Workers in the Sulfur mine

Workers in the Sulfur mines.
Photo by Fulvio Roiter (1953). Based on his book 'Visibilia', two miners at work in a sulfur mine in Caltanissetta. Forced to work naked due to the sweltering heat and because the vasstiti clung to the skin. The poet Alessio di Giovanni dedicated these verses to the 'carusi', the children who transported the sulfur out of the mine and began to work at the age of seven or eight: '... Scìnninu, nudi,' mmezzu li lurdduma / di li scalazzi ' nfunnu allavancati; / and, ccomu a li pirreri s'accustuma, / vannu priannu: Gesùzzu, flat! ... / But ddoppu, essennu sutta lu smaceddu, / grìdanu, vastimiannu a la canina, / ca macari 'ddu Cristu' announces it ... '

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