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THE MYSTERIES |
  
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| In the chief town of the region we can see the procession of the "Mysteries", special machines created, away back in 1748 to celebrate the feast of Corpus Christi, by Paolo Saverio Di Zinno, an artist of the Neapolitan school.
The streets of the town are busy with thousands of people who come from all over the region and, today, even from all over Italy. The Fair of the Mysteries is steeped in popular spirituality and is capable of recalling the fourteenth-century mystery plays from which it probably originated. The Mysteries are living pictures enacted by men, women and children, in an allegorical representation of the major feasts of the Church and of episodes from the Bible. The structures are made of a very flexible steel alloy, resting on bases of wood. The thirteen Mysteries are carried in procession on the shoulders of the bearers, accompanied by the rhythm of the music played by the band. Anyone seeing them for the first time is really amazed, for it is a fascinating, fantastic sight. The Mysteries represent St.Isidore, Mary Magdalen, St.Anthony Abbot, the Immaculate Conception, St.Leonard, St.Roch, St.Michael, St.Nicholas, St.Crispin, St.Gennaro, Abraham, the Assumption and - the most recently reconstructed according to the original design - the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The people of Campobasso are proud of the Fair of the Mysteries, which is the most famous sacred representation in the entire region.
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