May 5: Celebration of the Italian Snake Goddess Angitia — Theresa C. Dintino’s Abruzzo-Americana Wheel of the Year

by Theresa | Apr 27, 2022 | Goddess, Strega and Italian-Americana

“On the first Thursday in May the most pagan of Christian festivals takes place in Cocullo (AQ) in honor of San Domenico Abate, whose statue is carried through the village covered with live snakes; the old snake rites connected to the goddess Angitia were passed on to...

March 20/21: Celebration of the Goddess Prosperina – Theresa C. Dintino’s Abruzzo-Americana Wheel of the Year

by Theresa | Mar 13, 2022 | Goddess, Strega and Italian-Americana

A traditional celebration and acknowledgment of the spring equinox: the arrival of spring, more light and warmer weather in the northern hemisphere. We will celebrate the Italian Goddess Prosperina and her mother Ceres, who some may know as Greek Persephone and...

Feb 5: The Feast of Sant’ Agata – Theresa C. Dintino’s Abruzzo-Americana Wheel of the Year

by Theresa | Jan 28, 2022 | Goddess, Strega and Italian-Americana

The 2002 Calendaro Abruzzese from abruzzo2000.com that I purchased and kept tells us that “5th of February is the feast of Sant’ Agata who is the ‘protector of breast-feeding women, and as such is highly venerated in the countryside, since good and abundant milk was a...

Theresa C. Dintino’s Abruzzo-Americana Wheel of the Year

by Theresa | Jan 23, 2022 | Strega and Italian-Americana

I was not born in the Abruzzo. I was born in Keene, NH, the daughter of a second generation Italian American. I am not Italian but half of my ancestors are all from the same village in the Abruzzo: Torre de’ Passeri. My journey back to the roots of my Italian lineage...

Francesco Paolo Michetti (1852-1929): Famous Artist of the Abruzzo

by Theresa | May 26, 2021 | Strega and Italian-Americana

Francesco Paolo Michetti  (1852-1929) is a famous artist of the Abruzzo region of Italy. Born at Tocco da Casauria near Chieti, a large percentage of his paintings are of his native Abruzzo. His paintings of the Abruzzo also give us a great idea and understanding of...

Through the Apennines and the Lands of the Abruzzi

by Theresa | May 13, 2021 | Strega and Italian-Americana

In my research into the Abruzzo region of Italy that my family is from, for my novel The Strega and the Dreamer, I found the work of women ethnographers, folklorists and travel writers of the early 1900s to be the most helpful.  Ethnography is: 1. The branch of...