Looking at the skyline, from the  Sanctuary of the Civita on a clear day, the view is to say the least breath taking. The cape of Circeo opens the horizon with its majestic peak, land of the mythical sorceress who enchanted Ulysses. Looking on a little towards the left, one can see the two islands of Ponza and Ventotene followed by Ischia and Capri; places that have a millenary history, the home of imperators and famous learned men. The former mentioned islands were the home of anguish for political prisoners in confinement during the twenty years of fascism.

Itri, a land full of tradition, was Michele Pezza’s place of birth in the far 1771, also known as, in history, Fra’ Diavolo, a character whose life I shall narrate between legend and reality. Furthermore, I shall talk about the Mount Civita, the place from which starts my visual travelling shot; here rises, since over five centuries, a venerable place of cult. The Sanctuary called Madonna della Civita, during the years has been transformed, from a votive chapel (938 A.D.) into the actual venerated and often visited Sanctuary, by the profound faith of Itri’s inhabitants and non.

Driving along the hairpin bends of the high-way Valle del Liri n°82, which meanders at the foot of the Aurunci Mounts, we reach the Sanctuary of the Civita; in the bed of the valley, amongst hills covered with olive trees, lies ITRI, further ahead one can see Gaeta as well. Within the sacred walls of the Sanctuary is kept the icon which portrays the Celestial Mother holding her child, it was painted by the evangelist St. Luke. The folk tradition narrates that the icon escaped the iconoclast fury, which raged Constantinople in (675–741 A.D.), and it was found on the Mount Civita after various ups and downs, amongst the branches of a Holm oak tree by a young shepherd in search of one of his lost cows, he finds it kneeling before the Holy painting. The icon was given its name from the Mount and was venerated ever since, by Itri’s faithful and by those of nearby towns, as MADONNA of the CIVITA.

The above mentioned characters and places are the historical, cultural, and tourist itineraries I shall go through, with the aim to distinguish, in a simple manner, the origins, places and folklore of a land and its people who are proud of their identity. People I have had the opportunity to meet and appreciate in over thirty years of my having worked in their municipal office. This piece of work I present wishes to be a tribute to those with whom I have worked with keen and disinterested commitment, in cultural activities of sporting and organizing nature, which have given me the possibility to live an intense stage of my life in an unrepeatable way. My thoughts go to Father Alberto Rivezzi, a Passionist parish priest of S. Maria Maggiore, who passed away prematurely and was an expert on life.

The text books I have consulted are listed in the bibliography given on the margins and show the interest that this land has always aroused, amongst historians, for the presence of its "Sanctuary" and for being Fra’ Diavolo’s birth place.

©Written by Pino Pecchia

©Translated by Paola Sepe.