In Search of the Ghost of Joachim Murat in Pizzo Calabro with the Ghost of the Count of Sciancato

As Halloween approaches, In Search of… with the Ghost of the Count of Sciancato ventures into the strange, the macabre, and the uncanny, exploring mysteries where history and legend blur and conjecture begins. What follows suggests possible explanations, though not the only ones.

The Ghost of Joachim Murat: The Restless Usurper in Pizzo Calabro

Along La Costa degli Dei, where the sea breaks against the cliffs of Pizzo and the old Aragonese castle overlooks the water, the ghost of a fallen usurper is said to linger. His name was Joachim Murat, a French cavalry officer, marshal of Napoleon, and puppet king of Naples.

In October 1815, Murat landed at Pizzo with a small band of followers, hoping to reclaim the kingdom he had lost. Napoleon's empire had collapsed, and Ferdinand IV of Bourbon had recovered his throne. Yet Murat, unwilling to accept his defeat, imagined that the people of Southern Italy would rise to welcome his return. Instead, he was met with hostility, seized, and imprisoned in the fortress.

The Execution of Joachim Murat
by Edoardo Matania (1847–1929)

Tried by a military commission, Murat was condemned to death and executed by firing squad on October 13, 1815. His body was buried in an unmarked grave beneath the Church of San Giorgio, where his remains are believed to rest.

But death, it seems, did not entirely silence the former king. According to local legend, Murat’s restless spirit, chained and cloaked in royal finery, still wanders the castle, unable to find peace. Some claim to have glimpsed his apparition within the old stronghold, condemned to haunt the place where his ambitions ended.

For years, it was said that violent storms around the anniversary of his downfall, known as 'A tempesta i Giacchinu (Joachim’s Tempest), were attributed by some to Murat’s restless spirit crying out for vengeance.

Perhaps the ghost of Pizzo is nothing more than a storm or a trick of the mind. Yet when thunder rolls across the sea, it may be the lingering vanity of a defeated usurper, condemned to wander the shores of a kingdom that was never rightfully his.

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Sebastiano III, Conte di Sciancato, a minor prince of forgotten Lucania, was said to have loved his wife more than his soul. When his beloved bride, Donna Lucrezia di Nerafiora, died in a tragic accident, he could not accept the will of fate. In his grief, he turned to ancient books and desperate learning, searching for a way 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.