Origins: C is for Corsica

Corsica, the fourth largest island in the Mediterranean, is located Southeast of France and is one of its
26 regions, although it is considered a territorial collective, with slightly more autonomy than a
regular region. Corsica’s population of around 275,000 lives mainly in the two major cities of
Ajaccio and Bastia. Because of the geography of Corsica, which is very mountainous, its many
villages are often isolated from each other, and are mostly set back about 15 kms from the sea
(Corsica has a coastline of 1,000 kms) or in the interior. They are built from granite, with houses
close together. There are around 365 villages, many with less than 100 people.

French is the official language in Corsica, although a large number of Corsicans speak the indigenous
language - Corsu, an Indo-European language of Romance or Latin origin. The French still have not
ratified the European Minority Language Charter. The Corsican language and its many dialects is
used in a local improvisational form of poetry, Chjame à Rispondi (Call and Response), a form
usually used by men which is jealously guarded, even by those who don’t generally speak Corsu.
Music is also central to Corsican culture, with the traditional form of polyphonic singing dating back
to the 16th century. Polyphony is sung by, usually, groups of three men, with a fourth “angelic” voice
coming out of the harmonies.

Corsica is home to around 80 menhirs (standing stones) and stands out from other Mediterranean
countries with megalithic sites, in that the Goddess is invisible in its megalithic past, despite the fact
that Corsica still practices remnants of its megalithic culture. Of the 80 menhirs, only one or two
show possible signs of a Goddess, and it is believed that the menhirs largely represent dead heroes,
warriors and chieftains. The remnants of the megalithic past survive mainly in the Corsican cult of
the dead and the extraordinarily important place death plays in Corsican culture, particularly in the
villages, and despite attempts by the Catholic church to Christianise the island. The surviving
dolmens show that they were designed for collective burial; the voceru are special songs sung in
honour of the dead; the caracolu, the ritual dance where mourners dance around the corpse, is still
practised.

There are many ways in which Corsicans recognise imminent death, such as the beating of an
invisible drum which can never be located; the procession of mubba (phantom pigs) passing the
house at night; the appearance of the malaceddu (white owl) tapping on the window; or the most
dread of all symbols of death, the appearance of the Squadra d'Arozza, the phantom funeral
procession.

“Bearing a coffin and lighted tapers they proceed along the road and into the village with the sound
of a tramping army, or with a drum beating a funeral march. When they reach the house of which one
of the occupants is to die they call him by his name, but he is the only person not to hear them. Any
contact with them is dangerous. Some believe that even to meet the Squadra is to risk death. Having
summoned its victim the Squadra then goes to the village church, where it can be heard chanting the
Mass for the Dead, perhaps that rending Corsican Mass sung in polyphony, the paghjella, a music
said by some scholars to derive from the megalithic age, and which does indeed seem to be torn from
the roots of time. The procession can afterwards be seen carrying the coffin to the cemetery. A
somewhat similar premonitory procession is known as the mumma. The coffin contains the spirit of
one who will shortly die. He may be saved if a living person has the courage to stop the procession,
break open the coffin, and tear some shreds from the shroud of the phantom corpse. But this must be
done before the procession crosses a stream.” 1

Corsicans believe that life is programmed from birth, so even the form of imposed Christianity they
practice is fatalistic. Free will has little place in their belief system. So it is with the first of the occult
practitioners of Corsica, the Mazzeri (dream hunters), whose dreams predict illness and death.

It is believed that the activities of the Mazzeri stem from the hunter-gatherer society of pre-Neolithic
times, before 6000 BC. The Mazzeri go out at night in their dreams and kill an animal. The face they
see on the dead animal, usually someone from their village, will be the person who dies, within the
space of three days to a year. If the animal is only wounded, the person will face accident or illness.
To become a Mazzere, the person must have a psychic gift that opens them to the other world. Once
recognised, their initiation takes place in dreams, and the initiation is given by a practicing Mazzeri,
often someone from the same family, who will call the initiate to take part in a dream hunt. This
generally takes place in adolescence.
Only animals and birds are killed in the dream hunt, and the weapons may vary: guns, spears, axes,
knives, stones and sticks. The preferred weapon is a cudgel known as a mazza, cut from the root and
stem of a vine. The Mazzeri hunt in familiar landscapes, often near water such as a stream or pond.
Water in traditional Corsica was most often regarded as evil.

“The Corsicans, including the Mazzeri - or - colpadori [in the south] have their own explanation. The
Mazzeri do not go out at night in their physical bodies, but in their soul or spirit; the word spirit is
more appropriate because free from Christian religious connotations. The spirit of the mazzere, when
hunting, meets the spirit of his victim, a human being who has assumed animal form. When he kills
the animal he severs spirit from body; the body lingers on for some time afterwards, but this life is
only a reprieve and inevitably the body will sicken and die. The killing by the mazzere is therefore a
symbolic act perpetrated in the realm of dreams, or what the Corsicans define as "the other" or
"parallel" world, to which mazzeri have privileged access.” 2

Today there are an estimated 30 Mazzeri in Corsica.

While the Mazzeri are considered to be shrouded in the shadow world, the Signadori represent the
opposite. They are the light bearers of the Corsican occult world. Many Signadori can cure illnesses
and have knowledge of the traditional medicinal plants, but the Signadori alone can avert the Evil
Eye. In Corsica, the Eye (l'occhiu) causes a variety of maladies, while sapping the energy that would
allow the person to resist it. L'occhiu causes an intense state of physical and mental depression; it
attacks people who are weak such as children, and may also affect domestic animals.

Envy (invidia), a traditional Corsican sin, can destroy social harmony, and be the downfall of a
person or family, preventing success. The Corsican attitude to success is ambiguous; conspicuous
wealth is resented. (The Corsicans were thus predisposed to welcome the Franciscan cult of poverty
that penetrated the island.) Invidia may destroy the individual and their target, and everything they’ve
gained.

The Signadori intervene against l’occhiu and invidia by invoking mystical forces. “Their
intervention, though differing in detail from one person and one locality to another, conforms to an
established rite practised all over the island. The Signadore, who is likely to be a woman, pours cold
water into a white soup plate and makes the sign of the cross above it three times with her right hand.
She then lets fall into the water, again making the sign of the cross, three drops of hot olive oil from
the little finger of her left hand. The oil was traditionally taken from the glass or metal lamp that
stood on the mantlepiece; today it is scooped from any receptacle of heated oil.” 3

The Signadori appears to be entering a trance, but is in fact reciting one of the many prayers which
must be learned at or near midnight on Christmas Eve, the sacred time when evil is inoperative. (The
Signadori are devout Catholics who escaped persecution by the Inquisition.) The prayers are taught
by grandparents to grandchildren and are thought to be inspired by the spirits of their ancestors. The
Signadori may take on the illness or problems of the person for whom she is working, but this will
dissipate once the hot oil has dispersed in the water.

“The Signadori do much to appease conflicts on the island, unobtrusively, using their own chosen
methods. They take no part in local quarrels, even when they well know what is going on in their
communities. Their action is not directed against individuals, but against l’occhiu, l’invidia that is
working through them. Their aim is to restore a harmony, psychic or physical, broken by the forces
of destruction, by invoking those of Christianity.” 4

It is believed that the incantations, chants and prayers used by the Signadori, originated in medieval
Christianity, although it has been impossible to give them a date. A prayer to staunch blood is cast in
a sequence of declarations which pay tribute to the Virgin Mary and to the magical quality of the
number three:

Madre Maria per mare venia

Mother Mary came by sea

The practices of the Mazzeri and the Signadori are antithetical. The Mazzeri are concerned with
death; the Signadori with healing and life. The Mazzeri work by night in their dreams, in a parallel
world; the Signadori work at home in the open, during the day. It’s believed they once collaborated
to control weather, averting the rains that are so dreaded in the mountains. Both practice some
aspects of the old Shamanic practices of Europe, but a complete practice no longer survives in
Corsica.

Perhaps, because of the coming of Christianity, the persecution of many occult practitioners, the
imposition of the cults of the Virgin Mary and the Saints, both the Mazzeri and Signadori have lost
elements of their old shamanic practice.

Notes:

1. “The Corsicans and the Dead”, www.terracorsa.info

Further Reading:

Campo Santa by W.G. Sebold (Hamish Hamilton, 2005)

The Dream Hunters of Corsica by Dorothy Carrington (Trafalgar Square Publishing, 1996)
Carrington’s synthesis of the occult traditions of Corsica, based on decades of studying and living on
the island.

Music:

The Music of Corsica by Petro Guelfucci, Voce di Corsica and others - Published by ARC Music
productions, 2003
Pulifunie by I Muvrini - Published by Bel BIEM (date not given)
Corse: Musiques Sacrees, Settimana Santa in Bunifazziu - Published by Ocora/Radio France, field
recordings, March 1989.