Legends

Between suicidal mermaids, brothers recognizing each other at the point of death, beautiful maidens weeping tears of love, the legends that take place in Salerno are many and painful.
Salerno is city-myth, rich in legends throughout its history. We have told elsewhere the story of the magician Barliario, a historical and legendary character at once, and that of the founding of the Medical School by the four doctors who came from all corners of the world. But let us look at other Salerno legends.
THE FOUNDING OF SALERNO
Salerno, a most noble city, has, inevitably, noble origins. The stories about its founding are many, all of them beautiful.
The Gulf, first of all, is dedicated to the Sirens, two of whom, marked its borders. The Sirens lived on the islets of the Gauls, also known as Sirenuse, and with their song, as Homer tells us, beguiled sailors, who lost control of their ships and were shipwrecked. Odysseus, by having himself tied to the mast of the ship, and plugging the ears of his men, was able to hear their marvelous song, and escape the malice, and the Sirens, despairing of defeat, allowed themselves to die on the beach. The first, Leucosia, lay down at Punta Licosa, the southern peninsula of the Gulf of Salerno; the second, Ligea, at the end of the Sorrento peninsula, the northern part of the Gulf of Salerno. The third, Parthenope, on the beach where Naples, the city dedicated to her, would later rise. The Gulf of Salerno was born marked by the beautiful and cruel Sirens.
But the founding of Salerno is linked, by multiple legendary sources, to the patriarch Noah. The name of the city, according to some, is in fact linked to Queen Elerna, daughter of the builder of the ark. According to others, it was even founded by Sem, one of his three sons, or even Salt, son of Sem, founder of four other cities, all beginning with the letter S.
It is certain that the area of Salerno was the crossroads of several histories and several peoples, for here the Etruscans settled, who had the southern border of their expansion, in relationship in the Sele Plain with the Greeks, who lived in Poseidonia- Paestum. And here pressed the Lucanians and Oscans, pre-Roman Italic peoples. Salerno is, therefore, a crossroads of traditions and peoples since legendary prehistory.
THE TWO BROTHERS
One day a fleet of a thousand Saracen ships appeared in the sea of Salerno. The terrified people took refuge inside the city walls, and a fierce siege began.
The war had been going on for a year, and Prince Guaiferio, no longer able to endure the siege that sowed death, misery, and disease, proposed that a duel between the strongest Saracen and the champion of the Salerno people would end hostilities.
The two knights chosen were Count Umfredo dei Landolfi for the Salernitans and Prince Rajan for the Saracens. From the Sea Gate came out, handsome in his armor, Umfredo, who, mounting a white horse, rode around the walls, shouting his challenge to the Saracen. In response, Rajan appeared, riding his black horse, challenging him and the Salernites who had appeared at the top of the walls to watch the duel. The two knights chased each other and fought with spears, then with swords, first on horseback and then, wounded and tired, on the ground. In the heat of the fight they arrived, between chases and escapes, as far as Vietri. Here the fight continued savagely, with the two knights now clinging to each other, stripped of weapons and bleeding, but determined not to yield to the other.
By sunset they were exhausted, and one and the other leaned against two rocks that reached almost to the beach, the last camp of the duel. At the moment of surrender, Rajan saw on the now naked chest of the Christian knight a crest, the same one he also wore.
That my eyes see, Umfredo, the crest of my family, we are brothers then!
How is it possible, do not offend me, I am your enemy!
But yes, my father all his life sought a son who had been taken from him by pirates, a son who bore the family crest in his chest. And I, I have wounded you to death, brother, forgive me.
And you forgive me, brother, whom only at the point of death did I meet. Farewell.
And the two brothers slipped into the water, dead, trying to embrace each other. Since then the two rocks in front of Vietri beach have been known as the Two Brothers.
THE STORY OF “POOR ENRICO”
The beautiful story of “Poor Henry,” also known as the “Golden Legend,” has been told many times and for many centuries. It testifies how, where medical science cannot, it comes to heal the mystery of Faith.
This is the legend of poor Henry according to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s version.
A young German prince fell ill with the horrible disease of leprosy and no cure could cure him.
One night, while he was suffering as usual, Satan appeared to him, in the guise of a wandering physician, and told him, “There is only one way to heal: obey the Masters of the Salerno Medical School. You must undergo a special cure: wash your sores with the blood of a virgin who will have to sacrifice herself for love.”
The news of this terrible cure became known throughout the Kingdom, and a beautiful and noble maiden named Elsie, came to the Palace. Full of love for young Henry, she offered her life for the cure. But the prince would not accept her sacrifice and decided to set out on a journey to Salerno, to learn directly from the School how to heal.
Arriving in Salerno with his retinue, the prince went to the Palace Chapel and entered just as a new doctor of medicine was being conferred a degree. The young graduate stood before the Almo Collegio Medico, presided over by the Prior, and was holding the disputation with the medical elders.
At the end of the ceremony the young man was given a book on which he swore to follow the rule and ancient formulas of the School, to visit the sick poor twice a day and once at night, and not to take any fees from them. After the solemn oath, the Prior, followed by the Almo Collegio, stepped down from the podium and stood before the young man still kneeling. Once invited to rise he slipped the doctoral ring into his right hand and kissed him on the forehead. Then the Prior, wrapped in the purple robe, embroidered in gold and silver, with an ermine cloak over his shoulders, proclaimed him doctor.
Prince Henry and his retinue were impressed and moved by that scene, and before talking to the doctors, they went to where they were even more surprised by the grandeur and beauty of the temple. When they arrived at the Crypt they knelt before the relics of St. Matthew and behold the miracle! The prince stood up and smiled: on his face the signs of evil had disappeared.
Henry, grateful, lavished rich gifts on the Cathedral; then he wanted to marry on that very miraculous altar his beloved Elsie and was able to return happily to his kingdom.
THE BEAUTIFUL ANTONELLA
Near the Convent of St. Benedict is a fountain, the fountain of the beautiful Antonella, dear to all maidens in love. The beautiful Antonella was a handmaiden of Queen Margaret of Durazzo, who lived in the beautiful palace near precisely St. Benedict. There the maiden met with her beloved Raimondo, a nobleman in the service of King Ladislaus. Love could not be satisfied because of the difference in the rank of the two lovers, and the king sent Ramon to war, where he covered himself with honors. Returning from the war, the king allowed the noble Raymond to marry his Antonella, who had been locked up in the Convent of St. Michael. But in her place came his evil sister. Only when, two years later, Queen Margaret fell ill with the plague and wanted Antonella by her side did she immediately discover her cruel sister’s deception and reveal it to Ramon. His beloved was still imprisoned at St. Michael’s, but she too was ill. Ramon only had time to greet her and watch her die, and then flee, maddened by grief, to the Irno Valley, where her wails of love can still be heard. And the fountain still weeps Antonella’s tears of love, dedicated to all the maidens in love in Salerno.