Corsica

CORSICA. - By area it is the fourth island of the Mediterranean, yet it extends over less than half the size of the two largest (8,722 sq km). Geographically it forms a system with nearby Sardinia, from which it is separated by a narrow (12 km) arm of sea (Strait of Bonifacio). It is almost entirely mountainous, with notable differences in appearance. The interior is crossed by alpine mountain ranges, culminating at 2,710 m in Monte Cinto. The climate, temperate maritime in the coastal regions, becomes less mild or even extreme as one moves away from the sea; rainfall, everywhere sufficient for agricultural needs (800-900 mm annually), is greater on the side facing the Tyrrhenian.

The spontaneous vegetation, in which forest and scrub predominate, has given way to cultivation over relatively limited areas, which have diminished considerably in the last twenty years. Both pastoralism and agriculture do not yield what they could, owing to a shortage of labor, lack of capital, backward techniques and a deficiency of government measures (land reclamation). Chestnuts, olive oil, citrons and fruit are the most notable products. Pastoralism is of slight importance, fishing almost entirely neglected, and industry practically nonexistent.

The population, doubled in the last 150 years, amounts (1946) to 268,000 inhabitants (333,000 in 1936), which corresponds to an average density of 30 inhabitants per sq km (31 in the province of Nuoro, but 43 for Sardinia as a whole). The only two notable urban centers are Bastia (52,000 inhabitants) and Ajaccio (31,000 inhabitants).

Corsica has been French since 1768. Italians, who appear in the censuses among foreigners (3.4% of the total population), probably number more than 10,000.

Giuseppe Caraci

II. DIOCESE AND ANCIENT HISTORY

There is no reliable information about the origins of Christianity in C. The bishop Florentius, given by some as the evangelizer of C. and venerated on the island, was perhaps an African martyr whose relics would have been brought to the island by African refugees from the Vandal persecution (Lanzoni, I, pp. 699 and 1097).

Lanzoni holds that Christianity reached the island through sailors, soldiers and freedmen. The fleet of Misenum had two stations in C.: Aleria and Mariana, both on the eastern coast; in the interior, at the time of St. Gregory (597), the mountains of the diocese of Aleria were still inhabited by pagans; Pope Gregory the Great had a church and a baptistery erected on the Nigeuno (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 1488).

At the same time there were five dioceses on the island, all on the coast. On the eastern coast were the dioceses of: Mariana, on the river Golo, whose first certain bishop is from the year 649. Aleria, at the mouth of the Tavignano, was in the year 591 "iamdiu pontificatu destituto" (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 1146); in that year Martin, bishop of Taina, was transferred there; he was succeeded by Peter (ibid., 1402). Taina, not far from Aleria, was invaded and sacked in 591 while Martin was bishop there. On the western coast: Ajaccio, which in 601 had been for a long time without a bishop (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 1850); Saona, which in the year 591 was likewise without a pastor.

The patron saint of C. is St. Julia, noted by the Hieronymian Martyrology under 22 May: in C. insula passio sanctae Iuliae; her passio is without value (BHL, 4516-17); she is perhaps a martyr of African origin, whose relics were perhaps translated on the same occasion as those of St. Florentius.

The other two martyrs venerated in C., Amanza and Laurina, are not mentioned in the hagiographic sources.

Enrico Josi

III. MEDIEVAL AND MODERN HISTORY

At the opening of the Middle Ages one sees the pontifical authority taking an interest in public works in Corsica as well, just as on the Italian mainland. Gregory the Great opened roads and transformed the monasteries into strongholds for the defense of the people, neglected by the governmental authorities. In 774, when Charlemagne confirmed Pepin's donation, Corsica became part of it, in name if not in fact. Under the Franks there were frequent incursions of the Saracens who long plagued the island, until around the middle of the 11th century, when the combined forces of the two maritime Republics of Pisa and Genoa served to ward off the grave danger. In 1078 Gregory VII, reconfirming the pontifical sovereignty over C., gave legatine powers to the bishop of Pisa, provoking the jealousy and discontent of the Republic of Genoa. Thus, in the two following centuries (12th and 13th), C. represented one of the principal causes of discord between the two Republics, which fought bitterly for dominion over the upper Tyrrhenian, until in 1284, in the battle of Meloria, the Genoese inflicted upon the Pisans a tremendous and irreparable defeat. But, angered by the anti-Guelph policy of the two rival Republics, Pope Boniface VIII conferred the kingdoms of C. and Sardinia upon James II, king of Aragon, who, however, could not immediately set out to conquer and occupy the two islands.

In the 14th and 15th centuries, struggles between the great and the common people, with varying fortunes, plagued C., provoking, in turn, the intervention of various States and princes, including Pope Eugene IV, who in 1446 sent there a legate of his own and a body of militia. To escape from a difficult and precarious situation, in 1453 the Corsicans turned to the Banco di S. Giorgio, to which Genoa ceded its rights of sovereignty and which, after fierce efforts, succeeded in striking a mortal blow at the local feudal system and in preserving its dominion over the island until the time of the hard contest between France and Philip II of Spain. Then, under the leadership of Sampiero Corso, a brave and valiant captain, the Corsicans rebelled against Genoa, the ally of the Spaniards, and took up arms in favor of the Franco-Turks: the peace of Cateau-

Cambrésis, however, forced the French to evacuate the occupied territory, and C., after other attempts at rebellion, and after the killing of Sampiero in an ambush (1567), returned under the full dominion of Genoa.

From that time the Republic sought to reorganize the island administratively and to reestablish there order, quiet, and ecclesiastical discipline, deeply disturbed by the war, by internal agitations as well as by the prolonged absence of the bishops. The Holy See naturally contributed to this as well: already earlier Julius III, in full agreement with St. Ignatius of Loyola, had sent to C., with the title of apostolic visitor, Fr. Silvestro Landini, a Jesuit, who preached there with much fruit, bringing about an extraordinary conversion of the people; a little later, in 1570, Pius V appointed St. Alexander Sauli bishop of Aleria, who remained there for twenty years, exerting himself in fulfilling his pastoral duties, striving above all to extinguish enmities and instilling in souls sentiments of true Christian life. Still later, in 1595, Clement VIII, at the request of the Republic of Genoa, sent there various missionaries, and six years afterward, two apostolic visitors of the same Society of Jesus: on their suggestion, in 1602, the opening of a first college at Bastia was decided, and in 1617 of a second, at Ajaccio.

For more than a century and a half, C. remained quiet or resigned under the Genoese government; but in 1729, because of the odious manner of collecting a tax, the revolts of the population against the constituted authorities began again: in the following years a diet at Corte (1735) declared the island free from all political dependence on the Republic and proclaimed as its protectress the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary. Various so-called national governments then came into being, the last of which was headed by Pasquale Paoli, the hero of Corsican independence, from 1755 to 1769, until he was defeated by an army of the king of France, to whom Genoa had made full cession of all its rights over the island (V. PAOLI, PASQUALE).

After the conquest, C. was subjected to a military regime and reduced to obedience: only twenty years later, on Nov. 30, 1789, the National Assembly of Paris subjected it to the common law and declared it forthwith united to France, that is, forming part of the national territory. Later, the Concordat of 1802 reduced the island's five dioceses to a single one, with its seat at Ajaccio. In very recent times, that is, in the time of Pope Pius X and Cardinal Merry del Val, there were negotiations between the Holy See and the French government to arrive at the division of the island into at least two dioceses, called for by its very geographical conditions, and they had already reached a good point, when various reasons, chiefly among them the diplomatic rupture between the two parties, caused everything to fall through.

At Ajaccio there is a sanctuary of the Madonna della Misericordia, who appeared at Savona in 1636, and who is the patroness of the Corsican capital.

At Cargese there still exists a parish of the Byzantine rite, whose vicissitudes have been very troubled. The Genoese, in fact, transported from the Peloponnese in 1676 a colony of Greeks to Paonia; from this village it was driven to Ajaccio and in 1775 transported to Cargese. - See plate XXXIII.

IV. FOLKLORE OF CORSICA

The singular aspects of the folklore that made nineteenth-century Corsica so picturesque are gradually fading or disappearing. Among the elements of male dress, the "berretta misgia" still survives, now made of simple cloth, rounded at the top and folded over on one side; on the other hand, the "u pilone," which in Tommaso's day was a "cloak of goat's hair," and the footwear of leather strips woven at the instep and under the sole, are disappearing. Thus the women of the common people now habitually dress in black; but in the last century they had costumes in vivid colors, which included the "bustu," the "a rota" (a full skirt with tight pleats) and the "u scurzale" (an apron often embroidered), the "u mandile" (head scarf) or the "a faldetta" (an underskirt tied in a knot and turned back over the head). The betrothal ceremony, which is still called the "abbraccia" or the "amicizia," took place according to graceful traditional practices; but far more alive still are the funeral customs, of very ancient stamp. The manifestations of grief, quite violent, are part of the rite, which varies from place to place; in it the funeral lament ("vòcero") is a source of poetry in which maternal and family sorrow finds accents of the strongest dramatic power. In the "vòcero," with expressive images and original metaphors, the virtues of the dead are extolled, their cut-short youth is mourned, or a life spent in hard work in the fields. Often the "vòceri" are also songs of vengeance, in that through them the women spur their closest relatives to avenge the dead (if by violent death). This custom, which gave rise to an endless chain of murders and fed banditry, has by now disappeared: perhaps a little too much colorful literature has been written about Corsican vengeance. And the same may be said of banditry, which found its reason in particular psychological, historical and environmental conditions that are rapidly evolving. Thus the songs of the bandits are also disappearing, which constitute a particular sector of Corsican folk poetry, while strambotti, lullabies and children's songs, toasts, etc., find a perfect correspondence with analogous songs of Tuscany, perhaps imported from there by the woodcutters of Lucca in their seasonal migrations to the Corsican mountains. Nevertheless the most ancient foundation of the customs, as a whole, recalls to us a close affinity with the folklore of Sardinia. In the churches, and in particular in those of the interior of the island, certain prayers are constantly said in the Italian language (the Rosary, the Way of the Cross, religious hymns); which also happens in many places for sermons. The dialect is always spoken by the majority of the inhabitants, including those who have been settled in France for many years. It should be remembered that in the sanctuary of "La Santa" (Calacuccia), on 8 September, a characteristic procession of men only takes place, which winds in the manner of a snail and is called the "granitola."

Paolo Toschi