ANCIENT HANDCRAFTS

 

 

 

 

Some old fashioned handicrafts still belong to a great historical cultural, social heritage of “Ciociaria”.

Bell melters job has nearly disappeared but it is anyway interesting. Since five centuries Veroli was home of very famous artists of this handicraft.

Famous are also the handicrafts man of simple musical instruments like fifes and pipes, which belong to the shepherds of the land surround Villa Latina and Acquafondata. Today they are considered typical Christmas musical instruments.

 
 

Nowadays it is almost impossible to find a “sharpener” that sharpens the blade of knives and scissors. If once a cobbler made shoes for the whole family with his hands nowadays you go to him just to repair the shoes. Old objects, hand-made, distinguished for their uniqueness. Wood is the raw material to made several utensils, especially agricultural implements and other objects used nowadays: cookwares, spoons, food can, as the typical ”scifette”, trays made of wood generally used for dishes such as fettuccine, gnocchi and polenta.

 

A kind of metal used to make traditional objects is copper, hot-worked with different shapes and utilities. The copper object that represents Ciociaria is the “Concone”, a bin used once by women to pick up water. Another kind of crafts is the wonderful embroidery made by women from Ciociaria.

 

Also the manufacturing of leather was important, especially for the “ciocie”, another icon of the tradition of Ciociaria. “Ciocie” are a kind of rudimental shoes used by farmers, made of a leather plantar lashed from the ankle to the calf with thin strings. They represent the most famous souvenir of Ciociaria.