Bitti, a conference on the history of traditional dress

The appointment is for August 31st at 8:30 pm in Piazzetta Pittalis in Bitti . The place is the Ethnographic Museum Complex , a small jewel in the art of preserving local traditions, where next Saturday the conference entitled “Miracles of traditional fashion in Bitti through the centuries” will be held.

The meeting , which marks the final evening of the successful “Tepilora Cultour- Itineraries out of time” event, conceived and created by the Istelai Cooperative and promoted by Gal Nuorese Baronia with the patronage of the Bitti Municipal Administration, is curated by Franca Rosa Contu, former head of the museums sector of the Regional Ethnographic Institute and Antonello Carzedda, a profound connoisseur of traditional Bittese clothing . The meeting, open to the public, will discuss the evolution of the characteristic clothing of the place with a greater focus on children's clothing.

Bitti is the municipality where many original traditional costumes are still preserved, thanks to the fact that, as often happened in other centers of Barbagia, they were commonly worn until the middle of the last century and are still worn today on special occasions such as religious holidays.

The reasons that pushed the Istelai Cooperative to organize this event, says Antonello Carzedda, are to be found in the fact that over time there is a risk of losing this extraordinary ethno-anthropological capital.

In the preservation of the traditional dress , the history of a community is handed down - says Mario Sanna, city councilor with responsibility for culture - a tool to tell the different evolutionary phases of civil society, also through the distinction of the different social classes that were very distinct in Bitti. It was in fact customary to say: "mintire sa manu in bertula" which literally meant "putting your hand in your wallet" to buy new fabrics and improve the fashion of those times.

The terziopelo, "vrennizzatu" in the Bittese language, were fabrics that were not easy to find because they came from abroad and were the same ones capable of classifying the social status of those who could then use them for their clothing.