It concerns a Mid-Lent tradition typical not only of western Friuli, but scattered across various places in a long stretch of Europe running from Portugal to Hungary and which in Italy touches in particular Lombardia, the Veneto, Emilia, Tuscany and Friuli. In summary, a puppet of an old woman (“vecia”) in the Mid-Lent evening is carried in procession, tried, accused of every wrong in the local community and condemned to the stake  despite the work of the defence lawyer.  The Romans also more or less did this two thousand years ago in the "Festum Annae Perennae"(15th March) and in the "Mamuralia" (16th March). The tradition, documented in more than twenty localities of western Friuli, besides Pordenone, was abandoned for some decades in the first half of the 20th century, but it is now in strong recovery in at least ten towns in the Province and the Associazione Propordenone deserves much credit for this. The studies of G. Chiaradia has helped to bring the tradition back into vogue, which is both a palingenesis of local society through the public denunciation of wrongs (rite of expulsion) and a wish for a better future (rite of  propitiation).
The performance of the trial has been supported by the actors of the "L. Rocco" Theatre in Pordenone.

(Source: Propordenone)