The practise of leaving roadside memorials originated in Mediterranean Catholic countries and is not only confined to Italy, of course, but they do seem to multiply here. The further south in Italy you go, the more likely you are to find "altarini" draped with crucifixes, holy pictures, black ribbons and statues. In this part of the country the Church has a stronger influence and people are less constrained by emotion, giving full vent to their grief at this modern of massacres.
Michelle Smargiassi, a journalist for La Repubblica newspaper, decided to write about "altarini" and in the course of two days drove 700 km (440 miles), stopping to photograph and examine these sad tributes tied to guardrails or erected on grass verges. he was intrigued by the use of plastic flowers over fresh flovers but came to see that plastic flowers were a way of people saying that their grief will never end while fresh flowers indicated that nothing, especially life, lasts for ever.
He says the "altarini" that moved him the most were the ones that left behind a tantalising piece of the story - a soft toy, a football scarf, a single Camel cigarette - but he was puzzled by the number of anonymous tributes. No names of the victims or clues as to what had happened. Wasn't the point to record who died and to warn other drivers that these were danger spots? According to psychologists he spoke to, many roadside memorials are silent messages of anger and sorrow. "By not leaving any identification, people are saying: 'This grief is mine, only mine. No one else can understand it'," says Smargiassi.
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