The use of ex-votos for thanksgiving or to invoke a grace dates back to time immemorial. In ancient times, and not only then, even the erection of a sanctuary or a temple was often a consequence of a received grace; for example, the Basilica of St. John the Evangelist in Ravenna was erected by Galla Placidia as thanks for having escaped with her son the storm that hit the ship she was on during a journey between Ravenna and Byzantium.
Ex-votos in terracotta or wood, addressed to even minor deities, such as the goddess Mefitis, are often found during archaeological excavations. In Roman times, as attested by the greatest writers of that era – Virgil, Cicero, Horace, or Tibullus – it was customary for sailors to hang painted votive tablets around their necks, dedicated to Isis, the goddess who protected against storms, or to Neptune, Castor, and Pollux, the protective deities of sailors. The tablets depicted the scene in which they had been protagonists during a danger or a storm; there was also another reason that drove people to go around and show the ex-voto: they begged to try to recover at least part of the value of the goods lost during the storm. Very common on the Mediterranean and Near Eastern shores, the ex-voto is nevertheless a phenomenon also known elsewhere, for example in areas bordering Italy, such as Switzerland, the former Yugoslavia, Austria.
It is curious that the craftsmanship of the votive tablets produced in Italy is quite uniform, whether made in the north, center, or south, as if they were produced by a single workshop. The standards for producing votive tablets are applied following quite precise rules, even though this form of expression is generally classified under the broad term “folk art.” The votive tablet is a veritable mine of information, and through it, for example, it is possible to follow the evolution of our seamanship; on drawings dating from the 1500s onwards, dramatic events are depicted such as tornadoes or big waves breaking on coasts, or the assault of pirates involving boats and crews of all kinds. Trabaccolos, galleys and great galleasses, 17th-century saettie, tartanes, Sorrentine polaccas, and felucones are the boats featured in the drawings; the boats are represented in various shapes and with different types of masts and sails, following the advances in naval architecture up to the depiction of steamships colliding with sailing ships, almost emphasizing the definitive transition from traditional navigation to “automated” navigation.
The technique generally followed for the creation of votive tablets is oil painting on wooden panels; sometimes a watercolor on paper has been seen subsequently glued onto a tablet. In the 1700s canvas was widely used, while from the last century other materials such as zinc, cardboard, masonite, glass have been introduced. The requested or received grace is represented in two or three successive scenes on the same drawing, and the position of the deity who intercedes – usually the Madonna – is always in the upper part, sometimes in the center but more frequently at one of the two corners of the panel; in the 1500s and 1600s the formulas V.F.G.A or V.F.G.R., “Votum fecit et Gratiam Accepit o Recepit” (He made the vow and received grace) were commonly used, usually drawn at the bottom left and repeated as many times as there were graces. In subsequent centuries the acronym P:G:R: or P.G.O., “per grazia ricevuta o ottenuta” (for grace received or obtained), was used. Rarely dated and never signed, the ex-votos are classified precisely based on the scenes depicted: the type of clothing, architecture, customs in vogue in a given period, the iconography of the Madonna are the study elements for a correct dating.
Undoubtedly, ex-votos are the “thermometer” of devotion to one saint rather than another: the more votive tablets collected in a church or sanctuary, the greater the popular devotion there is for that divinity to which the place is dedicated; for example, in the Sanctuary of the Madonna dell’Arco thousands of ex-votos are collected, from the 1500s onwards, covering the most varied topics, from volcanic eruptions to road accidents, from episodes of exorcisms to simple falls. The Sanctuary also holds a substantial number of maritime votive tablets which, instead, are often collected in chapels near the sea. In the beautiful small church of Albori, a village on the Amalfi Coast, there is an abundance of ex-votos concerning seamanship. Among the people who use ex-votos most frequently and consistently are certainly the members of ship crews, united in danger and isolation by a constant sense of anxiety and religiosity; often resolvable with the help of magic, the saint, or the miracle.
