Societas Mortis

Overview

Men dressed in black confraternal clothes come out of a church, carrying with difficulty a large cross of iron and wood and walk without accompanists, without a band and without a procession. It happens in Monterosso al Mare, a tourist resort of the Cinque Terre (Liguria, Italy), where every year the rite of the Societas Mortis is staged, a pilgrimage that reaches the monastery of Soviore from the streets of the village at 800 meters above sea level. A ritual that, between contradictions and reinterpretations, continues to survive.