Every year, in February, a costumed wedding procession crosses Rocca Grimalda, in Alto Monferrato, amidst whip cracking, multicoloured ribbons, and sparkling music-we are talking about the LACHERA of Rocca Grimalda, one of the most authentic and evocative Carnivals in Piedmont.
At its origin, tradition questions the Jus primae noctis imposed in antiquity by a cruel castellan.
History and legend, myth and ritual, symbolic forms and social functions are intertwined in this as in many other Italian Carnivals: but the significance that even today the people of Rocca attribute to the "dance against the tyrant" handed down by the elders makes us understand how a folkloric fact can keep intact, on the threshold of the year two thousand, its value as a foundation myth of a country's collective identity.
