“In the fighting that we do, one time we fight over the wheat and all the other grains, another time over the livestock, and at other times over the vineyards. And so, on four occasions we fight over all the fruits of the earth and for those things won by the benandanti that year there is abundance.’ Thus, at the core of the nocturnal gatherings of the benandanti we see a fertility rite emerging that is precisely patterned on the principal events of the agricultural year.”
