“Sega la vecchia” (To saw the old woman) is a form of itinerant popular theater with begging, played during the mid-Lent in Umbria. The companies – composed of fifteen to twenty young male peasants – move from house to house, repeating the performance until dawn, getting eggs and wine in return. In the most common regional (Umbria - Italy) variants, the plot of the representation is centered on the scene where the two sawyers, “cut down” and try to saw the Old Woman which is, at the same time, an oak tree. The Old Husband (Old Man) enters the scene looking for his spouse, and then he despairs at seeing the Old Woman wounded and “sawed”. At this point, after the intervention of the police and the identification of the responsible, the therapeutic operators (the Pharmacist, the Doctor, and the Nurses) riding a Donkey, take the stage to cure the dying Old Woman which, however, in some cases recovered only after the extreme unction of the Priest, whereas in other cases she literally goes in the arms of “Maravalle”, the Devil. The aim of our work is to preserve, protect and document forms of this particular intangible cultural heritage that are dying and also to reflect about the new conditions of representation.
Working about an Italian Intangible Cultural Heritage: The Popular Theatre of “Sega la vecchia” in Umbria (意大利的非物质文化遗产研究：翁布里亚的“塞加拉维奇亚”民间戏剧)
Parbuono D
2016
Abstract
“Sega la vecchia” (To saw the old woman) is a form of itinerant popular theater with begging, played during the mid-Lent in Umbria. The companies – composed of fifteen to twenty young male peasants – move from house to house, repeating the performance until dawn, getting eggs and wine in return. In the most common regional (Umbria - Italy) variants, the plot of the representation is centered on the scene where the two sawyers, “cut down” and try to saw the Old Woman which is, at the same time, an oak tree. The Old Husband (Old Man) enters the scene looking for his spouse, and then he despairs at seeing the Old Woman wounded and “sawed”. At this point, after the intervention of the police and the identification of the responsible, the therapeutic operators (the Pharmacist, the Doctor, and the Nurses) riding a Donkey, take the stage to cure the dying Old Woman which, however, in some cases recovered only after the extreme unction of the Priest, whereas in other cases she literally goes in the arms of “Maravalle”, the Devil. The aim of our work is to preserve, protect and document forms of this particular intangible cultural heritage that are dying and also to reflect about the new conditions of representation.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
