the cult of Saint Anthony is still widespread. Always in our campaigns, the image of the saint is found in places where they rest and pets. Sometimes, to make the best impression at the back entrance of the barn, is a finely painted ceramic tile, in most cases, a holy and wrinkled gross of any artistic value. Whatever its form, the substance does not change. The famous Egyptian abbot is always there, with the garments of a hermit, his long white beard, stick to Tau, the pig and a bright flame at the foot.
But let's see who was this saint, and it has become the main patron saint of animals. Anthony Abbot (so named to distinguish it from the as the famous Anthony of Padua), was born at Coma, in Egypt, in 251, the nation where he died at 105 years, after a life spent wandering in the desert.
Considered the patriarch of all monks, twenty years after he stripped himself of his wealth and devoted himself to asceticism. For four decades lived on only bread and water in meditation and prayer. Of great spiritual wisdom, Antonio gathered around him many disciples. Much of the popular cult of fame derives from Antonio healer from ' herpes zoster , Called shingles. It is said that the followers of the saint, to better help the sick who came to the hopeless French church of Saint-Antoine de Viennois, a place where were the relics, they decided to build a hospital and hospitalization. This is how the Hospitaller Order of the Antonians. To ensure the existence of the sick and religious, it is said that pigs were bred for slaughter, left free to roam the country and maintained by public charity. Need that occurred banned the free movement of animals in the city, with the exception of pigs Antonians who, since then, had to bring recognition to the famous bells around his neck. In fact, many argue that the attributes and patronage of the saint have a more ancient origin, deep, sometimes even pagan, as the date on which it is celebrated (17 January), corresponding to Sementina Roman Festivals, where already the goddess Ceres was appeased with the blood of a pregnant sow.
On this occasion it is customary to bless pets on churchyards to protect them from disease and renew the image of the saint in the stables propitiatory purposes. For the festival of their patron, then, the animals were treated kindly, well-fed, free from work and, of course, could not slaughter. It is said that, in this magical night, the animals acquire the floor. In Romagna, it was also tradition to give the animals sick a piece of bread blessed on the day of St. Anthony, to heal, or three black beans, ideal for facilitating the reduction of the cows. The
somewhere, finally, the lottery is still celebrated pork fat ( The lutarì de porc grass), as in Romagna, or you do fill of fried dumplings, as is the custom in Guastalla: Sant'Antoni chìssulèr that the Fri darsèt to Sner (Anthony gnoccolaio which is January 17).
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