It’s not every weekend that you’re awakened by the sounds of a parade passing along a nearby street. But that’s exactly what happened to us these past two weekends. On Saturday, September 24th, was the Carro Matto parade and on Sunday, October 2nd, was the parade of the Bersaglieri.
The Carro Matto, or Crazy Cart, is an annual procession from Rufina to Florence. A huge cart is loaded up with the classic bottles and tied down with a complicated complex of straw ropes. The impossibly tall cart of Chianti is rolled into the Piazza della Signoria in celebration of the Chianti Rufina – a tradition of bringing the season’s first wine to Florence’s cathedral for blessing. Presenting the wine to the Signoria goes back centuries. The cart carries about 1500 wine bottles. Bands lead the parade, traffic is stopped, and bottles are sold in the piazza. The star attraction is the carro matto. The wine was transported from the countryside to taverns and wine cellars in this way, back when a pair of oxen and a cart were used. Straw was used so that the bottles would not break during their journey. That’s why your Chianti bottles have straw baskets around them. At the end of the parade everyone poses for photos alongside the carro matto.
The Bersaglieri, or marksmen, was another interesting parade. The star attraction were 4 military units each playing various brass instruments (trumpets, tubas, trombones, etc.), marching quickly through the streets, dressed in camouflage and wearing black hats decorated with long black feathers. Italian flags were hanging alongside the streets and a huge flag was carried behind the procession. So, who are these Bersaglieri? Let’s see what Wikipedia has to say.
“The Bersaglieri are a corps of the Italian Army originally created by General Alessandro La Marmora on 18 June 1836, later to become the Royal Italian Army. They have always been a high-mobility light infantry unit, and can still be recognized by the distinctive wide brimmed hat that they wear (only in dress uniform in modern times), decorated with black capercaillie feathers. Another distinctive trait of the Bersaglieri is the fast jog pace they keep on parades, instead of marching.”
We ran out of the apartment to catch up to the parade as it made its way past the Duomo and into Piazza della Signoria, leaving our camera behind (thankfully I can pull photos from the Internet). Locals cheered and applauded as the Bersaglieri passed. In the piazza speeches were given, awards handed out, and the Bersaglieri played their traditional tunes. It all ended with the Bersaglieri playing the Italian National Anthem as green, white, and red smoke flares created streams of the national colors over the piazza.
“The Bersaglieri are a corps of the Italian Army originally created by General Alessandro La Marmora on 18 June 1836, later to become the Royal Italian Army. They have always been a high-mobility light infantry unit, and can still be recognized by the distinctive wide brimmed hat that they wear (only in dress uniform in modern times), decorated with black capercaillie feathers. Another distinctive trait of the Bersaglieri is the fast jog pace they keep on parades, instead of marching.”
We ran out of the apartment to catch up to the parade as it made its way past the Duomo and into Piazza della Signoria, leaving our camera behind (thankfully I can pull photos from the Internet). Locals cheered and applauded as the Bersaglieri passed. In the piazza speeches were given, awards handed out, and the Bersaglieri played their traditional tunes. It all ended with the Bersaglieri playing the Italian National Anthem as green, white, and red smoke flares created streams of the national colors over the piazza.