The tradition of the ‘Vennari Santu’ in Taverna (CZ) originated in the late 18th century.

Following the 1783 earthquake, which devastated the whole of Calabria, the statue of the Holy Crucifix, attributed to the school of Fra Umile da Petralia and kept in the destroyed church of the Convent of the Observant Friars, was transferred to the church of Santa Barbara. It was then that the confreres of the Arciconfraternita SS. Sacramento – SS. Salvatore, enchanted by the beauty of this statue, decided to venerate it and solemnly celebrate it every three years: thus the Good Friday procession was born.

It all began with the Pia Pratica dei Venerdi di Quaresima: inside Santa Barbara, solemn liturgies and ancient chants known as ‘Lamentations’, commemorate the Passion and Death of Christ. In the streets, the mournful sounds of the ‘grancascie’, huge drums made of wooden hoops and goatskins, announce the beginning of the Tradition.

On Good Friday at two o’clock in the afternoon, young actors stage the arrest of Jesus in the Garden of Olives: it is the so-called ‘Pigghiata’, followed by the Celebratio Passionis Domini. At the end of the rite, the procession winds its way through the streets of Taverna: an actor Christ carries the cross followed by the Turba Romana, angels bearing the symbols of the Passion and statues representing the five Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary: Christ in the Garden, Christ at the Pillar, Ecce Homo; Crucified, Our Lady of Sorrows with the dead Jesus on her lap.