The mechanical nativity scene.

In the former oratory of the Compagnia della SS. Annunziata, in Piazza della Madonna, Riparbella’s mechanical nativity scene is on display: around eighty square metres of landscape with more than a hundred and forty figures twenty centimetres tall, moved by electronic mechanisms. It is hand-made by the townspeople, and every year it gains some new detail.

Mechanical nativity scene Photo coming soon

An oratory that changed jobs five times

The oratory was built in 1502. Over the centuries it changed use many times: it was a granary, a hospital and a mortuary, and during the French occupation it was taken over and requisitioned by Napoleon’s soldiers. In 1830 it took the name “San Celestino”, after the relic of the saint kept there, which is now in the parish church.

It was later restored at the expense of the Compagnia della SS. Annunziata and reopened on Easter Day 1926. The church was deconsecrated in 1964 and after that date it housed the Cinema Roma until the 1980s. On the façade there survives a sacred image in coloured tiles depicting the Nativity.

What you see inside

The figures are at work at craft trades, in the fields, in the woods and in a kitchen from many years ago. While the housewives get on with the housework, down in the cellar one man is hammering the hoop of a barrel and another treading grapes in the vat. Beside the lake stands the mill for grinding wheat, and a little further on a waterfall whose water pours from a real glacier.

In the background a landscape of towering snow-covered mountains; at their foot, the grotto of the Nativity. Above the hill woodcutters are cutting firewood, and beside them a small town where everyday activities come back to life, then a little village below the walls of Jerusalem where figures in Eastern dress ply various trades. There are many lighting effects: dawn, sunset, night, the comet star, fires, snow, glaciers, lakes and waterfalls. Among the figures you can pick out craftsmen, washerwomen, fishermen, shepherds, bricklayers, woodcutters and even a barber.