WATERHOLIC A drop of water a drop of hope

The Legend of Colapesce

The Legend of ColapesceColapesce was a boy, son of a fisherman, who lived in Messina, a city of the Sicily.

Cola loves the sea, and all the good things that it offers…. up to the point that…. as his father catches fishes, he throw them again into the sea!!!

His mother is a really bad one , and the story tells that, being a witch, she transformed Cola in a fish.

Actually he could control that situation, he could choose when to be a fish or human, but he prefers to

spend all the time into the sea. He becomes really useful for fishers: infact he could

advise them when it wasn’t a good idea to go out into the sea, because of an incoming storm!!!

At that time Federico the 2nd was the king of Sicily, and he was really interested in Cola, and he wanted to known him. He meet Cola, and ask him to take back a glass, thrown by the king into the sea. Colapesce did it. After that the king decided to throw his crown, and ask again Colapesce to bring him back. That time, Cola takes 2 days to came back, and relates to the king that he had seen 3 columns, bearing the Sicily island above the sea (one column for each corner of the island, that

has a triangular shape).

But Colapesce noted that one of them was really strong , the second one was pretty good, but third one was close to

collapse.

The King asked Cola the last, hard and brave job: to bring him back a golden ring, from the deep bottom

of the sea. Cola, knowing the difficulty of this act, answered the king that he will find the ring and let him find on the beach 3 days after, but he probably won’t come back from the abyss, exhausted by the

fatigue. 3 days later the king found the ring, but Cola didn’t come back… and people believe he’s still under the sea, upholding the island of Sicily,

replacing the broken column

The Statue of Colapesce – CATANIA