by Salvatore Memoli
The places of worship of Fratte are linked to important testimonies that make the small territory, closed between the river Irno and the Via dei Principati, an important reference to the living Faith of the inhabitants. Sometimes, there is a strong need of the heart to rediscover important stories of history, to revive them, to make them facts that speak of centuries of history, of ancient and current spirituality, to understand where one comes from.
A relatively young street in the current district, in relation to the facts I will describe, is via Calata San Vito. This denomination certainly derives from the particularity of the territory, largely hilly, from which the expression Calata, as in other places, is ascent, descent, steps, steps, upstream. Calata San Vito is between the Carosello hill and the Irno river, where the bridge over the Irno river is located.
The name of San Vito derives from the presence in the area of an ancient Christian temple dedicated to San Vito di Andrella or de Scutura. This chapel or church was almost certainly located near the river Irno. There is no news of it except through the name of San Vito. The date of its construction is also lost in history. As for the saint, he was martyred near the Sele river in the third century, in the countryside of Eboli. It is said that the Fratte Chapel dates back to 1338, in honor of the Martyr. The martyrdom of Vito, which took place in the center of the Sele plain, dates back to 15 June 303, under the emperor Diocletian. With Vito, Modesto and Crescenza were killed. The church of Eboli, in the plain of Santa Cecilia, was built in the tenth century, as reported by some chronicles of the Salernitana Church. The same chronicles date back to 1338 the construction of the Church of San Vito in the territory, centuries later, called Fratte. This devotion can be understood if we consider that the Carosello hill and the Irno river was crossed by a road that led to the ancient “oppidum Roty”, that is to say the city of Rota, then San Severino. This road took the name of via dei Principati, of which Calata San Vito is an important stretch, recalling the choices of Prince Arechi II in the year 871.
Certainly the road, where the place of worship dedicated to San Vito was built, proud of his faith in Jesus which he did not want to deny, recorded the passage of important men, rich merchants, powerful and wealthy men. The construction of the Church of San Vito is traced back to them, of which there are no more remains that help to identify the place.
Many centuries later, the flood of October 25, 1964, exactly 10 years after the flood of 1954 that destroyed Salerno, Fratte was hit by the overflow of the river Irno. A few years later one of the vacated buildings was totally demolished in via Mario Pagano, next to the Po te di Calata San Vito. With the demolition of the building an ancient chapel came out. Popular history has it that this chapel was built in 1903 by a member of the De Martino family, domiciled there, very devoted to Sant’Alberto, to whom the saint dedicated the chapel. In it there was a relic of the Saint, duly authorized with deed n. 827 of 4/12/1903 signed by Cardinal Respighi, a relic still preserved by the family today. When the Church was abandoned, the bells were donated to the Church of Santa Croce di Torrione which had been destroyed by the bombs of 1943. The sacred furnishings were donated to the Parish of the Holy Family in Fratte.
Finally, it seems right to call the attention of the Doctrinary Fathers, who are very attentive to the requests of the Frattese people, to evaluate, with the recovery of the veneration for S. Espedito, also the memories of San Vito and Sant’Alberto that have always accompanied the populations of the territory .
San Vito and Sant’Alberto two memories that speak of the Christian faith and the devotion of people who have merits in the history of Salerno.
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