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Information and Contacts

For information on the UNESCO application, initiatives, community contributions, and the journey of the Feast of Sant’Agata, contact us: we are at your disposal.

The Feast of Saint Agatha in Catania tells of a living heritage of faith, memory and participation. This site supports the UNESCO nomination process by gathering information, updates, documents and community testimonies, inviting everyone to actively contribute to the knowledge, safeguarding and transmission of the Feast. 

About the Nomination Proposal

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From the proposal to the Application

It is not only about presenting to the world one of the most intense religious and popular festivals of the Mediterranean. The nomination aims to tell, safeguard and pass on a living heritage that belongs to Catania’s deep history and that, every year, continues to renew itself through the participation of its community.


The Feast of Saint Agatha is ritual, memory, devotion, collective organization, handed-down knowledge, lived urban space. It is the way Catania recognizes itself, moves through its own history and hands to new generations a bond that unites faith, culture, civic identity and shared responsibility. The nomination process is promoted by the Municipality of Catania, the Archdiocese of Catania, the University of Catania and the Committee for the Feast of Saint Agatha in the city of Catania, as provided for by the Memorandum of Understanding signed on 6 June 2025. The Memorandum identifies the Municipality of Catania as the lead body and establishes a Promoting Committee tasked with coordinating the activities needed for the nomination, supported by a Scientific Committee and by research groups and a technical staff.

The nomination of “The Feast of Saint Agatha in Catania” for UNESCO’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity stems from a shared path among institutions, the religious community, the scientific world and civil society 

It is not only about presenting to the world one of the most intense religious and popular festivals of the Mediterranean. The nomination aims to tell, safeguard and pass on a living heritage that belongs to Catania’s deep history and that, every year, continues to renew itself through the participation of its community.


The Feast of Saint Agatha is ritual, memory, devotion, collective organization, handed-down knowledge, lived urban space. It is the way Catania recognizes itself, moves through its own history and hands to new generations a bond that unites faith, culture, civic identity and shared responsibility. The nomination process is promoted by the Municipality of Catania, the Archdiocese of Catania, the University of Catania and the Committee for the Feast of Saint Agatha in the city of Catania, as provided for by the Memorandum of Understanding signed on 6 June 2025. The Memorandum identifies the Municipality of Catania as the lead body and establishes a Promoting Committee tasked with coordinating the activities needed for the nomination, supported by a Scientific Committee and by research groups and a technical staff.

SAFEGUARDING PATH AND CANDIDACY PROPOSAL
01
13 / 06 / 2017

Entry into REIS

The Feast of Saint Agatha is included in REIS - the Register of Intangible Heritage of Sicily.

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Why apply

The Feast of Saint Agatha is a living cultural heritage because it does not belong only to the past.

It lives in the present, in the voice of the faithful, in the step of the Candelore, in the fercolo that crosses the city, in liturgical celebrations, in organizational know-how, in the music, in inherited gestures, in the care of ritual settings, in the memory of families, parishes, associations, volunteers and all those who, in different ways, take part in its continuity.


Its strength lies not only in the greatness of the event, but in the depth of the bond that ties the Catanese community to its Patron Saint. Each year the city does not merely attend the Feast: it prepares it, awaits it, accompanies it, recognizes it as an essential part of its identity.
The history of the Feast intertwines with some of the decisive pages of Catania’s history. The memory of the return of the relics from Constantinople, celebrated on 17 August, points to a tradition that spans the centuries.


Even the great fractures of urban history - the eruption of Etna in 1669 and the earthquake of 1693 - did not erase the relationship between Catania and Saint Agatha. On the contrary, after those breaks, the Feast accompanied the city’s material and symbolic rebuilding, helping to redraw routes, spaces, squares and ways of living the urban center. After the earthquake of 1693, in fact, the layout of the rebuilt city led to a redefinition of the processional route within the new walls, enhancing wider squares and streets.

The Feast thus fits into a unique cultural landscape: that of a city marked by lava and Baroque, by destruction and rebirth, by the presence of Etna and the late-Baroque rebuilding of the Val di Noto. 

Catania is in fact one of the components of the UNESCO serial site “Late Baroque Towns of the Val di Noto”, listed for the value of the reconstruction after the 1693 earthquake, while Mount Etna is recognized by UNESCO for its extraordinary geological, scientific, cultural and educational value.


The nomination therefore stems from a clear conviction: the Feast of Saint Agatha is not only a great religious and popular event, but a complex system of practices, knowledge, relationships and cultural spaces that the community recognizes as part of its own heritage.
In this perspective, the UNESCO path does not want to turn the Feast into a show, nor reduce it to a tourist image. It aims, on the contrary, to protect its most authentic meaning: the participation of the faithful, the spiritual dimension, transmission between generations, the community’s responsibility, respect for ritual places and times. The Feast of Saint Agatha is already entered in the Register of Intangible Heritage of the Sicilian Region, in the Book of Celebrations, Feasts and Ritual Practices, approved on 13 June 2017. This is an important basis for the nomination journey, but also a starting point: UNESCO recognition in fact requires a broader process, grounded in community participation, documentation, safeguarding measures and the ability to ensure continuity over time. According to the 2003 UNESCO Convention, intangible cultural heritage includes living traditions, social practices, rituals, festive events, knowledge and know-how passed down between generations. The same Convention stresses that intangible heritage is such only when the communities, groups and individuals who create it, safeguard it and transmit it recognize it as their own. For this reason, the nomination of the Feast of Saint Agatha is, first of all, a community journey. An invitation to learn, take part, document, safeguard. A way to tell the world that Catania holds a living heritage, not because it is static, but because it can cross time while staying true to its soul.

UNESCO CANDIDACY

The objective of the candidacy

A path of safeguarding, participation and transmission to preserve the Feast of Saint Agatha as a living heritage of the community.

01 Safeguarding

Safeguarding a living heritage

The candidacy aims to promote the protection of the Feast in its most authentic dimension: the rituals, times, places, gestures, words, sounds, objects, devotional and organizational practices that make its continuity recognizable.

Safeguarding does not mean freezing the Feast in time, but supporting its transmission consciously, avoiding trivialization, simplification or superficial forms of consumption that could weaken its meaning.

02 Community

Strengthening community participation

The Feast lives through the community that recognizes, practices and transmits it. For this reason, the candidacy process promotes the active involvement of devotees, Candelore, parishes, brotherhoods, families, volunteers, associations, schools, the University, cultural operators, residents and all those who participate, directly or indirectly, in the life of the Feast.

Broad, free and informed community participation is one of the central principles of the UNESCO process. The criteria of the Representative List require that the element be nominated with the widest possible participation of the communities concerned and with their free, prior and informed consent.

03 Knowledge

Documenting, studying and sharing

One of the fundamental objectives is to collect, organize and make accessible the historical, anthropological, ritual, photographic, audiovisual and testimonial documentation related to the Feast.

The candidacy process will also be an opportunity to build a shared body of knowledge: archives, oral testimonies, scientific materials, maps of ritual places, photographic and audiovisual collections, digital tools and educational paths capable of telling the story of the Feast to different audiences, in Italy and worldwide.

04 Future

Transmitting to future generations

The candidacy aims to become a permanent program for education about living heritage.

Schools, universities, youth centers, associations, museums, archives and cultural institutions can become spaces of transmission, where young people learn not only the history of the Feast, but also its civic, religious, cultural and community meaning.

Transmitting the Feast means educating new generations of aware citizens, capable of understanding its depth and participating with respect.

05 Rituals and places

Preserving rituals, knowledge and cultural spaces

The Feast of Saint Agatha is inseparable from its places: the Cathedral, the processional streets, the squares, the churches, the places linked to the memory of the martyrdom, and the spaces crossed by the Candelore and the fercolo.

The candidacy aims to recognize these spaces not as simple settings, but as living cultural places where the community renews its bond with the Saint and with the city every year.

Likewise, the knowledge that makes the Feast possible will be enhanced: organization, craftsmanship, music, devotional practices, the care of ceremonial elements, route management, oral memory and skills passed down over time.

06 Sustainability

Promoting respectful and sustainable participation

The Feast attracts a vast and intense participation every year. The candidacy aims to encourage responsible participation, welcoming devotees, citizens and visitors without altering the profound meaning of the event.

Sustainability significa sicurezza, accessibilità, cura del decoro urbano, gestione dei flussi, attenzione alle persone fragili, comunicazione corretta e rispetto dei tempi rituali. Significa anche aiutare chi arriva da fuori a non essere semplice spettatore, ma ospite consapevole di una comunità in festa.

07 Governance

Strengthening the governance of the process

The Memorandum of Understanding established a shared governance model, in which the Municipality of Catania, the Archdiocese of Catania, the University of Catania and the Committee for the Feast of Saint Agatha collaborate according to their respective roles.

The Municipality, as lead organization, ensures overall coordination; the Archdiocese preserves the religious and spiritual dimension of the Feast; the University contributes through study, research and scientific validation activities; the Committee for the Feast provides its heritage of organizational, ritual and traditional knowledge.

This collaboration is one of the essential elements of the candidacy, as it combines institutional vision, community roots and scientific rigor.

08 Dialogue

Opening Catania to international dialogue

The candidacy aims to strengthen dialogue with other communities that preserve intangible cultural heritage around the world.

A possible UNESCO recognition would not only be a title for Catania, but an entry into an international network of experiences, knowledge and best practices dedicated to safeguarding living heritage.

The Feast of Saint Agatha can offer this network the story of a city that, through devotion to its Patron Saint, has transformed memory, suffering, reconstruction, faith and popular participation into an extraordinary form of cultural continuity.

09 Monitoring

Measuring, improving, sharing back

The candidacy process also aims to create monitoring tools for the cultural, social, educational and economic effects of the Feast and its safeguarding measures.

A better understanding of participation, volunteering, educational activities, critical issues, accessibility, community perception and local impact will make it possible to improve heritage management over time and provide the city with a more conscious understanding of its own richness.

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Info & Contacts

Discover how the path to the Candidacy proposal begins