CALASCIO, Italy — The streets are silent and
cats hunt in abandoned houses, but the view from the battlements of Calascio’s
castle is spectacular — good enough perhaps to save this dying Italian
hamlet.
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Local officials have put restoring the ruins and
attracting tourists at the heart of their bid to revive the village, which has
won 20 million euros ($22 million) in
EU post-pandemic funds.
Surrounded by Abruzzo’s snowcapped peaks, Calascio
is one of 21 dying or deserted villages awarded an equal share of a
420-million-euro pot by the Italian government.
Critics question how equipped the tiny councils are
to spend such vast sums of money — which translates to almost 154,000 euros per
person in Calascio.
The nationwide project has soured relations in
several regions between winning villages and those that have lost out, and
prompted warnings over potential fraud and waste but Calascio’s mayor Paolo
Baldi, a former mountain guide originally from
Rome, is undaunted.
“We want to bring the hamlet back to life,” said
Baldi, who did up one of its ruined houses in 1993 and moved in with his young
family.
Once a bustling and wealthy wool center, Calascio
shrunk from over 2,000 residents at the start of the 1900s to just 130 now,
almost all of them elderly. In the winter months, only 70 or so people remain.
Just three children have been born here in 12 years.
It has no grocery shops, schools, or surgeons.
What the hamlet does have is Rocca Calascio, an
ancient castle which draws 100,000 tourists a year. Baldi plans to spend a big
chunk of the funds — just over 4.6 million euros — on restoring part of the
ruins, which were damaged in a deadly earthquake in 2009.
It is hoped
archaeological digs will determine when
the castle — originally a watchtower — was built, and reveal more about a
neighboring church and graveyard, where bones come to the surface after storms.
Some funds will also go to creating jobs and
attracting more tourists, with just under 7.5 million euros earmarked for a
“scattered” hotel in the village’s empty houses and nearly one million euros
for a museum.
Locals say they hope young families will move to the
area and perhaps open their own businesses.
“Do you know what the biggest event was in Calascio
this year? It was the birth of a baby,” tobacconist Walter Zara told AFP.
Italy is the biggest beneficiary of the EU’s
800-billion-euro plan to boost the bloc after the pandemic, allocated almost
200 billion euros in grants and loans.
The funds for Calascio are part of a program to
increase tourism in undervalued areas, notably in the poorer south, and ease
pressure on hotspots like Venice.
Villages across
Italy competed, with winners
including Pietrabbondante in Molise, which boasts a sixth-century amphitheater.
“Italy’s real
wealth today lies precisely in these small centers,” Mayor Baldi says, adding
that countless hilltop hamlets across the country are in a state of serious
decline but could be “a driving force for the economy”.
Here, that driving force includes a sheep farming
school. The plan is to teach youngsters the ancient art of pastoralism, where
shepherds and their flocks spend the warmer months on the move.
Funds will also go to increasing cheese production.
The region’s pride is Marcetto, a traditional sheep’s cheese made using live
maggots, which soften it with their digestive acids.
It was a staple for herders who used to gather with
their flocks outside the 16th-century
Santa Maria della Pieta church, perched
just along the ridge from the castle.
Bleating livestock permitting, mass at the so-called
“Shepherds’ Church” was followed through a little side window.
Fermented cheese and religion may not be enough.
Domenico Ciccone, 78, who began shepherding at just 10 years old, said he was
not convinced it was a job that would attract many youngsters.
Ciccone’s son and wife pitch in with the milking,
but without a new generation of pastoralists to help over the coming summer, he
has been forced to sell much of his flock.
“It’s a tough job, you’ve got to like it. There’s no
taking time off for a party, or a Sunday, (or) if it’s stormy”.
He also questions whether training new shepherds will help
reverse the population decline, quipping that “a 20-year-old who looks after
sheep all day long isn’t going to have any luck with women!”
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