Harvest Festival (Comme 'na vota)

A rural ritual that stands the test of time

The Harvest Festival, known in Roccasecca by its local dialect name «Comme 'na vota» (Like in the old days), is one of the most authentic testimonies of the rural culture of Ciociaria. This is not a performance staged for tourists, but a faithful repetition of real agricultural work: harvesting wheat by hand with a sickle, exactly as it was done before the arrival of combine harvesters. The field is located in the Tore area, along Via del Miglio, within the municipality of Roccasecca, in the province of Frosinone, in southern Lazio.

The harvest day

It starts early, when the sun is still low and the stalks retain some of the night's freshness. Around eight in the morning, the reapers enter the field and move in a line, bent over their sickles, cutting the wheat in handfuls. As the work progresses, the stalks are gathered and tied into bundles: in the local dialect, these are called «regne». By the end of the morning, all the regne are stacked into one large sheaf, which will wait there for the next phase of the cycle.

At midday, around one o'clock, work stops. Everyone sits together around a long table set outdoors: lunch is prepared by local women using homemade products, following the recipes and rhythms of the past. It is the most convivial moment of the festival, where the stories told by the elders become the true highlight.

Music, dance, and memory

The afternoon drifts into folk music. Performances by Maestro Gianni De Angelis accompany the traditional songs and dances that, in rural society, always marked the end of great harvest days. There is no stage, no ticket office: music is played right in the middle of the field, and passersby stop to listen.

What follows: threshing with vintage machinery

The harvest is only the first chapter. The sheaf left in the field awaits threshing, which takes place in the following weeks, in July, using vintage agricultural machines brought back to life for the occasion. Seeing a historic thresher in operation, with its belt and unmistakable sound, is an experience that can still be enjoyed live in Roccasecca.

The man behind the festival

This event exists thanks to the tenacity of Antonio Pulcini, an octogenarian guardian of traditional agricultural labor, who brings the initiative back every year with great enthusiasm. His stated goal is to involve the younger generations: letting kids try the sickle, explaining why wheat was tied in a certain way, and showing that behind a loaf of bread, there was an entire community at work.

Why it is worth visiting

• A non-touristy re-enactment, performed by those who truly knew that work
• A rural lunch with traditional homemade products
• Folk music and dances from the Ciociaria tradition
• The chance to witness threshing with historic machinery
• A beautiful rural setting at the foot of the Cairo Mountains, in the birthplace of Saint Thomas Aquinas

Roccasecca and the Ciociaria region

Roccasecca is a municipality in the province of Frosinone that combines a perched medieval village, the ruins of the Counts of Aquino castle, and a countryside still cultivated with wheat and olive trees. The festival is part of a vibrant calendar of popular traditions, which also includes «Le serenate comme 'na vota» in August, in the Caprile district. Those visiting southern Lazio in summer will find here one of the most direct ways to understand what it really meant to live off the land in this part of Italy.