The article ‘Long-lost carnival bread recipe rediscovered and revived’ (March 4) described an 18th-century theatre performance called Il-Qarċilla: “The oldest surviving script was written by a priest and it is surprisingly extremely heavy on vulgarity and sexual innuendos, such as reference to a bride who loves to eat sausage. Fr Demarco’s Qarċilla even includes outright explicit words referring to male and female genitalia.”
It then asserted: “Modern academics are not sure how 18th-century Malta – with its strict, repressed culture and heavy-handed Church – allowed for that material to be written (by priests, of all people) and performed in front of families with children on the streets. But some believe the reason was exactly that – an outpouring of repression.”
A performance of ‘Il-Qarċilla’ in Valletta. Photo: Dorian BugejaThe article failed to identify these “modern academics” who claim that 18th-century Malta was characterised by a “strict, repressed culture and heavy-handed Church”.
In fact, a respected (modern) academic actually claims the opposite. This is the abstract of Frans Ciappara’s chapter ‘Perceptions of marriage in late-eighteenth-century Malta’ (published by Cambridge University Press in Continuity and Change, 2001):“Although the Catholic Church claimed to control marriage, in late eighteenth-century Malta, the faithful still considered matrimony to be a personal affair… Episcopal court records and parish registers… reveal substantial numbers of clandestine marriages, contravening the Council of Trent’s directives concerning entry into marriage. Couples separated from each other at will, without the Church’s consent. A few took other partners, despite the inquisitors’ nets. Couples viewed sexual relations as matters for themselves to regulate and sex outside marriage as not something into which the Church was to intrude. Especially noteworthy in this respect were relations between betrothed, since a man would not marry a woman who could not bear children.”
Ciappara’s study flatly contradicts the assertion proposed by these “modern academics”. Not only was the saucy script not “an outpouring of repression”, as they claim, but it would actually seem to have been in harmony with the times.
From Ciappara, one can easily glean the common Maltese attitude towards marriage: “People in eighteenth-century Malta ignored their priests’ counsel in marriage affairs… a high proportion of the Maltese never married at all” (p. 383). This observation could explain the real motivation behind the Qarċilla text.
But there are other observations in Ciappara’s essay that explain the times in which the Qarċilla piece was written: “No matter how much the clergy might try to control marriage, people looked upon matrimony as their own personal affair” (p. 382) and “promiscuity must have been rampant, at least in some parishes” (p. 389).
As to the heavy-handedness of the Church: “Couples who after their marriage were found to be related were made to kneel down during high mass in front of the main door, or in the presbytery of the parochial church, holding a lighted candle in their hand” (p. 391).
The “modern academics” claim that in 18th-century Malta, sexual culture was “strict” and “repressed”. The professional academic (Ciappara) claims that “the custom of examining the bed sheets after the first night of marriage to test if the bride is a virgin, so characteristic of Mediterranean mentality, did not exist in Malta” and that “in the common view, sexuality was for the people to decide” (p. 393).
One wonders what primary sources were consulted by these “modern academics” or whether they are aware of Ciappara’s important work based on primary sources.
Mark Sammut Sassi – Valletta