CIECHI. – Scientifically, a blind person is understood to be an individual whose eyes are entirely devoid of the sense of sight, that is, are not even capable of perceiving the mere difference between light and shadow.
Socially, the definition of blindness varies from country to country. In some, it is given in practical terms, such as the impossibility of walking without guidance along unfamiliar routes, or of counting separated fingers at a fixed distance (1 or 2 m.), or of performing work for which sight is essential. In the United States, an individual is defined as blind if he possesses visual acuity no greater than 20/200 in the better eye, with corrective lenses, or greater than 20/200 but with such a limitation of the visual field that the widest diameter of that field does not extend beyond an angle of 20 degrees. In Italy, visual acuity must not exceed one tenth in either eye, with the best possible and tolerated correction; those who, despite having more than 1/10 vision, have such limitations of the visual field that the excess portion of their visus cannot be fully utilized, or who have alterations of the light sense or disturbances of the muscular balance of the eye, are also considered blind.
In general, sight is regarded as indispensable for carrying out any normal activity, so that the ability of blind persons, demonstrated on numerous occasions, to practise a profession or trade is considered exceptional and attributed to special sensory compensations. In reality, every blind person who has no other physical or psychological impairments can participate in the productive life of the community, provided that he is suitably educated or re-educated.
The beginning of organized educational activity on behalf of the blind took place in Paris at the end of the eighteenth century, with the founding of the first institution intended for blind youths (1784), due to Valentin Haüy (1745–1822).
The first problem to be solved was that of learning, hence the need for a system of writing in relief perceptible to the touch. Various systems were experimented with over time, but the one universally accepted for its completeness and practicality is the system devised in 1829 BRASILE (v.). The Braille system is based on the various possible combinations of a number of raised dots not exceeding six, each of which corresponds to a letter of the alphabet, a punctuation mark, or a graphic indication. The same combinations are used for numbers and musical notation. The introduction of this system has made the boundless field of culture and knowledge accessible to the blind.
By continually replacing visual elements with others perceptible to the touch, blind persons can now concretely learn subjects such as geography, geometry, the natural sciences, etc., with the aid of maps and raised drawings, relief models, scale models, and adapted instruments. With such special teaching materials, the blind are given the possibility of arriving at a conception of forms and reproducing them through modelling and drawing.
Moreover, the education of hearing is fundamental in accustoming the blind to spatial evaluations, the localization and assessment of obstacles, and the perception of architectural forms insofar as these can be recognized through the reflection of sounds: this permits the development of ease and independence of movement and of the ability to orient themselves. To a lesser degree, the other senses too, and particularly the sense of smell, perform a complementary compensatory function.
It is only from this educational development that the sensory abilities of the blind derive—abilities which the public often erroneously attributes to a nonexistent sixth sense.
The first institution for the blind founded in Italy was that of SS. Giuseppe e Lucia in Naples (1818); it was followed by the Configliachi institution of Padua (1838) and the institution of Milan (1840); subsequently, all the principal cities of Italy had their own institution for the blind, established through the initiative of religious orders or private benefactors. At present Italy possesses a truly imposing educational system, which has required the creation of a coordinating body: the Federazione nazionale delle istituzioni pro c., founded in 1923 (Rome, Via Quattro Fontane, no. 147). The Federation, in agreement with the Unione italiana dei c., obtained the extension of compulsory education to the blind, together with the corresponding intervention of the State through subsidies for the institutions and of the provinces through payment of fees for indigent blind persons (D. L. 30 Jan. 1923, no. 2839); the requirement of specialized training for teachers and assistants in schools for the blind, through a one-year training course at the school of methods for educators of the blind, established for this purpose (R. D. 15 Nov. 1925, no. 2483); and the specialization of the institutions, the implementation of which is still under way.
Of the thirty existing institutions, fourteen, recognized by the State as educational and instructional bodies, with elementary schools and vocational-preparatory schools, are placed under the authority of the Ministry of Public Education, and their nationalization is imminent. Among others, mention should be made of the school of methods in Rome referred to above (which, upon the death of its founder Augusto Romagnoli, took his name); the Francesco Cavazza institution of Bologna (music school and boarding school for secondary-school and university students); the Martuscelli institution of Naples (music school and boarding school for secondary-school students); the Serafico institution for persons who became blind late in life at Assisi, run by the Rogationists; and the S. Alessio institution of Rome (music school), run by the Somaschi. Among the other Italian institutions, mention should be made of the national Braille printing press (Via Antonio Cocchi, no. 2, Florence), which supplies textbooks for the schools and also publishes books on various cultural subjects; and the national Braille library of Monza, which possesses numerous works available for loan, as well as a record library, still in the process of development, for the dissemination of the talking book.
It should be noted that educational action can also have a considerable rehabilitative effect on those who become blind in adulthood. Although they cannot always attain the sensory compensation results characteristic of childhood, they nevertheless succeed in regaining a capacity for intellectual or manual work. A specialized institution for vocational education, based in Florence, provides for their re-education, as well as for the training in various trades of young blind persons who have left the other institutions. At the same institution, a school of massage, the only one recognized in Italy, provides training for massage therapists.
The experience of the last half-century has demonstrated that blind persons can also undertake manual work, in those activities or stages of production in which the use of sight is not indispensable. Apart from massage and the tuning and repair of musical instruments, in which the abilities of the blind equal and perhaps surpass those of the sighted, other craft activities are open to those deprived of sight, such as the manufacture of brushes, basketry, knitwear, paper and cardboard goods, textiles, etc. Blind persons can also work in ordinary industry, for example,
in the calibration of metal objects. In addition, special devices, such as the telephone switchboard that substitutes acoustic signals for optical ones, enable blind persons to be employed productively.
It should be noted that, until 1918, work for the c. was regarded more as an element of recreation on a charitable level than as a genuine possibility of productive employment. Experiments conducted in the United States (Ford) and in Germany demonstrated the contrary, namely, the possibility of placing the c. both in ordinary industry and in special workshops, where they would work with the assistance of sighted workers. The latter was the system that prevailed in Italy, with the establishment of the national employment agency for the c. (1934), which coordinated the activities of the various knitting, weaving, hemp-processing, bag-making, shoemaking, metal-trinket, etc. workshops scattered throughout Italy; this organization survived without burdening public funds until 1944, but has unfortunately recently suffered the grave consequences of the post-war period.
Intellectual work offers the c. extensive possibilities. Today in Italy there are numerous teachers in public and private schools (approximately 150) and professionals who practice law, work in journalism, direct commercial and industrial enterprises, etc.; music, both as instruction and performance, also constitutes a fertile field of activity for c. endowed with specific aptitudes.
The organizational capacity of the c. has been demonstrated throughout the world, and particularly in Italy, by their professional associations. In Italy, the Unione italiana dei c., founded in 1920 for cooperation between civilian c. and war c., gradually assumed increasing importance, until it obtained recognition as the «representation and protection of the moral and material interests of those impaired in sight before public administrations and before all bodies and institutions whose purpose is the assistance, education, and employment of the c.» (D. L. 26 Sept. 1947, no. 1047).
The State is entrusting ever greater responsibilities to the Union, which carries out its activities through a central office (Rome, Via Quattro Fontane, no. 147), 23 regional or interprovincial sections, and numerous subsections and representatives. In 1948, in application of art. 38 of the Constitution, the funds necessary for the first time were granted to the Union for the distribution to all needy c. of a monthly assistance allowance, the amount of which is still modest; this grant, renewed for 1949, is still provisional in nature, but tends to become permanent.
Moreover, through the activities of one of its building agencies, the Union provides its members with public housing under a comprehensive construction plan in the various cities.
The Union publishes three monthly periodicals in braille, Corriere Braille, Gennariello (for children), and Faro (musical), as well as one in ordinary print, Corriere dei c.
Among the principal foreign institutions devoted to the education, employment, and assistance of the c., the following should be mentioned: l'Association Valentin Haüy pour le bien des aveugles, Paris; la Ligue Braille, Brussels; la Stichting «Het Nederlandse Blindenwezen», Amsterdam; the Blindenstudienanstalt, Marburg-Lahn; the Österreichischer Blindenverband, Vienna; the Dansk Blindenhof, Copenhagen; the Ostlandske Blindforbund, Oslo; the Blind Institute, Tomteboda (Sweden); the National Institute for the Blind, London; the St. Dunstan's College, London; the Irish National League of the Blind, Dublin; the Organización Nacional de Ciegos, Madrid; the Schweizerischer Blindenverband, Zurich; the American Foundation for the Blind, New York; the Perkins Institute, Watertown, Mass. (U.S.A.); the American Foundation for Overseas Blind, New York. At the international conference on blindness in Oxford (Aug. 1949), a committee was elected to promote an international federation of the c., with its provisional headquarters in Paris.
Le pitture cimiteriali presentano la scena del miracolo secondo la narrazione di s. Giovanni (9, 1 agg.); però Cristo tocca la testa del c., non i suoi occhi.
La più antica rappresentazione si trovava in un cubicolo del cimitero di Domitilla, veduto intatto dal Bosio (Roma sotterranea, Roma 1632, p. 249); l'affresco venne distaccato dal Boldetti e dato insieme con altri dello stesso cimitero al benedettino Placido Scammacca il quale li collocò nel suo monastero di S. Nicolò in Catania, dove si conservano deturpati da restauri (H. Achelis, Römische Katakombenbilder in Catania, Berlino 1932, p. 14 e figg. 8, 96).
Il miracolo è poi rappresentato in un arcosolio di Priscilla (Wilpert, Pitture, tav. 70, 1); in tre cubicoli del cimitero Ad duas lauros (ibid., tavv. 68, 3; 105, 2; id., Ein Cyklus christologischer Gemälde aus der Katakombe der heil. Petrus und Marcellinus, Friburgo in Br. 1891, tavv. 1-4).
Nelle sculture invece si distinguono più rappresentazioni; in alcuni sarcofagi si trova la scena della guarigione del c. Bartimeo, narrato da Mc. 10, 46-52 e da Lc. 18, 35-43; tipico è l'esempio del frammento di Villa Doria a Roma.
La guarigione del c. nato è uno dei soggetti più spesso rappresentati nei sarcofagi cristiani antichi; il Garrucci e il Le Blant ne avevano dati cinquantasette esempi; il Wilpert ne ha aggiunti oltre venti (gli esempi elencati dal Garrucci e dal Le Blant sono in Wilpert, Sarcofagi, II, p. 296, n. 2; quelli del Wilpert, ibid., nn. 3 e 4). Gli esemplari più caratteristici sono offerti dai frammenti dei cimiteri di S. Callisto, S. Sebastiano e Pretestato (ibid., tavv. 228, 3; 229, 7; 231, 7).
Un bell'esempio è stato trovato in un sarcofago di recente rinvenuto presso la confessione di S. Pietro in Vaticano. Un gruppo di sarcofagi presenta invece la scena della guarigione di due c., secondo Mt. 20, 30-34, ai quali il Signore tocca gli occhi e restituisce la vista; in genere il primo c. si appoggia con il bastone, mentre l'altro si guida tenendo la sua mano sulla spalla del precedente; questa scena apre in genere la serie cristologica nel centro di sarcofagi specie nelle Gallie, ad es., nei sarcofagi di Dil (Wilpert, Sarcofagi, II, p. 295, tav. 230, 2), di Clermont (ibid., p. 295, tav. 230, 5), di Valence (ibid., pp. 295-96, tav. 214, 6), di Leida (ibid., p. 296, fig. 93), di Tarragona (ibid., p. 296, tav. 230, 5).
Il prototipo romano è il sarcofago lateranense 125; nel sarcofago di Bassa in Pretestato i c. sono tre (ibid., p. 296 e tav. 207, 1).
S. Marco parla della guarigione del c. di Bethsaida (Mc. 8, 22-25). La scena è rappresentata in un sarcofago ora nell'atrio della basilica di S. Lorenzo in Agro Verano. Il Signore tiene tra le sue mani la testa del c. e gli tocca con la destra un occhio (Wilpert, Sarcofagi, II, p. 296, tav. 197, 5).
In antichi monumenti cristiani non funerari la guarigione del c. si trova: in una delle formelle lignee intagliate della porta di S. Sabina in Roma (sec. v); in un vaso d'argento edito dal Bottari (Sculture, pitture sacre estratte dai cimiteri in Roma, I, Roma 1737, p. 18, 5).
Sempre nel sec. v si trovano le scene della guarigione del c. in vetri dorati, in avori, come, ad es., nella capsella di Brescia o in un dittico della cattedrale di Palermo (Venturi, I, fig. 382); nelle stoffe, come viene attestato da Asterio di Amasea (PG 40, 166-67); mentre il miracolo dei c. di Gerico figura nel ciclo musivo
di S. Martino «in caelo aureo» (S. Apollinare nuovo) in Ravenna. Nel sec. vi torna la guarigione del c. in una delle tavolette eburnee d'un evangelario di Milano (R. Garrucci, Storia dell'arte cristiana, Prato 1881, tavv. 454-55).
L'espressiva rappresentazione della guarigione del c. nato si trova nel Codice di Rossano (sec. vi) e quella dei c. di Gerico in una delle 5 miniature dell'Evangelario Sinopense, dello stesso secolo (H. Omont, Notice sur un très ancien manuscrit de l'évangile de L. Mathieu en onciale d'or sur parchemin pourpré et orné de miniatures conservé à la bibliothèque Nationale n. 1286 du Supplément grec, in Notices et extraits des manuscrits, 36 [1901], pp. 599-675). In scultura la guarigione del c. è nel ciborio di S. Marco a Venezia (Wilpert, Mosaiken, pp. 814-15 e figg. 377-78); in pittura la scena è effigiosa in una delle colonne del presbiterio di S. Maria Antiqua in Roma del tempo di Giovanni VII (705); poi ricorre nell'altare di Vuolvinio in S. Ambrogio a Milano (824-59); in avorio in una placchetta eburnea del paliotto di Salerno (fine sec. xi; il c. Bartimeo è rappresentato in una miniatura del cosiddetto evangelario di Ottone III di Brema; nella seconda metà del sec. xii nel ciclo musivo di Monreale; più tardi ancora nei cicli pure musivi del monastero di Chora, oggi moschea di Kahrièdjami in Costantinopoli, e nella chiesa della Metropoli di Mistra. - Vedi Tav. CI.