If you ask a historian, or good and amiable readers, he will answer that the tomb of the beautiful Parthenope is on the hill of San Giovanni Maggiore, where the sea then lapped the foot of the mountain. Another will tell you that Parthenope’s tomb is on the hill of Sant’Aniello, towards the countryside, below Capodimonte.
Well, I tell you that is not true.
Parthenope has no grave, Parthenope is not dead.
She has lived, splendid, young and beautiful, for five thousand years. She still runs on the hillocks, she wanders on the beach, she looks out over the volcano, she gets lost in the valleys.
It is she who makes our city intoxicated with light and mad with colors: it is she who makes the stars shine on clear nights; it is she who makes the scent of orange irresistible; It is she who makes the sea phosphorize. When on April days a warm aura floods us with well-being, it is its sweet breath;when in the green distances of the Capodimonte forest we see a white shadow appear linked to another shadow, it is she with her lover; when we hear in the air a sound of words in love, it is his voice that pronounces them; when a sound of kisses, indistinct, subdued, startles us, it is his kisses; when a rustle of clothes makes us quiver at the memory of it, it is his peplum that crawls over the arena, it is his light foot that flies over; When, from afar, we ourselves feel ourselves burning in the flame of a frightful eruption, it is its fire that burns us.
She is the one who drives the city crazy, she is the one who makes it languish and turn pale with love, it is she who makes it writhe with passion in the violent days of August.
Parthenope, the virgin, the woman, does not die, has no grave, is immortal, is love.
Naples is the city of love.
(Matilde Serao, Neapolitan Legends)
ANTONELLA CARULLO 