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History |
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This border of
earth, richest of archaeological testimonies, just inhabited
eight thousands years ago from the man of the "Mesolitico"
period - homo sapiens -, cross-road of the marine traffics in
the previous centuries immediately before and after the Christ's
birth, pilgrims destination since asserting of the Christianity,
seems one country without history.
Administratively the San Vito Lo Capo Commune was born in 1952,
when the Sicily Region recognized its peculiarity and it freed
it from the government of the city of Erice. The town of San
Vito Lo Capo was born around the current Sanctuary, restored
in the centuries. The first "factory", realized in
XIV century, has been one small chapel dedicated to "San
Vito Martire", the country patron.
The legend tell that the young Vito, mazarese patrician, son
of a high functionary of Rome, has had to escape from his born
city, with his wet-nurse Crescenzia and his tutor Modesto, than
had converted him to the Christianity, to rescue him self from
the persecutions ordered by Diocleziano; After two days of navigation
towards north, a storm forced the Vito's ship to land in a gulf
at the back of the wind, sheltered from rocks, good known from
that time sailors (Egitorso or Egitollo its name), and here
the three would have tried to convert the inhabitants of the
Conturrana village, that it rose at about three kilometers from
the sea, under a high one rock. |
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Vito,
Modesto and Crescenzia didn't succeed to convince the inhabitants
of the village of their "truth", indeed they were
drived away and threatened; an enormous landslide, that it
buried the village and its inhabitants, was the God punishment
for the unfaithfuls.
Not to far from the landslide (today called "contrada
Avalanche") that it hides the mystery of "Conturrana",
rises the chapel dedicated to "Santa Crescenzia",
constructed by the ericini in the XVI century: the tradition
tell that here were found Vito and its wet-nurce when the
divine anger destroyed the village.
Under the fallens masses of "contrada Avalanche"
have been finds fragments of ceramics and tools: it is probable
that of the village, really existed, have spoken of it Cicerone,
Rocco Pirri, Tolomeo, in a conflicting way, confusing it,
some times with Scopello and some times with Segesta,- it
has been destroyed by a meteorite fall down on the crest of
the mountain (to few kilometers of distance, in Custonaci
territory, is easy visible the width and deep chasm opened
by an other meteorite of enormous dimensions). |
The passage of Vito and Crescenzia, than after to
have abandoned Capo Egitarso they endured the cruelest persecutions,
provoked however great emotion between people of the zone, and around
to the XIV century (Vito died at the end of the XIV century, he
has got about 20 years old) was constructed the first chapel dedicated
to him. In the centuries the chapel undergoed various repairs, it
was magnified and embellished, also because were more and more numerous
the pilgrims who came here to venerate Saint Vito Martire. Original
documents, conserved in the Erice Archives give for existing a church
just in 1241; it was constructed by the faithfuls of Erice, of whose
"Universitas" (Montis Sancti Juliani) the sanvitese territory
apartained.
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wasn't costructions all around the chapel, and the pilgrims
were forced to sleep in stretch or to the bivouac. The primitive
factory, become then the current sanctuary, was born around
the church like fortress - lodging for giving hospitality to
the pilgrims, and to defend them from the bandits and from the
barbaric corsairs. Such realization laughed to the end of XV
century, and it was also constructed by the Erice faithfuls
(with their finances). The square tower of the church - sanctuary
- fortress, was realized about 150 years later, around the XVII
century.
The fortress had elegant lodgings for
the noble and modest rooms of stables for poor people, side
of a well said - obviously - "of Saint Vito "; the
church reputation and the miracles qualified to "San
Vito Martire" and to "Santa Crescenzia" (which
people addressed to exorcise the fears), "the divine"
punishments (storms, shipwrecks) that fell on various corsairs
that had the boldness to plunder the church and to rob the
faithfuls, attracted more e more people to the sanctuary,
and therefore to the beginning of the XVIII century were constructed
the first houses near the church. It is probable that first
they were only huts for the passage faithfuls, then some families,
decided to stopped itself there, may be to offer, for money,
food and lodging to the pilgrims; at the end of the XVIII
century around the church there was a small nucleus of habitations.
The country was born.
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Had to pass still a century because San Vito and
its districts became inhabited nuclei in the true sense of the word:
in years 1789 - 1791, in fact, were proceeded to taken a census
of the patrimonial properties of the Reign university, and the lands
included in the census came entrusted in emphyteusis, with the obligation
for the beneficiaries to settle down itself in the nearness. The
three districts in which the ericini jury had divided the territory
- Saint Vito, Macari, Castelluzzo become as many inhabitated villages.
In the succeeded years, many others peasants added to the first
ones - all coming from the territories of Erice - and after various
years began to arrive in San Vito also the fishermen, attracted
by the fishiness of the sea. These last ones came from Levant, from
Cinisi, Isola delle Femmmine, Capaci; the lack of a local market-place,
the difficulty to introduce the catch in the city markets, so far
by earth and by sea, for decades has maintained the social class
of the fishermen in a subordinated position regarding the peasants,
a relationship that today is invert.
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160 years the Commune of Erice managed the territory we have spoken
before, while it was elected to "under Commune"; in the
1952 the regional law elevated San Vito to independent Commune, assigned
to it the fractions of Macari and Castelluzzo.
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