AGNONE (Italy)- THE centuries-old foundry that supplies bells to the Vatican, while priding itself on being Italy's oldest family business, is beginning to fear for its future.
Craftsmen skilled in the time-honoured art are a disappearing breed, said Armando Marinelli, co-owner with his brother Pasquale of the business in the Molise region of southern Italy.
'The problem is finding the manpower,' he said, adding: 'Lots of young people come but then get bored.' The Marinellis produced their first bell in 1339 at the family workshop nestled in the Appenine hills.
The dark and dusty workshop is anything but pretentious. Four craftsmen ply their trade amid piles of clay, charcoal and wood, stirring glowing embers on which small grey moulds are drying before being used to form miniature bells.
'Our biggest bell was created for the Jubilee in 2000: five tonnes and six metres in circumference.' The foundry produces about 50 bells a year, 'sometimes fewer when there are larger ones,' veteran craftsman Antonio Delli Quadri said, standing in a room stacked from floor to ceiling with plaster moulds of Madonnas, saints and decorative friezes.
The artisans use wax to transfer the designs onto a brick 'core' slathered with clay, slightly smaller than the bell to be forged. Another layer of clay is applied to form a 'false bell'.
After this hardens, the wax inside is melted, leaving the imprint of the design in negative on the inside of the false bell in the technique known as 'lost wax'. Molten bronze, at a temperature of 1,200 degrees Celsius, is poured into the space to form the bell.
The foundry is considered Italy's oldest family business and among the three oldest family businesses worldwide, according to the American magazine Family Business. The business, which employs about a dozen workers, is among Europe's 12 remaining big foundries.
The secret to making a bell with perfect timbre? 'The base, where the sound comes from, should not be overloaded with designs, and its proportions must follow very precise mathematical rules,' he said.
Delli Quadri then picked up a wooden mallet and performed an impromptu concert on 10 big bells hanging in the workshop. Their deep tones reverberate in the eardrums of everyone listening - perhaps the origin of the Italian expression 'deaf as a bell'. -- AFP
