The Riviera of Angels - San Sòstene

As imposing as a castle, the mother church

At the highest point of the town a widening at the edge of the transit road introduces the view of the Mother Church of Santa Maria del Monte, documented in the 16th century but rebuilt after the catastrophic earthquake of 1783. An imposing construction, one can hardly believe that it occupies the site of a Norman castle. It is an unusual staircase of fifty steps, in fact, that covers the considerable difference in height between the churchyard and the entrance portal carved in granite. Inside are the high altar in polychrome marble, frescoes and 18th-century canvases. Especially notable is the Chapel of the Souls in Purgatory, where a canvas depicting Christ on the Cross with praying women can be admired.

From silk town to wind town

San Sòstene is a town that in its long history has experienced activities related directly or indirectly to agriculture and so-called silvo-pastoral activities. Evidence of this can still be found in the rural landscape, which shifts from the wheat, vineyard and olive grove belt to the forest and pastures that provided timber, chestnuts, cheese and meat. Rare, however, are the remaining evidences of mulberry cultivation, the first step in the silk industry, a historical prerogative of San Sòstene. The decline of the traditional economy, however, has been reversed in recent years thanks to the municipality's early commitment to the field in sustainable energy. "San Sòstene City of Wind" reads on signs at the entrance to the town, on account of one of the first wind farms in the region, more than forty turbines installed at altitudes between 900 and 1,200 meters on the first ridges of the hinterland.

A patron saint from afar

Saint Sòsthenes, who was he? To know anything about him one has to go back in time to the persecution of Diocletian, at the start of the fourth century AD. Sòsthenes was a Roman military serving in the garrison of Chalcedon, a city in Bithynia, an ancient region of Asia Minor. His refusal to comply with an order to execute the Christian Euphemia, and the confession of faith in Christ that followed, led to his martyrdom. In the Calabrian town that is honored with his name and patronage, he is celebrated on the first Sunday of September as is customary in the South: solemnities, illuminations, shows and street specialties.