

 

 

Roman Villa - Manoppello

 

This Roman Villa was only excavated recently and is open to the public on Saturday and Sunday as to reach it you have to walk through the garden of the land owners. It is not a spectacular site compared to places like Villa Adriana in Tivoli but of great importance locally. The villa is built on a high plain close to the Abbey of Santa Maria Arabona which itself was built over the site of a Roman altar dedicated to the goddess Bona.

 

The goddess was worshiped in this area and the nearby valley is called Vallebona. 

There are some very informative notice boards describing the villa site and its importance as well as the history of the local area. The pictures in the middle of the notice board are of a stone head found in the walls of a private house in Manoppello and now kept in the museum in Chieti. The stone head is believed to be of the same age of the Capestrano Warrior.

Roman Remains? The Big Dig

1.

 

We broke up an apron of cement that had been laid down up to the wall of the kitchen as we wanted to allow the base of the wall to dry and under the cement we found an area of foundation that looked as though it was put down for the stone steps that would have led up to the main door of the church. clearing out soil around the foundations I dug up 5 separate pieces of a cement like rock which resembles the cement romans made from lime, quartz and sand.

 

As can be seen from the first picture there are also small bits of terracotta in the 'cement '

 

Whether this means that our house is build on a Roman site or just that some roman building materials were around locally when the original church was built ?

 

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2.

 

2 more pieces of cement material and a terracotta floor tile with some paint/plaster on surface.

Abruzzo Ceramic Dishes from Lanciano pottery

2 lovely pottery dishes we bought from a local antiques dealer in Pescara the dishes are around 100-200 years old but we have not been able to find out very much about the production of domestic pottery in Lanciano.