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In 2007 we found a stone head of the goddess, but it was ruined, totally eroded. The one found is now perfectly preserved, as new, with its colors and a brilliant, white, luminous face", Lorenzo Nigro, head of the team of archaeologists in Mozia, full professor of Archeology and Art History of the Ancient Near East and Phoenician-Punic archaeology.

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She's a beautiful woman, then? "Beautiful", adds Nigro, who has dug far and wide across the Mediterranean, from Sicily to Lebanon, from Jordan to Egypt, and seems to have already fallen in love with her: "Astarte is a messenger of peace - he adds smiling - but she can also be vindictive, as all those who get involved in love affairs know. The face of Astarte - companion of the god Baal, the main deity of the Phoenicians, lord of marine and underground waters, god of storms and fertility - was hidden. just outside the sacred enclosure, in an easily identifiable and well protected point, in "one of the largest and most fascinating sanctuaries of the ancient Mediterranean, that of the sacred area of ​​Kothon".

  Department of Cultural Heritage of the Sicilian Region - Lorenzo Nigro, director of the archaeological mission in Mozia

The Phoenicians feared an attack from the Greeks, with whom they traded but whom they did not entirely trust. And they were right, given that in 397/6 BC Dionysius of Syracuse launched a very violent attack that destroyed the island, one of the most fascinating places in the world yesterday as today, in the center of the Marsala lagoon, where the spectacle of the sunset on the salt pans it is the backdrop to the excavations. The face of Astarte found in Motya was created more or less a hundred years earlier, between 520 BC and 480 BC, the latter being a crucial date for the birth of Greek Sicily, when the Carthaginians were defeated in the terrible and decisive battle of Himera.

The Phoenicians of Mozia knew their hours were numbered. And they knew that Carthage would not defend them. "The head was made in Selinunte or Gela, purchased from the Greeks, since in the 5th century BC the best craftsmen were the Greeks. The Phoenician society was a cosmopolitan society, where the two communities lived together, so much so that one of the inscriptions in the temple to which this head refers is in Phoenician, and names 'Astarte', and the other indicates 'Aglaia'". "The Phoenicians and the Greeks - continues Nigro, author, among other things, of two archaeological mysteries for Il Vomere editions - were rivals in trade, and between them there were clashes and wars, but in Sicily, in Mozia, there was a Greek community that had integrated. Mozia was a very open city, and precisely because of this openness it saw itself substantially abandoned by Carthage, which seemed to reproach it for this contact with the Greeks 'If you were such friends of the Greeks - I sentence' Carthage facts - well now get them!".

The people of Mozio hid Astarte in a circular pit of about one meter in diameter, next to two other objects, also in terracotta: a disk with the representation of a rosette in relief and a mold depicting a dolphin with a large naïve eye, which led to the discovery of the face. The effigy was located in the center of the stack, placed, upside down, on the ocher layer. The rosette, with traces of gilding, is one of the most widespread and popular symbols in the East and the Mediterranean.

  Department of Cultural Heritage of the Sicilian Region - The sacred area of ​​Khoton. The effigy of Astarte was just outside this one.

This "confirms to us that she is the Phoenician goddess". "The ritual of hiding is extraordinary - underlines Nigro - and we have reconstructed it: perfume was poured over the head upside down on a red ochre, then this was covered with symbolic offerings. The burial took place shortly before the final siege of Dionysius of Syracuse. This statue was in use for about eighty years, and was then buried before the enemies arrived: for us archaeologists it was lucky, because it was buried outside the sacred enclosure, in a recognizable place because there is a walled anchor which Sebastiano Tusa, on the basis of similar finds in Byblos and Ugarit, dated to around the 2nd millennium BC. It was not in the temple that was looted, one of the three in the sacred area of ​​Khoton".

Lady of life, reproduction, love, but also of the sea and navigation, of fresh and marine waters, Astarte is a "goddess with a thousand faces", who will be at the center of an upcoming exhibition at the Sapienza museum in Rome "will reconstruct the history of this divinity from the Sumerian era, when she was called Inanna, goddess of love and revenge, and all the faces that the 'Lady' has assumed over the centuries: Isthar of the Akkadians and the Assyrians and Babylonians, Hathor and Isis of the Egyptians, Phoenician Astarte, Aphrodite but also Hera and, in some cases Demeter, for the Greeks She was a female divinity who was successful because in the prehistory of the Mediterranean there were many mother goddesses, who a at a certain point they found themselves in her, capable of descending into hell and undressing to save her beloved Baal or Adonis or Osiris and bring him back to life".

Photo by Gianclaudio Marino

License https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en -  Lo Stagnone di Marsala

The investigations of Nigro's team in the southernmost area of ​​Mozia began in 2002, following the identification of a large rectangular pool 52.5 meters long: it was the center of a large sacred area, with the three major temples arranged radially along the perimeter. It is from this discovery that the hunt for Astarte began: first a headless terracotta cult statue emerged and then the head sculpted in calcarenite, heavily eroded. In a small temple, called the Tophet and dedicated to the Tanit of the Carthaginians, painted votive ostrich eggs were found, a symbol of life that continues, and numerous statuettes of faithful, made of terracotta. Finally, in the oldest temple, a pomegranate-shaped vase was found, the plant sacred to the goddess Astarte because it is very rich in seeds, a symbol of fertility. "The statues - explains Nigro - were washed in the sacred basin, where there is fresh water, a precious resource for the ships of the Phoenicians. Then they were adorned with jewels and votive offerings, a bit like our Madonnas today: In the temple we found some jewels years ago."

During the excavations, a bread mold, a loom weight, a flute made from a goat metacarpus, a bronze harpsichord, and deliberately archaic musical instruments ritually broken in half emerged in a large offering deposit. And also, a jug for pouring flavored wine and objects sacred to the goddess, used in cult actions, such as a turtle carapace bearing the inscription l-rbt, i.e. "to the Lady". "The Moziesi - concludes Nigro - use the universal language of the 5th century BC, that of Hellenized Sicily, to represent the most identifying element that exists: religious worship. They teach us the ability to assimilate and allow ourselves to be assimilated, to translate and transmit without betray, which was typical of the ancients and, in particular, of Sicily".

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L'acqua di San Giovanni

L’acqua di San Giovanni è un antico rituale che si effettua tra la sera del 23 giugno e la mattina del giorno seguente; esso è strettamente collegato alla festa pagana di Lithia, celebrata per festeggiare il solstizio d’estate e durante la quale si accendevano grandi falò durante la notte per simboleggiare l’energia del sole che in quel momento dell’anno era al suo massimo splendore e con lui anche le piante ma al tempo stesso era un rito per assicurarsi abbondanza e protezione durante la stagione della siccità, dei forti acquazzoni e grandinate improvvise.

Questa preparazione dai toni evocativi non è una semplice miscela di erbe e fiori dal profumo inebriante ma un vero e proprio elisir di purificazione spirituale e fisica. Per realizzarla si comincia, subito dopo il tramonto, con la raccolta degli ingredienti che per tradizione prevedono una varietà di erbe e fiori spontanei; il tutto viene poi immerso in acqua preferibilmente di fonte e all’interno di un recipiente di rame o di vetro dal momento che sono materiali capaci di trattenere l’energia delle piante.

La raccolta si effettua con calma e intenzione, in luoghi incontaminati o il più possibile distanti da strade trafficate. Una volta soddisfatt* del raccolto, si può procedere al riempimento del contenitore precedentemente scelto per poi immergere all’interno le erbe e i fiori. Durante quest’ultimo passaggio è consigliato sussurrare un’intenzione personale da infondere nell’acqua. A questo punto si può procedere al posizionamento del recipiente all’aperto o anche su un davanzale; durante tutta la notte, l’acqua si arricchirà ricevendo la luce della luna ma anche le essenze rilasciate dalle piante. Al mattino la miscela riceverà un ultimo ingrediente: la rugiada. Secondo il mito, gli Dei mandavano i nuovi nati sulla terra proprio in quella notte e per questo motivo ogni goccia era carica di potere vitale perciò riuscire a raccoglierla significava assicurarsi abbondanza e protezione per i mesi a venire.

Infine, per poter utilizzare la miscela si dovrà aspettare l'alba del 24 giugno. Trovando posto solo ed esclusivamente in questo magico periodo dell'anno, l'acqua non può essere conservata per via della sua natura transitoria e quindi riesce a donare i propri benefici soltanto entro la fine della giornata. Per utilizzarla bisogna filtrarla dalle piante oppure lavarsi le mani e il viso facendo attenzione a non prendere anche le erbe e i fiori; questo gesto carico di significato rinnova le energie vitali e protegge dagli influssi negativi.

Durante tutto il rituale è bene concentrarsi su quest'usanza intrisa di saggezza ancestrale perché in grado di farci rallentare e osservare la natura e facendoci partecipare in maniera attiva alla danza delle stagioni.

Come la terra

Piano piano si addormenta

Al mistero e alla magia dell'autunno

Prendiamoci quel tempo

Per rallentare e goderci

Quei i piccoli momenti

Di tranquillità

-la ragazza dal cuore nero♡