We are going to visit one of the mysteries of Europe. We will talk the hen of the golden chicks, a legend that goes from Argentario to Sweden, passing through Italy and Romania, walking through places but especially over time.
Take a seat for this trip and be prepared for many surprises. let's start the adventure.
En Argentinian one has been transmitted legend about a hen with golden chicks that is said to hide - or according to other versions move animatedly - near the Tower of Argentiera.
The legend is very curious but, doing a little research, the Argentario promontory would not be the only place in Italy where the story of a hen with her golden chicks is told, a bit like it happens with other stories.
Where and why does such a legend exist?
I must say that while researching I found other places (who knows how many more there are) and several interesting stories.
in tuscany
The legend of the hen with the golden chicks is famous near the Abbey of S. Rabano. We are in the Maremma Natural Park, about 15 km from Grosseto. The Abbey of S. Rabano was a medieval Benedictine monastery, of which today only the ruins and the tower remain, built in 1321 for defensive purposes and raised again in the following period.
According to an ancient legend, every hundred years or more, during a night lashed by a strong storm, a golden hen emerges from hiding with her chicks heading for a hidden treasure. Anyone who manages to see them and tries to follow them, will not be able to capture them or discover the treasure, what's more, they will lose the light of reason.
It is said that around the tower and in the nearby woods, the ghosts of some friars from the abbey - beheaded by pirates - roam to protect the treasure.
the young hunter
There is also a story about this ancient legend of the Tower of S. Rabano. It is said that a young hunter surprised by a storm near the Abbey first met a strange black cat, then a mysterious friar. Finally, just near the Tower, while he was stacking wood to try and start a fire, the hunter noticed a golden hen with 12 golden chicks as well, and decided to follow them.
The mother hen took him to a deep cave, with a hidden treasure protected by ghosts and a cat. There they attacked him, the young man managed to escape and ran out of the cave. At one point, running out of strength, he collapsed to the ground and fell asleep.
When she woke up in the morning, she thought she had just had a nightmare, but she saw the woodpile she had prepared and noticed that it had the cat's scratch marks on it. Had it really happened?
The hen and the king
Let's go back to Tuscany, near the town of monte acuto, near Pari (Grosseto).
Here we are told of a king who ordered the goldsmiths to make a hen with golden chicks to also demonstrate his power over nature. After his death, hordes of barbarians descended on the area and hid the chickens and chicks under the Rock of Monte Acuto.
Volterra and the Etruscans
Moving north, still in Tuscany, we find the legend of the hen with the golden chicks also in Volterra, with some references that go back in time to the Etruscans.
In fact, it is said of a hen with golden chicks that it would have been hidden near Mount Voltraio. The hen would represent the Etruscan confederation, while the chicks would represent the different cities that were part of it, including Volterra. In one of his novels, D'Annunzio also talks about Mount Voltraio and of a golden hen with her chicks that no one had ever found: this was to make it clear how well known this ancient legend was in the area.
Chiusi's labyrinth
Perhaps the most famous legend of the hen with the golden chicks in Tuscany is that of Chiusi (Siena). Already Pliny the Elder (XNUMXst century AD) in the Naturalis Historia it tells of the town of Chiusi where the Etruscan leader Porsenna is said to be buried within a huge and inextricable labyrinth.
According to a legend, today Porsenna's remains are said to be placed in a golden knot drawn by 12 horses and guarded by a hen with 5.000 golden chicks. It would therefore be a treasure of inestimable value but impossible to find.
Let's change region and move to Lazio
En Norm (Latin) there is talk of a treasure made up of precious gems and a hen with golden chicks, which would be hidden in the underground galleries of ancient Norba. Let us remember that ancient Norba was an important city, first an adversary of Rome in the Latin league and then a strategic point for the ancient Romans.
Its cyclopean walls and buildings dominated a dense network of tunnels. Legend Locate the hidden treasure in these ancient galleries.
let's go to Abruzzo. Here I found two important legends about the mother hen with golden chicks, with references to the ancient population of the Samnites.
the young woodcutter
The first refers to Mount Arazzecca, in the province of L'Aquila, which tells of a young woodcutter. His grandfather, who had recently died, appeared to him in a dream telling him to go up Mount Arazzecca with a sack and a hoe, showing him a precise spot to dig: near a tree with a large stone at its foot. Digging would have found a hen with golden chicks, but having taken the treasure he should never have looked back.
At dawn the young man, who had understood the place well, went to the mountain, dug in the right place and found the treasure, putting it in the sack. It was then that a violent storm broke out: the frightened woodcutter suddenly turned around, attracted by lightning and thunder, before running back home. He arrived exhausted at his house and immediately fell asleep. When he woke up, he opened the sack and found only dry leaves.
the missing cave
Another legend, in Castel di Sangro (L'Aquila), tells of a man in the Colle di S. Giovanni. The man, to chase a chicken, slipped down a cliff. Continuing into the cave, he found coins, gold objects, and a golden hen with chicks. Then, the man returned to the village to look for some sacks and take the treasure, but once he got back close, he could no longer find the cave.
let's go now to Molise
En Pietrabbondante (Isernia) tell of a hen with golden chicks hidden in a tunnel that goes from the area of archaeological excavations to the top of Mount Caraceno. No one has ever found the treasure, but it is said that there were very strong storms during each excavation, as if to protect it.
we go down to Puglia
En Manduria (Taranto) A legend tells that a hen with golden chicks was stolen from Taranto and hidden in an unknown place.
moving towards Calabria, here we find another famous legend
We are close to Carlopoli (Catanzaro), and the narration refers to the Abbey of Santa Maria di Corazzo. It is said that on certain days of the year whoever sees the hen with the golden chicks, overcoming many tests, will find the treasure hidden by the monks in the tunnels of the monastery.
Other versions speak of pure-hearted people who would be the only ones capable of following the hen to the fountain in the excavations, on full moon nights, but without ever having to wish for the treasure.
There are other legends about the golden hen and chicks in other regions of Italy, like Liguria and Friuli. The characteristics remain that of hidden treasure that cannot be found, due to elements of Nature, the Underworld, or random events.
Why are there so many stories about the hen with golden chicks? Do they have a common origin?
The answer lies in the Museum and Treasury of Monza Cathedral.
The Monza Treasure and the Lombard Queen Teodolinda
El Museum and Treasury of Monza Cathedral, among the many works, also includes a "hen with chicks." As can be seen in the cover photo of the article, it is a mother hen with seven chicks, in gilt silver and precious stones; It was probably made by Milanese goldsmiths at two different times between the 589th and 616th centuries AD. It belonged to the Lombard queen Theodolinda (Queen of Italy from XNUMX to XNUMX), famous for the work of converting the Lombards to Catholicism.
Recall that the lombards they dominated Italy between 568 (invasion of Byzantine Italy) and 774 (fall of the Kingdom of Charlemagne): therefore they were present in many regions, such as Tuscany (including the Argentario ), which I previously listed in the stories of the legend of the hen with the golden chicks.
It's probably no coincidence: in fact, the Lombards had many stylized animals as typical goldsmith objects. The legend of the hen with the golden chicks may have spread under his rule.
Queen Theodelinda had ancestry from Bavaria, Germany. Among the population bavarian, the hen with the golden chicks signified the importance of the «rebirth of life». In the Christian sphere, on the other hand, he represented the Church as protector of the faithful.
And in Europe? We will have to move to Romania
In Romania, the famous Pietroasele's Treasure (or Petrossa's Treasure) is colloquially called "The Hen with the Golden Chicks" because it includes, among the many valuables, also some golden birds. It is a treasure from the 1837th century AD belonging to the Goths, found in Pietroasele in XNUMX, whose elements present today have survived theft and a great fire.
Some scholars think that some of the items may have been war booty from the Goths during their raids. We are talking, as for the aforementioned Longobards, of barbarian peoples.
Now let's summarize.
The common origins of the legends of the mother hen with the golden chicks: Sweden.
We start from the Torre dell'Argentiera (Monte Argentario) to move further into Tuscany and then to other regions of Italy. We end up in Monza to talk about the Lombards, before moving on to the Goths in Romania.
¿There is a common matrix between Lombards and Goths that could lead to a similar symbology around the goose with the golden chicks and its legends? The answer is yes! It would seem that Lombards and Goths were born in the territories of present-day Sweden. Incredible.
Another question arises spontaneously, remembering the treasure of the Etruscan leader Porsenna. Is there instead a common matrix, older, between the Etruscans and the barbarian populations of Lombards and Goths? There are complex studies on the origins of the Etruscans and it is not easy to answer the question. Meanwhile, it would seem that there could be an origin of the Etruscans, as an ancestral component, from the descendants of populations from the steppes of present-day Russia and Ukraine, progenitors of the current Indo-European languages. This obviously goes against the theory of the Etruscans as an indigenous population..
Could, in any case, the barbarian populations have seized an older Etruscan symbology? Maybe.
If we are not certain about the origins, we cannot have certain answers.
So we know that the mystery continues.
What do we get out of all this? It is up to us to continue transmitting the ancient legends, because in every story there is a fund of truth, or at least feelings that remain the same throughout the different eras, although they belong to different hearts. On the other hand, our life on Earth is only a fragment compared to time, which should not be wasted.