Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Saints & Superstitions
To call Naples 'magical' verges on the literal. This is Europe's esoteric metropolis par ex-
cellence; a Mediterranean New Orleans with less voodoo and more Catholic guilt. Here,
miracles pack out cathedrals, dreams channel lottery numbers, and horn-shaped charms
ward off the dreaded
mal'occhio
(evil eye). Myths and legends litter the streets, from tales
of human sacrifice in the Cappella Sansevero to that of a prophetic egg below the Castel
dell'Ovo.
LOTTERY DREAMS
In every visible aspect the Neapolitan lottery is the same as every other lottery - tickets are bought,
numbers marked and the winning numbers pulled out of a closely guarded hat. It differs, however, in the
way that Neapolitans select their numbers. They dream them, or rather they interpret their dreams with
the aid of
La Smorfia
, a kind of dream dictionary.
According to the good book, if you dream of God or Italy and you should pick number one; for a
football player choose number 43 (Maradona, a football-playing god - or
nu dio 'e giocatore
in local
parlance - is 43). Other symbols include dancing (37), crying (21), fear (90) and a woman's hair (55).
Some leave the interpreting to the lotto-shop expert by whispering their dreams into the shop owner's
ears (no-one wants to share a winning combination) and letting them choose the numbers. According to
the locals, the city's luckiest
ricevitoria
(lotto shop) is the one at Porta Capuana. Run by the same fam-
ily for more than 200 years, the current owner's grandmother was considered a dream-theme expert. To
this day, people bring their dreams here from as far afield as the US, Spain and Switzerland.
While
La Smorfia's
origins are obscure, links are often made to the number-word mysticism of the
Jewish Kabbalah. The term itself most likely derives from Morpheus, the Greek god of dreams, suggest-
ing that the tradition itself is linked to Naples' ancient Greek origins and to the Hellenic tradition of
oneirocriticism (dream interpretation).
Friends in High Places
Headlining the city's supernatural scene are the saints. Veritable celebrities, fireworks ex-
plode in their honour, fans flock to kiss their marble feet and newborn
bambini
(children)
take on their names. That Gennaro is the most common boy's name in Naples is no coin-
