LIFE: Up on Montallegro

CHIAVARI, Italy – There is a special place high above the town of Rapallo, on the Italian Riviera, that has fascinated me for all the twenty plus years I have lived in Italy. It’s called Montallegro. There isn’t much up there, a church and a couple of hotel/restaurants and some hiking paths through the woods that lead down to Portofino on one side and Chiavari on the other, but I am continually drawn to it. 

Sanctuary of Montallegro

It’s a very peaceful place, beyond the reach of the hustle and bustle of the posh seaside towns below. Behind the church there is a path through the woods, and at the end of the path there is a small hotel/restaurant called Pellegrino. But more about that later.  

The centerpiece of Montallegro is the Sanctuary of Montallegro and the many ex-votos that hang on its walls. It was built during the 16^th century, a time when Rapallo was being attacked and sacked by the Ottomans and Barbary pirates. Rapallo was only a village of about 1,300 people at the time, so it was easy for the famous Turkish pirate, Alì Dragut Rais, to overtake its small civilian army. Once he had the taken over the town, he sacked the village, captured a good many of the town inhabitants and then sailed away to Algeria to sell his captives as slaves.   

Rapallo and its Fortress

The attack by the Turkish pirate was a devastating event. The townsfolk then built a castle/fortress near the waterfront, got themselves a cannon, and from that point on were able to protect themselves from further attacks. Both the castle and the cannon are still there, just in case, even though the pirates are long gone.

But less than ten years after the attack by Ali Dragut Rais, Rapallo once again became a battleground. This time the war was between the two local noble families, the Bianchi and the Del Torre, who were fighting each other for control of the territory. At the same time, an equally dangerous threat was looming, the Black Plague. 

 This is One Way of Getting Up There

The Black Plague, which had already killed thousands of Europeans, was rapidly spreading throughout Liguria, and if by some miracle you managed to avoid dying from the plague, you had a good chance of dying from small pox or TB, as  both of those diseases were also spreading like wildfire. And if you did manage to avoid those diseases, there was always the threat of dying of hunger because of widespread famine caused by the fact that so many people were dying there was no one left to tend the fields, which were flooding because of torrential rains.   

In other words, life was tough. It was during this period that a farmer, Giovanni Chichizola of Canevale, claimed that the Virgin Mary came to him while he was tending his goats in the hills above Rapallo, and told him to build a church on that site. There’s actually more to this story, but I’ll save that for another Sunday. The point is the church was built and even during the period of construction, life seemed to miraculously improve for the people of Rapallo.

 The Walls of the Church are Covered with Ex-Votos

The townspeople thanked the Virgin Mary for their improved fortune and began showing their thanks by bringing ex-votos to the church and putting them up on the walls. Farmers would give thanks for healthy crops, the merchants and artisans for continued success. Even seamen and fishermen would go to the church and make their vows and pray to the Virgin Mary to keep them safe at sea. 

Just because the pirates weren’t attacking the town any more didn’t mean that they were not lying in wait in one of the many coves that line the Ligurian coast, ready to pounce on the ships hauling cargo or bringing in treasure from far- away places.  And let us not forget the ever present danger of storms at sea and what that represented to fragile fishing boats or sailing ships propelled by men pulling oars when the wind blew hard from more than one direction.

So yes, if they did survive, even salty sailors would trek up the mountain and show their gratitude with a heart or a painting or a souvenir brought back from where ever they had sailed back home from. From its position high above the town, and closer to heaven, Montallegro was the perfect place to sit and give thanks to the Virgin Mary for their survival for they knew just how precarious their journey had been.  

The View from Il Pellegrino

But I’m not a sailor or a merchant or even a farmer, I’m not even a believer but there is something truly spiritual about being in Montallegro that brings me peace. I cannot think of a better way to spend an afternoon than sitting out under the trees at the Il Pellegrino hotel/restaurant, looking out over the sea, thinking about things and enjoying that feeling of renewal that I get when I’m there. It’s no wonder the Italians don’t talk about this place. They want to keep it all to themselves, and I don’t blame them.