Il Vero Sesto Cajo Baccelli 2022
Consulting the phases of the moon is a practice that, independently of Rudolph Steiner, has been integral to farming since humans began to grow their own food. Here at Il Palazzone, although we are not a biodynamic winery, the lunar calendar influences bottling dates, determines frequency of pump-overs and when we plan certain vineyard operations. We chose yesterday, 14th December 2021, to bottle our Rosso del Palazzone 02/22 because it was a fruit day. The lunar calendar is also used for planning wine tastings and opening bottles. In 2009 Tesco and Marks & Spencer, UK retailers that at the time sold a third of wines consumed in Britain, only invited critics to taste when the biodynamic calendar suggested wines would show best. Now of course there is an app for this…. Here in Italy people consult the moon before cutting fingernails or hair. Just like pruning trees, whether the moon is waxing or waning will change the velocity of re-growth.
An essential instrument for all this comes out once a year, small enough to fit into a back-pocket. Il Vero Sesto Cajo Baccelli; a pastel blue booklet that, as specified on the back page, contains 100 pages including the cover. This almanac has been published for the last 145 years in Florence and is sold all over Italy. Times change, this year, for the first time it is available on Amazon and Kindle….
Sesto Caio (or Cajo) Baccelli, known as Lo Strolago di Brozzi was a 17th century cabalist and astrologer. He was from Florence and related to the famous astrologer Rutilio Benincasa (1555-1626). Sesto means sixth and the frontispiece specifies that he was Settimo’s (Seventh’s) elder brother. Sesto was famous for publishing a lunar almanac for farmers, which was resuscitated in 1878 and has been coming out every year in October since then.
It starts with a doggerel poem about the events of the previous year, touching on Italian and world events. These sestine used to be read at Sunday lunch tables and can be bought in collector’s sets of 50 years at a time. This year’s verses start with by comparing us all to snails, venturing out after the rain. We were wearing the wrong kind of masks at Carnival and it’s certainly not a bed of roses (“non è che sia tutto rose e fiori”) yet our shops and restaurants are slowly reopening, and even a screen is a sort of window to the world. From here, subject matter ranges from referencing the 6th January events in US, climate change and climate change deniers, Mars landings and the cargo-ship stuck in the Red Sea. Sesto triumphantly recaps the Italian Tokyo Olympics successes and the UEFA soccer win, before benevolently suggesting some lucky numbers to play on the lottery (20, 5, 6).
A list of religious festivals including the feste mobili is followed by the specifics of the four eclipses of 2022, two solar and two lunar. Only one of these will be visible from Tuscany (the world’s epicenter, clearly) and each city’s time is specified (1 minute difference between Arezzo and Florence). Month by month there is a lunar calendar peppered with mottoes and detailed farming instructions. The instructions are in sections; fruit trees, olive groves, vineyards, cantina, livestock and vegetable garden (orto). Last of all is the giardino since flowers are a farmers’ last priority.
All Saint’s days and every category they celebrate are shown, along with sunset and sunrise times, weather predictions for the whole year, historical titbits and lucky numbers per month. Spring starts on 20th March at 16.33 and it will be umido. Unfortunately it will rain on 31st October which might ruin the feast day for butchers. Lawyers should be celebrated on 30th May, schoolteachers on 13th August. There is a horoscope for the year, articles and poems, two page of jokes, mathematical problems with ten €60 prizes and a comprehensive list of all sagre, festivals and markets in Tuscany, province by province. Last, but not least, all postal rates for 2022.
You will never spend a better €2.
