The Sphinxes Shall Keep Their Watch

After nearly a decade of legal battles, protests, and uncertainty, the fight to save the Elizabeth Street Garden appears finally to be coming to an end. The beloved sculpture garden in downtown Manhattan had long faced demolition, with the city seeking to raze it for affordable housing. Now, according to several sources, the city is expected to step back from those plans, bringing an extraordinary reprieve to a place whose survival had seemed increasingly uncertain.

I am especially pleased by the news because this little refuge has long been a favorite haunt of mine. Tucked away from the commotion of the surrounding streets, it is one of those increasingly rare corners of Manhattan where the city seems to recede. I often stop there with a cup of coffee, finding a shady place among the greenery and old stone where I can gather my thoughts and enjoy a little peace in its tranquil environs.

Much of the garden’s peculiar charm comes from the architectural fragments, statues, columns, urns, and weathered monuments scattered throughout the grounds. The place possesses something of the atmosphere of an old European garth, where nature and antiquity intertwine.

Of all its silent inhabitants, I am especially fond of the twin stone sphinxes. Reclining enigmatically among the foliage, they often invade my thoughts as I sit nearby. There is something wonderfully incongruous about encountering those ancient forms in Nolita, silent guardians of mysteries transplanted into a small garden between tenements.

The preservation of the Elizabeth Street Garden is about more than saving a patch of greenery. The city is crowded and dirty, and it needs more green spaces, not fewer. It also needs places that serve no immediately measurable purpose beyond beauty, contemplation, memory, and repose. The garden is one of those rare places. God willing, I will continue to sit there with my coffee, gathering my thoughts beneath the trees while the two sphinxes keep their inscrutable watch.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, August 12th, Feast of Santa Chiara d’Assisi

Ghost of Princesses in Towers

It is curious how the mind works. Whenever I walk through Central Park and catch sight of the stark glass-and-steel skyscrapers rising above the trees, my thoughts wander elsewhere. For a fleeting moment, they cease to be office buildings. They become lonely towers standing over a forgotten kingdom, their highest windows concealing princesses imprisoned by dark sorcerers and guarded by fire-breathing dragons, awaiting the arrival of some knight-errant.

As a boy, I often dreamt of riding beneath storm-filled skies with a sword at my side, like Sigurd of old, seeking ancient Hindarfjall, where noble Brynhild, bound by dark enchantments, lay asleep behind a wall of shields and a ring of fire. I knew, with the unwavering certainty of childhood, that somewhere there were dragons to be slain, curses to be broken, and black keeps where fair maidens awaited deliverance. The world seemed vast enough to contain such wonders.

That world has changed, or perhaps only our imagination has grown dim. We live in an age that deconstructs and subverts tales of valiant knights and damsels in distress, reducing them to outdated, childish fancies unworthy of serious men. I cannot help but pity such disenchantment. A society that no longer dreams of heroes is, I think, poorer for it. Though such longings have become unfashionable, I cannot abandon them.

Thankfully, the dreaming boy remains. Whenever those towers rise above the trees, some forgotten part of me still believes that behind one high window a candle burns, a princess waits, and a knight, though long delayed, is still riding through the darkness.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, August 12th, Feast of Santa Chiara d’Assisi

“Voci, suoni e canti di briganti in terra di lavoro" in scena a Chiauci (IS)

Twelfth Sunday After Pentecost at Our Lady of Sorrows Church in Jersey City, New Jersey

Giacinto de’ Sivo: In Defense of the Two Sicilies

Giacinto de' Sivo (1814-1867)

Giacinto de’ Sivo (1814–1867) was one of the most influential historians and political writers of nineteenth-century Southern Italy. Born in Maddaloni, near Caserta, he dedicated much of his life to preserving and documenting the history, traditions, and institutions of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. A committed Catholic and Bourbon loyalist, de’ Sivo emerged as one of the leading intellectual voices opposing the Italian Risorgimento, arguing that the unification of Italy came at the expense of the South’s legitimate monarchy, cultural identity, and political independence.

Educated in law but drawn to literature and history, de’ Sivo initially pursued a career in public service, eventually serving as counselor for the province of Terra di Lavoro. Following Garibaldi’s conquest of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in 1860, he refused to swear allegiance to King Vittorio Emanuele II and openly opposed the new regime. In 1861, his uncompromising defense of the Bourbon cause led to his imprisonment on two occasions. Amid mounting political persecution, he left for Rome in 1862, then under Papal rule, where he spent the remainder of his life devoted to scholarship and writing.

Before composing his major historical works, de’ Sivo continued his opposition through journalism. He contributed to the legitimist newspaper L’Iride and later founded La Tragicommedia, a satirical journal that sharply criticized the new Italian government. The publication was suppressed after only three issues, illustrating the increasingly hostile climate faced by Bourbon loyalists in the aftermath of unification.

His best-known work, the five-volume Storia delle Due Sicilie dal 1847 al 1861 (History of the Two Sicilies from 1847 to 1861), remains a foundational text of the Bourbon perspective on Italian unification. Drawing upon official documents, eyewitness accounts, correspondence, and contemporary reports, de’ Sivo presented a detailed account that countered prevailing liberal interpretations. He argued that the conquest of the kingdom was driven not solely by popular enthusiasm for national unity but also by military invasion, diplomatic pressure, internal betrayal, and foreign influence. Among those he criticized most sharply was the liberal statesman Liborio Romano, whom he regarded as instrumental in the kingdom’s demise. Few writers did more than de’ Sivo to shape the historical memory of the Bourbon Kingdom, providing later generations of legitimists and historians of Southern Italy with the intellectual framework for reassessing the fall of the Two Sicilies.

Throughout his writings, de’ Sivo emphasized the legitimacy of the Bourbon monarchy and defended the social, religious, and legal institutions that had developed over centuries in Southern Italy. He regarded the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies as a distinct civilization rooted in Catholic faith, regional traditions, and centuries of institutional continuity. In his view, it was an independent state whose political and cultural identity deserved to endure. His works consistently highlighted the contributions of the South to Italian and European civilization while criticizing the post-unification policies he believed marginalized the Mezzogiorno.

Although his views have remained the subject of academic debate, de' Sivo is widely regarded as the foremost Bourbon critic of the Risorgimento and an indispensable source for understanding the collapse of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. His writings became an important precursor to later discourse surrounding the Southern Question, regional inequality, and the long-term consequences of Italian unification. Largely dismissed by mainstream liberal historiography of the late nineteenth century, his scholarship received renewed attention after Benedetto Croce reassessed his work in 1918. While rejecting de’ Sivo’s Bourbon political conclusions, Croce nevertheless acknowledged the depth of his research and the historical value of his work.

Whether read as a passionate defender of the Bourbon cause or as a significant historian of his age, de' Sivo's writings remain an enduring testament to the profound complexity of Italian unification and the importance of preserving perspectives that challenged its dominant narrative.

~ By Antonio Isernia

An Unexpected Guest from Wallachia

A friend returned from Romania with this miniature Vlad the Impaler, and he looks surprisingly at home in a library devoted to Southern Italy. Maybe it is because of the enduring tradition that the Voivode of Wallachia may have found his final resting place in the small cloister of Santa Maria la Nova in Naples. Or perhaps he is simply one of those ghosts who reminds us that the histories of Southern Italy and Eastern Europe intertwine in ways few ever imagine.

Feast of the Assumption at the Oratory of St. Josaphat in Bayside, New York

New Music — From Naples to Madrid

New music that may be of interest to our readers.

• From Naples to Madrid, performed by Nuria Rial

Label: Coviello Classics
Release Date: July 3, 2026
Audio CD: N/A
Number of Discs: 1

Available at Amazon.com

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Photo of the Week: The Colossal Head of Augustus in the Cortile della Pigna, Vatican Museums (II)

The Colossal Head of Augustus, dating from the 1st century AD, is displayed on the east wall of the open-air Cortile della Pigna (Courtyard of the Pinecone) in the Vatican Museums (Photo by New York Scugnizzo)

Feast of the Assumption of Our Lady at Saints Cyril & Methodius Oratory in Bridgeport, Connecticut

Simple Pleasures: Tortoni and Memory

An old favorite returns: Biscuit Tortoni, served
just as I remember it, in a small paper cup

Visiting relatives the other day, I was pleasantly surprised when a Tortoni was served alongside the coffee. I had not seen one in years. Like the Napoleon I wrote about not long ago, it seems to have quietly fallen out of favor, at least in my family, making its unexpected appearance feel like the return of an old friend.

Light and frozen, Tortoni is a classic dessert made from cream, eggs, crushed amaretti cookies, flavored with almond or vanilla, traditionally finished with minced almonds and a maraschino or amarena cherry. Its story begins not in Italy, but in eighteenth-century Paris, where it was created by Giuseppe Tortoni, a Neapolitan who owned the celebrated Café Tortoni. By the mid-nineteenth century, the dessert had crossed the Atlantic and became a fixture in Italian American restaurants, including beloved New York establishments such as Gargiulo’s in Coney Island.

Seeing a Tortoni again reminded me that so many of the simple pleasures once taken for granted have quietly slipped away. Yet all it takes is one familiar dessert shared with coffee among family to bring them back, if only for an evening.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, August 8th, Feast of the Fourteen Holy Helpers

Remembering Antonio Molle Lazo, Carlist Martyr

"I will suffer the greatest torments rather than apostatize from my God."

Today we remember the martyrdom of Antonio Molle Lazo (b. 2 April 1915 — d. 10 August 1936), a young Requeté who was captured, tortured, and brutally murdered while trying to protect the nuns at the convent of the Hermanitas de la Cruz (Little Sisters of the Cross) in Peñaflor, Seville, from Republican militiamen during the Spanish Civil War. His dying words were ¡Viva Cristo Rey!

Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May his soul, and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen

Twelfth Sunday After Pentecost at St. Michael's Church in Staten Island, New York

Final Preparations Underway for the 137th Annual Feast of San Rocco di Potenza in Little Italy, New York

San Rocco di Montpellier, ora pro nobis

As the 137th Annual Feast of San Rocco di Potenza approaches, members of the San Rocco Society gathered Friday evening at the historic Shrine Church of the Most Precious Blood (113 Baxter Street) in Little Italy, New York, to begin the final preparations for this year’s celebration.

The miraculous papier-mâché statue of San Rocco was placed upon the Guariglia side altar against its vibrant scarlet backdrop. At the same time, fresh flowers were arranged before both the high altar and the saint’s image.

Mass will be celebrated at 11:30 A.M. on Sunday, August 16th, followed by a solemn procession carrying the statue and a first-class relic of San Rocco. The streets of Little Italy and Chinatown will echo with the music of Danny Vecchiano and the Giglio Band as the faithful accompany the saint.

Religious articles and raffle tickets will be available for purchase outside the church.

We look forward to celebrating with you. Evviva San Rocco!

Friday also marked the Feast of San Donato di Arezzo, and in his honor, we placed flowers before his image as we prepared to honor our beloved San Rocco. Evviva San Donato!

San Donato di Arezzo, ora pro nobis

New Music — Domenico Scarlatti: 14 Sonatas

New music that may be of interest to our readers.

• Domenico Scarlatti: 14 Sonatas, performed by Aapo Häkkinen

Label: Brilliant Classics
Release Date: July 16, 2026
Audio CD: N/A
Number of Discs: 1

Available at Amazon.com

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Feast of the Assumption at the Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Remembering Maria Teresa of Austria, Queen of the Two Sicilies

31 July, 1816 — 8 August, 1867

In memory of Maria Teresa of Austria, Queen of the Two Sicilies, we pray for the happy repose of her soul. Viva ‘a Reggina!

Eternal rest grant unto Her Majesty, O Lord and let perpetual light shine upon her. May her soul, and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

Assunta Feast at Casa Italiana Springfield Italian Social Club in Springfield, Massachusetts

Restoring Pietas in the Age of Iron

The Great Chain of Being, 1579,
copperplate engraving, from
Rhetorica Christiana, Diego Valadés

Tradidi quod et accepi.
~ I Corinthians 15:3
(I handed on what I also received.)

In the terminal stage of secular-materialist decadence, the concept of pietas, that primordial, vertical axis binding man to what is above, behind, and beyond him, appears not only forgotten but repugnant. Yet it is precisely in this wasteland that its resurgence becomes both possible and essential as an act of inner rearmament.

For the ancients, pietas was neither sentiment nor social utility. It signified a disciplined fidelity to the transcendent order, an unwavering sense of belonging to a world imbued with sacred hierarchy. It was the Romans’ submission to divine law, to the patria as a metaphysical principle, and to the bloodline not just as biology, but as spiritual continuity. To possess pietas was to live within the Great Chain of Being and to accept one’s station with dignity.

In contrast, the modern individual, uprooted and cynical, frantically asserts his “freedom” from all inherited forms. He has become formless and unbound, cut off from the divine, estranged from his ancestors, and detached from the soil. His rebellion against authority, masked as liberation, is truly a flight from responsibility, continuity, and reverence. He dismisses the sacred and bows to the profane. Thus he becomes prey, pliant before the Reign of Quantity, conscripted into the tyranny of the impersonal, only fit to serve the very nihilism he helped conjure.

Yet the figure of the sovereign man remains, one who, from within the ruins, guards the inner citadel, the unshakable fortress of the self. For him, pietas is not a social norm to be revived, but a secret flame to be protected. He maintains ancestral devotions not to revive a dead past but to affirm his participation in a timeless order. He bows not to public opinion but to the living God. In silence and discipline, he realigns his being with the Axis Mundi, Christ Himself, the true center of the world, where heaven and earth meet.

Restoring pietas is not about moralizing or social reform. It is a conversion of the heart, a return to the source, a spiritual war against the entropy of the age. It means reawakening the memory of sacred origins, reestablishing the vertical tension between man and the divine, and living one’s life as ritual, as an offering.

For those still attuned to the ancient echoes, the message is clear: cultivate fidelity, honor what exceeds you, and bear the weight of the past like a crown. This is pietas, and it is the path of return.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, August 6th, The Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord

Feast of the Assumption at Holy Trinity Oratory at Renaissance Montessori in Gainesville, Virginia

The Eyes That Still Wonder

The wild still has a way of speaking to those willing
to listen (from the author's personal archive)

My recent trips upstate have brought countless reminders that the wonder I knew as a child has never left me. Few sights still fill me with such joy as seeing deer in the wild.

That love was instilled in me by my parents, who cherished the outdoors, and especially by my father, a hunter whose respect for nature ran far deeper than the pursuit of game. From them I learned to look closely, to appreciate the beauty of the natural world, and to understand that every encounter with wild creation is a gift from God.

Whenever I see deer, a soaring hawk, an ancient forest, or a landscape that seems untouched by time, I feel a happiness that is difficult to describe. It reminds me that there is still mystery, beauty, and order in the world. For a brief moment, everything else fades away.

In an age that so often rushes past the quiet miracles of creation, I remain grateful that the sight of a deer stepping from the trees can still fill me with the same wonder I knew as a child. Some things are simply too beautiful to outgrow.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, August 5th, Feast of the Madonna della Neve

The Great Bourbon Book Shortage

Mystery solved. Now I know why it’s nearly impossible to find replacement copies of my beat-up old editions of Harold Acton’s The Bourbons of Naples and The Last Bourbons of Naples. My friend has apparently decided to hoard every copy in existence. At this point, I’m convinced he’s single-handedly responsible for the shortage.

New Book — Religion and Ideas in Southern Italy: Church, State and its People during the Early Modern Age

A forthcoming title that may be of interest to our readers. Available at Amazon.com

• Religion and Ideas in Southern Italy: Church, State and its People during the Early Modern Age by Isabel Harvey and Milena Sabato

Publisher: Routledge
Pub. Date: October 20, 2026
Hardcover: $200.00
Language: English
Pages: 348

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Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Holy Trinity Church in Hackensack, New Jersey

In Search of Leucàsia with the Ghost of the Count of Sciancato

In Search of… with the Ghost of the Count of Sciancato explores mysteries where history and legend blur and conjecture begins—along with the strange, the macabre, and the uncanny. What follows suggests possible explanations—though not the only ones.

Leucàsia: The White Siren of the Southern Sea

At the southernmost tip of Apulia, where the Ionian and Adriatic seas meet amid striking white cliffs, sailors have long spoken of a beautiful maiden whose song could sway both hearts and storms.

They called her Leucàsia.

According to legend, Leucàsia was a siren whose beauty rivaled her voice. She fell in love with a young shepherd named Melisso, but his heart belonged to another maiden, Aristula. Enraged by his rejection, Leucàsia unleashed furious winds and crashing waves upon the lovers as they embraced along the shore.

The Siren by John William Waterhouse

Choosing death over separation, they clung to one another as the storm-tossed sea engulfed them.

Moved by their tragic devotion, the goddess Minerva transformed the lovers into two rocky headlands, forever facing one another across the bay. Wracked with guilt, Leucàsia turned to stone and was said to have given her name to Leuca, now the town of Santa Maria di Leuca. Today, those headlands are known as Punta Ristola and Punta Meliso.

Some scholars see in Leucàsia another expression of the ancient siren traditions that once echoed throughout Magna Graecia. Others believe the legend arose later, shaped by the dramatic landscape itself as a poetic explanation for the lonely rocks and restless waters where two seas converge.

For generations, fishermen claimed that the wind sometimes carried a woman’s voice across the cliffs at dusk. Others insisted that pale shapes could be seen upon the rocks before storms rolled in from the horizon.

Whether born of imagination, echoing waves, or shifting light upon white limestone, the legend became part of the landscape itself.

Was Leucàsia merely a local legend woven around the rugged coast of Southern Italy?

Or did the ancient Greeks preserve, through myth, the memory of a place where the sea itself seems to sing?

……………………………………

Sebastiano III, Conte di Sciancato, a minor prince of forgotten Lucania, was said to have loved his young bride, Donna Lucrezia di Nerafiora, beyond reason. Unable to accept her death, he turned to forbidden books and desperate learning, seeking to restore her to the world of the living. The attempt cost him his life. The ruins of his torre lie hidden, and when the earth trembles, some whisper he still searches for her.