Shamans and Italian Healers of Today from a Comparative-Contrastive Viewpoint

A group of scholars in Italy is involved in an interdisciplinary research project on Indoeuropean magic tradition, its origin and traces of its survival. It emerges from the research that the origin dates back to the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods and that certain typologically shamanic elements of this tradition are to be considered autochthonous. Influences from the eastern Euro-Asiatic continent arrived later and often became blended with a mythical and magic vision of the world which was from many aspects already convergent. Autochthony also explains the strength of the survival of some forms of this magic tradition, among which are ancient therapies still practised by today’s healers. From a comparative-contrastive viewpoint, the rituals of Italian healers of today present some relevant elements which share common ground with shamanic rituals. Conflictual or hostile relationships between Italian healers and ordinary “official” doctors are not to be found, but a rapport of reciprocal collaboration is absent. Traditional medicine in most cases is considered a priori inferior and “primitive” by official doctors. In general, sick people resort to traditional medicine for well defined pathologies, such as sciatica, dislocations and herpes zoster (“fire of St. Anthony”), and when they have had no success in the therapies of official medicine. Recently, however, the recovery of ancient knowledge is becoming a phenomenon increasingly shared by society, even among young people. It is no accident that in Italy there is also a noticeable increase in interest in Siberian shamanism, not only because of the figure of the shaman, his trances and his function as medicine man, but also for the strongly ecological aspects of this system of beliefs.