La Befana and Epiphany in Italy: Food, Family, and the Final Feast of the Holidays

This is the busiest night of the year for La Befana. She is flying through the sky on her broom.

There is no point in waiting up for Italy’s Good Witch, because you will not see her. Befana makes terrestrial appearances just once a year, on Epiphany, January 6, when she distributes sweets and small presents to good children, leaving them in stockings.

Throughout Italy, neighborhood pastry shops sell Befana stockings as well, filled with a variety of sweet offerings.

Some children also receive candy coal, which tradition says Befana brings to bad children.

In truth, all children in Italy are good children.

Befana simply knows to bring coal only to those particular children who enjoy the thrill of turning their lips dusty gray and their tongues black.

In Florence, Befana is very much present. On Epiphany morning she delivers her delights to children throughout the city and then makes her way to the Meyer Children’s Hospital just outside of town, where she visits and entertains young patients. Afterwards, she parks her broom and consents to be driven in a cortege of historic cars that proceeds slowly along the Arno, crosses the Ponte Vecchio, and arrives at Piazza della Repubblica, where more children anxiously await her.

Several years ago, my daughter and son were among them.

The Befana they met was delightful – homely, generous, warm – and perfectly matched their idea of what a Befana should be. She spoke with a strong Tuscan accent. She arrived and departed in a magnificent blue 1933 Peugeot.

On Befana day, I trust that you are taking the day off.

Children are especially celebrated, but it is also a day when families — perhaps for the fifth time in two weeks — come together for one last holiday gathering, often at lunch. There is no prescribed menu for Befana. Unlike Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, or New Year’s Day, the meal has no fixed culinary obligations. It resembles, instead, a particularly important Sunday lunch. And if the family has not yet exhausted it, this may be the occasion for the final panettone of the season.

It is difficult to love Italy and be anywhere else at this time of year.

There are, however, three people who are working today : the Three Kings. Melchior, from Persia; Caspar, from India; and Balthazar, from Arabia or Ethiopia, are on the final leg of their long journey to visit the infant Jesus.

In Florence they look as if they had just stepped from a Renaissance fresco.

It seems almost certain that they, and Befana as well — perhaps all together — will enjoy an excellent Epiphany lunch.

For two weeks in Italy, from December 24 through January 6, life revolves around food, family, friends, travel, tradition, rest, and more food. Visiting Italy during this period offers a holiday that does not end after two brief days, but continues without interruption for several generous weeks.

Every Insider’s Italy client traveling privately in Italy during this time is part of the celebration.  We place you directly inside the holiday traditions of each place — bonfires, Christmas markets, concerts, pageants, vin brûlé, presepi, bagpipes, and more. You are present at every holiday table.

Please enjoy this small Befana gift to lovers of Italy.

And consider joining us next December and January for a winter journey in Italy that places you inside the season rather than observing it from the edges. Start your planning here.

Auguri e Buona Befana !