WITH THE FREE PATRONAGE OF
CARNEVALE DI PUTIGNANO
CHURCH OF SAN PIETRO APOSTOLO
Event on the Monday before the end of the Carnival celebrations on Mardi Gras
The Extreme Unction of Carnival
Carnival Monday, identified here in Putignano as "a deje d’ minz "(the middle day between Sunday and Shrove Tuesday), is a typical festival that takes place in the city streets, especially in the historic village. The party comes to life thanks to the procession of the "Extreme Unction of Carnival" and "of the Carnival testament (of the pig or of the donkey).
The masked men and women in ecclesial garments arranged in procession, pass through the streets of the city imparting the sacrament that anticipates the die of the Carnival and the revelry connected to it. Through the distribution of goods, the rite publicly denounced the wrongdoing and vices of the community which was thus freed from the evil committed during the year. In a joking tone, sadness, despair and grief are simulated for the now near end of fun.
Buontemponi, goliardici and children, are the participants of this light-hearted procession, one of the oldest rites of the Putignano carnival, unique in Europe and handed down for generations for hundreds of years
"In the nineteenth century in Putignano on the morning of the last day of Carnival" all the masks dress brown, and crying (that is, screaming) with a rough map, with a piece of rope in hand, to dry the tears first, of those they meet, or to force them to cry with the second, instructing everyone to prepare themselves for 'days of penance "" (V. Morea)
It was a widespread custom in the past years, on Carnival Monday to participate in the village balls, in the ballrooms available throughout the city area
This website project born from the idea of Gianni Musaio is enclosed in a team spirit and is the result of the collaboration of people, ordinary citizens, who care about the historical, cultural, artistic, geographical, food and wine heritage of the historic center of Putignano, a town in to live.