Imagine an alluring fragrance and thousands of yellow spots on green and blue backgrounds, a light breeze from the sea playing the leaves and refreshing broken and wise hands; clear stones that the sun makes hot and sweaty foreheads, curved legs and bent backs, like the mythical Atlas holding up the world, in a perfumed procession of ‘little ants’.
Imagine careful, graceful movements suspended between earth, sky and sea, fingers as hard as wood that have been massaging generous plants for centuries.
The Amalfi lemon is much more than a fruit.
For us it holds fabulous suggestions of past times and tales of enchanted travellers, it guards the wisdom of divine gardeners and the tenacity of a community that builds its future with daily effort. Tenacity, yes, because this is the first word that comes to mind when we stop to admire the landscape that surrounds us.
A landscape to which, as locals, we are used and almost find ourselves amazed, when someone, visiting the Costiera for the first time, asks us about the particular structure of our lemon groves, which appear as large green staircases that gently descend towards the sea.
And when this happens, we like to pause a little longer to tell the story of our lemon terracing, just as if it were a historical monument that preserves the memory and image of the activities of a past and a present that is not always easy.
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The terrazzamenti: gardens pulled out of the mountains
The terraces of the Amalfi Coast are an immense and widespread monument, built over the centuries by hard-working and anonymous landscape architects too often forgotten by history; they are the symbol of the perseverance of man who stone by stone, with sweat and the hope of a better future, has transformed the mountains into fabulous hanging gardens.
The gardens wrested from the mountains have allowed generations of men, from the radiant medieval era onwards, to feed themselves and the most fortunate to become rich, they have designed and sustained the agricultural and urban landscape of the coastline, they have regulated a complex and dangerous hydrogeological situation and protected its inhabitants. The environmental and cultural reasons mentioned above therefore require the utmost attention and effort to preserve a landscape that is as fascinating as it is delicate.
The construction of the terraces requires sophisticated building techniques, the result of centuries of experience and cultural exchanges that the coastal inhabitants have had with other Mediterranean peoples over the centuries.
The first step is the construction of the ‘macere’, the retaining walls of the land that makes up the cultivable area of the terrace, which in the jargon is called ‘chiazza’ (the square in Neapolitan dialect). The ‘macere’ or ‘macerine’, of varying height depending on the difference in height to be bridged, are built with a skilful dry-laid arrangement of stones taken from the site, starting from the largest and heaviest at the bottom to the smallest at the top, with a maximum wall thickness at the base that decreases as it goes upwards; the top of the wall is closed with the ‘cottimo’, a lime border that makes the whole thing compact.
In some cases, the base and some horizontal bands are also reinforced with the use of lime, obtained from the limestone rock of which much of the Amalfi Coast is made. Between the wall and the ground, it is useful to place a layer of crushed stone to aid water drainage.
The drainage of water is fundamental for the preservation of terracing. It is favoured by dry-stone walls that allow rainwater to flow away, and by skilful hydraulic systems, including cultivation techniques and the way the land is ploughed, which allow water to drain away without causing the rubble to spill over. The water, once unrestrained, can be collected in tanks of varying sizes, the so-called ‘peschiere’, and used for irrigation by descent.
Lemons, vines, vegetables and every type of plant that can be cultivated at these latitudes will complete a gigantic work of land art: divine gardens that generations of writers, artists and travellers have extolled and depicted in every way.
All-female strength and tenacity
If we have spoken of tenacity, it is no coincidence.
Because the inhabitant of the Coast is strong and tenacious in the deepest sense of the term and without distinction of gender. Because when we talk about sfusato amalfitano and the very particular conformation of our territory, other stories from the past also come to mind and deserve to be narrated, because they say a lot about our land and its inhabitants. They are stories of mothers and daughters, of wives and sisters, women of all ages destined to bear the enormous burden of families and their lives.
It is no coincidence that in our dialect when we talk about work we use the expression ‘A’ fatica’ (hard work).
Work used to be hard, since long ago the lack of technological comforts was combined with the asperity of our places: working literally cost hard work, in the mean of physical effort and energy expended.
As you can imagine, the gathered lemons had to be transported.
While today the coastal area still has its own particular conformation, despite the presence of roads passable by vans and vehicles, in those days much of the transport took place along impervious paths.
And here enter the story of our land, the so-called ‘furmechelle’ (from our dialect meaning ‘little ants’), the women who carried, on their heads or by mule, the heavy baskets containing the harvested lemons, the yellow gold of the Amalfi Coast.
This inseparable link between the lemon growers and transporters and the landscape of the Amalfi Coast has leapt into the eyes of national and international newspapers, receiving the attention it deserves.
It may also have been thanks to new market trends that continually turn the spotlight on quality gastronomy and consequently on the world that revolves around it, but we are truly proud and moved, when we finally see the ‘flying peasants’, the hidden soul of the Amalfi Coast, in the stories of attentive writers, in the pages of national and international newspapers, in documentaries and on television programmes. “The Guardian” and numerous other newspapers celebrate the hard work of the Amalfi Coast farmers.
Observing carefully, at the back of the smiling faces of the lemon growers who have made the headlines today, you almost seem to catch a glimpse of the contentment of the anonymous heroic peasants of past centuries, their sullen gazes filled with satisfaction at having finally received a worthy place in the history of their beloved land.
A Story Told by the National and International Press
The deep connection between lemon growers and the Amalfi Coast landscape has caught the attention of national and international newspapers, receiving the recognition it deserves.
While it may also be due to new market trends that are constantly shining a spotlight on high-quality food, we are truly proud and moved to finally see the “flying farmers”, the hidden soul of the Amalfi Coast, in the stories of attentive writers, on the pages of national and international newspapers, in documentaries and television programs. “The Guardian”, “La Stampa”, “La Repubblica”, and”Il Sole 24 Ore” and many other Italian publications are celebrating the hard work of the Amalfi Coast’s lemon growers.
Looking closely, one can almost see the contentment of the anonymous heroic farmers of the past in the smiling faces of the lemon growers who have now made the news: their gazes shine, filled with satisfaction at receiving a worthy place in the history of their beloved land.
The steps needed to reach the big stages
By now, sfusato amalfitano is indispensable in the kitchens and dishes of the great chefs, and fortunately someone has noticed that this product, though of divine quality, certainly does not descend from heaven but is literally the fruit of an ancient agricultural tradition, carried on through a thousand difficulties and with a visceral love.
Essential for the proper placement of the Amalfi lemon on the market was the recognition of the Protected Geographical Indication (‘IGP’) mark, which protects its production and marketing, and so, almost four hundred years after its first cataloguing by Giovan Battista Ferrari, the ‘Limon Amalphitanus’ enters the Olympus of citrus fruits.
Contributing to the rebirth of the Amalfi Coast’s lemon groves is also a growing type of tourism that is attentive to biodiversity and a proper understanding of the specific nature of the area visited, thus transforming the coast’s lemon groves into tourist destinations.
The road ahead is still long, steep and tiring like the flights of stairs that lead to our lemon orchards, but the passion and respect for the work of our ancestors have given us the strength to obstinately continue to take care of our Sfusato amalfitano, to safeguard its quality and to look after the terraces where they are planted, a fundamental work that preserves the delicate balance of the Amalfi landscape.
