Campania

CAMPANIA. - I. GEOGRAPHY. - A historical region of southern Italy, comprising the Tyrrhenian slope of the Apennines, from the Gulf of Gaeta (lower Garigliano) to that of Policastro (Sapri). To the properly Apennine zone (from the Matese, which rises to 2050 m., to the Cilento, where Mt. Cervati reaches 1899 m.), of essentially limestone constitution, and to the sub-Apennine zone, to which belongs, together with the Neapolitan volcanic district (formed of active apparatuses, such as Vesuvius, m. 1186, and quiescent ones, such as the Campi Flegrei and the Epomeo of the island of Ischia), the mighty limestone mass of the Lattari (m. 1443), which constitutes the backture of the Sorrentine peninsula, there stands in contrast the flat section to which the name C. originally belonged (that is, the Capuan plain on the lower Volturno), which together with the lesser alluvial plains (lower Garigliano, the plain of Pesto), or volcanic ones (between Naples and the Sorrentine peninsula) represent on the whole 1/5 of the region's area, and the island groups of the Pontine and Parthenopean islands (Ischia, Procida and Capri). The climate of C., temperate and warm along the coasts, becomes less mild inland and fairly harsh in the mountain zones. Characteristic, especially in comparison with neighboring arid Apulia, is the relative abundance of rainfall.

To the great diversity of landscape there correspond notable contrasts in the forms of activity and in settlement. Agriculture (48% of the active population) benefits on the plains from the notable fertility of the soil, the abundance of water and the favorableness of the climate; here, besides cereals, hemp and vegetables are cultivated, while on the slopes of the hills the olive, the vine and citrus fruits thrive (the rivieras of Salerno and Amalfi). C. is, among the regions of southern Italy, the one with the greatest development of industries, from the ancient and traditional ones (pasta, tomato and fruit preserves, coral working), to the new (footwear, glove-making) and the very newest (mechanical, naval, textile), which are by now flourishing there; it is also, again in southern Italy, the region in which the lines of communication (especially railways) are the densest and most convenient. Maritime activity constitutes another notable resource (the fishermen of the gulf of Naples go as far as the Greek islands and the coasts of Algeria).

With 4.2 million inhabitants (Jan. 1, 1948) over 13,505 sq km, C. now marks, in Italy, the absolute maximum of regional population density (273 inhabitants per sq km) and provincial density (Naples: 1505 inhabitants per sq km). The coast of the gulf of Naples, from Pozzuoli to Sorrento, exceeds 1000 inhabitants per sq km; almost half of the Campanian municipalities record a density above 200 inhabitants per sq km. It is characteristic, however, that only one urban center exceeds 100,000 inhabitants, indeed now touching a million; and this suffices to clarify the particular position of Naples with respect to C.

Giuseppe Caraci

II. HISTORY

Campania took its name from the original nucleus of Capua and the ager campanus, the flat territory that surrounds it like a broad field, a name that came to designate the surrounding localities as well, as a consequence of historical events or, more often, of administrative needs. In the Augustan age Campania, forming part of the Regio prima together with Latium, already had a greater extent than the original one; later it came to include also the country of the Hirpini and a large part of Samnium.

In 1927, when the province of Terra di Lavoro with its capital at Caserta was abolished, some municipalities of that province were incorporated into the region of Latium, in the new provinces of Frosinone and Latina, and Campania came to constitute a political unit, without true homogeneity of traditions or even of geographical configuration. On June 11, 1945 the province was reconstituted, so that the ecclesiastical region once again coincides with the civil one. Historical reasons and traditional needs contributed to its formation, giving it, in comparison with the civil region, a smaller extent but a greater homogeneity, although even this is not perfect. It now consists of three metropolitan sees: Capua, with the suffragans Cajazzo, Calvi and Teano, Caserta, Isernia and Venafro, Sessa Aurunca; Naples with the suffragans Acerra, Ischia, Nola, Pozzuoli; Sorrento with the suffragan Castellammare di Stabia. Moreover, within the territory of Campania, but immediately subject to the Holy See, are the archbishopric of Gaeta, the bishopric of Aversa, the nullius abbey of Montecassino with the annexed prepositura of Atina; recently the prelature of Pompei was also added.

Christianity was introduced into Campania very early. Suffice it to think that at Pozzuoli, the ordinary landing place of Orientals traveling to Rome, the apostle St. Paul, on disembarking there, already found some "brethren." That St. Peter also landed there is, however, a very uncertain report, since it is handed down by the apocryphal Actus Petri cum Simone. Hermas (Pastor, Visio II, chaps. 1-4) mentions Cumae but without alluding to its Church. Yet the thought comes spontaneously to us that the sees of those numerous bishoprics which we know existed in Italy in the middle of the 3rd century must be sought, besides in Latium, in Campania; Capua, Naples and Cumae present themselves as the most probable, and perhaps the first of these could be traced back already to the end of the 1st century. In any case it will not be too rash to conclude that already toward the end of the 2nd century in several places of Campania there existed

Christian communities, organized with their own hierarchy. In the 4th century, while Capua and Naples are among the few cities of Italy that have a basilica erected by Constantine, the region counts several dioceses that must go back to the time of the persecutions. Correspondingly rich is the flowering of martyrs and saints. Rufus with the group of Capuan martyrs, Januarius with that of the Neapolitans, Erasmus of Formia are among the best known. At Nola, which had become, especially through the merit of its bishop Paulinus, a little holy city of the West, St. Felix attracts numerous pilgrims. At the Council of Nicaea (325) we see Pope Sylvester represented by Vincent of Capua. In that same century Capua would be made illustrious by the doctrine of Victor.

The bishops of Campania are mentioned as a numerous group by St. Athanasius, by the Council of Sardica in 343, by Pope Liberius, by St. Hilary of Poitiers, by Pope Innocent I during the 4th century and then by St. Leo in two letters of the middle of the 5th century (Lanzoni, p. 175).

Despite the splendid vitality that Christianity displayed throughout the region, pagan worship still persisted here and there, preferably on the mountains near the ancient sanctuaries. St. Benedict indeed found ample evangelical work in the Cassino countryside still in the 6th century, while on the summit of the mountain, in place of the ancient temples, he was establishing his monastery which was to exercise a beneficial and decisive influence in the formation of Christian Europe. The Gothic wars during the 6th century, as in other parts of Italy, piled up ruins upon Campania, and St. Gregory the Great bears witness to this for us; but these were certainly surpassed, a few decades later, by the Lombard invasion, through which Campania too was entirely divided and fragmented and its religious and civil life overturned or annihilated. Roman dominion, now represented by Byzantium, came to be restricted to the coastal strip, where the duchies of Naples, Gaeta and Amalfi acquired an ever more autonomous physiognomy and life. The central part grouped itself into the Lombard duchy of Benevento, from which Capua and Salerno later broke away. Among the minor lordships, characteristic is the almost independent one of Montecassino, at the gates of the region on the road leading to Rome. Ecclesiastical life felt the effects of these vicissitudes. And with religious life the cultural and artistic manifestations regained vigor, nourished by the various centers and especially by the Benedictine ones of Montecassino and S. Vincenzo al Volturno.

The Saracen invasion at the end of the 9th century repeated once again, though on a smaller scale, the damages of the Lombard conquest. The Campanian forces intervened victoriously at Ostia (816); and in Campania, with the battle of the Garigliano, Saracen power in southern Italy was definitively broken (915).

In the 11th century a new vitality animated those regions which, even in their fragmentation, had regained well-being and wealth. And while Benevento, at the end of the century, passed to the Church, in the region, as in all of southern Italy, the Norman monarchy was taking root, which in 1059 received from Nicholas II the first investiture, repeated then constantly in the following ages, when, once the kingdom of Naples was constituted, it was held by the Norman, Swabian, Angevin and the other succeeding dynasties as a fief of the Apostolic See, albeit through struggles and conflicts. Every Greek element was eliminated from the region; while Naples acquired an ever more predominant position until it became the capital of the kingdom. The arrangement of the region may be said to be by now definitive within the framework of the kingdom which, though recognizing itself subject to Rome, would sustain, especially in the 18th century, struggles to free itself and make itself completely independent.

Despite these conflicts, at times very acute, the population of Campania has always preserved a foundation of lively and great religiosity. The numerous pious works, confraternities, institutions and churches, the latter of which in Naples, for example, were until not many years ago more numerous than in Rome; the sanctuaries, from those of Pompeii, of the Madonna dell'Arco, of St. Alphonsus at Pagani, of St. Januarius at Naples and Pozzuoli, to the many others, especially Marian ones, that stud even the most remote and humble little villages; the frequent, expansive religious manifestations and festivals, in which all the exuberance of the southern temperament appears, an exuberance that serves to explain, if not entirely to justify, those excesses and minglings of sacred and profane that not infrequently peep out in these festivals, which, moreover, were, and in many places still are, the only recreation of a people of limited needs. Among the most characteristic festivals, mention should be made of that of the lilies at Nola in honor of St. Paulinus, and that of the four altars at Torre del Greco.

Tommaso Leccisotti

III. ART

The surviving testimonies of Early Christian art outside Naples (v.) are very scarce. At Cimitile near Nola, St. Paulinus, at the beginning of the 5th century, wished to build a new basilica next to the one where the tomb of St. Felix was; at Nocera Superiore, almost in the same period, the basilica of S. Maria Maggiore was built. The phases of development of sacred architecture, from the 6th century to the year 1000, owing to the destructions and the reworkings of the scanty remains, are not yet well clear. Of the work of the Lombard architects and stonecutters who worked at Capua, Salerno, and Benevento, and of the Byzantine buildings that arose during the domination of the Eastern Empire, few records remain. In the 8th century two churches of the Byzantine type were built: the destroyed church of S. Maria delle Cinque Torri at Cassino and that of S. Sofia at Benevento where, however, one notes an original interpretation of Eastern models. Elements of a Byzantine character are visible in the churches of S. Giovanni a Mare at Gaeta, of S. Costanzo at Capri, and in a few other sacred buildings of the region.

More than in architecture, the influence of Byzantine and Eastern art in general manifested itself in decorative sculpture, in wall paintings, and in illuminated codices. With the growth of the maritime power of Amalfi, with the advent of the Normans, then of the Swabians, the arts flourished again and had their golden period. Already through the merit of Desiderius, abbot of Montecassino (1058-87), great impetus had been given in C. to building activity; in fact Desiderius summoned architects and masters of mosaic and inlay from the East, and then Montecassino became an artistic center of great importance from which architectural and decorative manners spread throughout the region. Church architecture nevertheless remained faithful to the basilical type with a Latin cross in its structure, while in decoration it was enriched with particular motifs inspired by Siculo-Muslim models but with a decided local character, especially at Salerno and at Amalfi.

Portals decorated with sculptures of a Lombard character, with fragmentary marbles of the Roman era or of the Byzantine type; bronze doors imported from Byzantium (as in the cathedral of Salerno and of Amalfi) or of evident derivation from Byzantine models (as in the half-destroyed doors of Benevento and in those of the cathedral of Ravello); ambos, episcopal thrones, Easter candelabra, iconostasis chancel screens increased the splendor of the famous temples. It is then also frequent to find the use of mosaic decoration with geometric motifs, the work of Campanian masters who derived their taste from Siculo-Muslim art.

In the field of painting, Byzantine culture dominates. At S. Vincenzo al Volturno there was a painting school (9th century) of which important testimonies remain (oratory of the abbot Epiphanius), but the fundamental document of medieval Campanian painting is constituted by the cycle of frescoes that the abbot Desiderius had painted on the walls of the basilica of S. Angelo in Formis. Their influence is reflected on the frescoes of other medieval Campanian basilicas (S. Maria a Foro Claudio at Ventaroli, S. Maria del Piano at Ausonia).

When the Franciscans and Dominicans, favored by the Angevins, succeeded the Benedictines in spiritual power, Campanian artistic activity had a further development. The Angevins, having consolidated their dominion, summoned French architects to Naples who associated themselves with native builders, spreading throughout C., from the capital, the principles of the new Gothic architecture. When the Aragonese succeeded the Angevins, Spanish Gothic established itself and prospered, down to the Renaissance which in C. had no vital artistic seeds. In the 15th-16th centuries architects, painters, and sculptors reworked artistic forms inspired preferably by Tuscan and Roman exemplars. From northern and central Italy, from Sicily, from Spain, artists then flocked in crowds, in search of work and fortune; from Luciano and Francesco Laurana to Guglielmo Sagrera to Domenico Gagini.

During the Spanish domination the viceroys and above all the Jesuits, the Theatines, the Fathers of the Oratory, in order to renew or found churches and convents, gave a vigorous impulse to the building movement which culminated in the 17th century under the direct influence of architects such as Cosimo Fanzago, Giov. Antonio Dosio, Gian Battista Cavagni, Domenico and Giulio Fontana, Francesco Picchiatti, and of sculptors who immigrated from northern Italy such as Giuliano Finelli, Andrea Bolgi, and others. In 17th-century painting, on the other hand, Naples and C. asserted themselves with eminent personalities; Gian Battista Caracciolo, Massimo Stanzione, Bernardo Cavallino, Salvator Rosa, Mattia Preti, Luca Giordano, Francesco Solimena created a local painting school that oriented Campanian art toward other goals, leading it to merge, with the passage from one century to the next, into the painting of the 19th century. In the second half of the 18th century, while architects such as Domenico Antonio Vaccaro and Ferdinando Sanfelice were building sumptuous churches and palaces, covering them with a rich stucco decoration - the last flashes of declining Baroqueism - L. Vanvitelli at Resina (villa Campolieto), at S. Giorgio a Gremano (villa Vargas), and above all at Caserta (royal palace and park) was elaborating architectural forms destined to prepare the gradual advent of 19th-century Neoclassicism. Peculiar manifestations of the spirit and artistic taste of the 18th century in C. were the majolicas, used especially to cover the extrados of the church domes, and other products of the minor arts: furniture, porcelain, tapestries, marbles, Nativity-scene sculptures, silks, among which those of S. Leucio are famous. Between the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th, French predominance imposed the Neoclassical fashion and art languished amid academic formulas and canons. After a period of stagnation it resumed its course through the work of G. Gigante, D. Morelli, F. Palizzi, G. Toma, M. Cammarano, V. Gemito.

Felice de Filippis

IV. FOLKLORE

The popular traditions of the C. [Campania] are distinguished according to certain principal centers or zones: the city of Naples, the coastal region, Irpinia (Avellino) and the Beneventan Samnium. In the picturesque variety of its usages and customs, Naples has always had one of its principal attractions. A broad view of Neapolitan popular life from the sixteenth century onward can be had through the works of its dialect writers: Velardiniello, the "Gran Cortese", G. B. Basile, and others. From the eighteenth century, art too, especially by means of engravings and lithographs with folkloristic scenes, offers a precise and attractive documentation. It is above all the artisans and street vendors who, with their cries and their stalls, create the "local color": the marinariello, the ovaiola, the verdummaro, the maruzzaro (snail seller), the castagnaro, the mellonaro, the franfelicaro (seller of solid honey sweets and caramels), and likewise the zoccolaro, the knife grinder, the rope maker. A characteristic figure was also Rinaldo, a popular storyteller. Given the psychology of the inhabitants and the sunny beauty of the places, all the festivals take on an exceptionally noisy and joyful character. Suffice it to recall Piedigrotta, "the most Neapolitan festival that exists", which takes place on 8 September with pilgrimages to the sanctuary of the Virgin of Pozzuoli, and which for over a century has also become the festival of song. Also thronged and full of movement and color is the pilgrimage to the distant sanctuary of the Madonna of Montevergine in Irpinia. Characteristic forms of popular cult and of particular devotion are also found in the pilgrimages to the Madonna of Pompei, to the Madonna dell'Arco, etc. In the coastal zone, especially around Amalfi and Capri, the rustic architecture with little domes, terraces, arches and underpasses and with walls of a luminous white, which recalls that of the other Mediterranean shore, is very characteristic. Among the fantastic beings in which the common folk of the C. believe, let us recall "o munaciello", a beneficent household spirit, but sometimes mischievous, which is wont to appear in ecclesiastical dress with a skullcap: and fortunate is he who manages to take it from his head. Famous is the walnut tree of Benevento, already known from the Middle Ages as the "walnut tree of the janare" because it was held to be a meeting place of witches. This has fed on the spot, until some time ago, a tradition of magicians, charlatans and women who practiced witchcraft and popular medicine. Among the most beautiful women's costumes, the festive dress of the brides of Sessa Aurunca. The traditional costume is still worn in the various villages of Irpinia (from hirpus = wolf), as at Montecalvo, Calitri, Bisaccia.

Very well known is the "majo" of Baiano, a great tree around which on 26 December an immense bonfire is lit, while the faithful cry out: "O glorious one! Long live our St. Stephen!". Still very much alive are the representations of a sacred character for Holy Week, both in the form of semi-dramatic sermons and in that of "mysteries", large wooden statues forming groups with scenes of the Passion, placed along the streets, at the stopping places of the procession: important are those of Mirabella Eclano, Montoro, Lapio. Also frequent is the representation of the struggle between St. Michael the Archangel and the devil.

Very widespread are the Marian legends, almost all linked with places of worship of the Madonna, especially in the Sorrentine peninsula.

V. CAMPANIAN CONCILIAR REGION

It is one of the regions into which Italy was divided by measures of the Sacred Congregation of the Consistory of 15 February, 22 March 1919 and 29 September 1933 (AAS, 11 [1919], pp. 72-74, 176; 25 [1933], p. 466), for the purpose of celebrating regional councils in place of provincial councils.

It comprises the territories of the ecclesiastical provinces of Capua, Naples and Sorrento and furthermore the archdiocese of Gaeta, the diocese of Aversa, the nullius abbey of Montecassino with the nullius prepositure of Atina, and the nullius prelature of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary of the Most Holy Rosary (Pompeii).

In the chief town of the region (Naples) is located the regional tribunal for cases of nullity of marriage; it also functions as a tribunal of appeal for cases judged in first instance by the tribunals of the Beneventan (Benevento), Lucanian-Salernitan (Salerno), or Calabrian (Reggio Calabria) regions. The appeal against the sentences of the Campanian regional tribunal must be brought before the tribunal of the Lazio region (Vicariate of Rome) or before the Sacred Roman Rota (cf. Pius XI, motu proprio Qua cura, 8 December 1938, in AAS, 30 [1938], pp. 410-13). - See Pl. XXXIII.

Pio Ciprotti