The Tuscan Tradition of Carnevale di Viareggio: An Exploration of Italian Culture

Mia Boykin

April 7th, 2025— When you walk through the streets of Tuscany’s small towns, they usually hold a calm vibe. Similar to the residential streets of Georgetown, small coffee shops and local businesses line the vias and avenues. If you stay away from the more touristy areas of Tuscany, you can find yourself in a relaxing, beachy environment. Just a short train ride away from Florence you’ll find the town of Viareggio, whose calming waves invite tourists all year round. However, there’s one time of year when the quaint beach town turns into a mile-long party – Carnevale.

At Carnevale, Viareggio, a small beach town on the coast of Tuscany, transforms into a magical universe like nothing tourists have seen before. Towering floats roll through the streets, their papier-mâché figures twisting over the crowd, bringing to life caricatures of politicians and pop culture icons, as well as commenting on social issues. The air vibrates with the hum of hundreds of thousands, their voices blending with the pulse of marching bands and drums. Costumes are everywhere – not just on the performers but on the spectators themselves, blurring the line between observer and participant. For several weeks each year, the city transforms into a stage where satire, artistry, and tradition collide. 

Though the modern Christian practice of carnival celebrates the five weekends before Lent, carnivalesque celebrations are much older. Masked parades with carried or pulled “floats” are a tradition that go back all the way to ancient Rome and early Mediterranean societies. 

Ancient Roman festivals like Saturnalia and Lupercalia were annual events that usually involved inverted social norms, feasting, gift-giving, and social/financial role reversals. Slaves could be given temporary freedom, all work and businesses were suspended, and moral restrictions on citizens were eased; it was definitely a party. When Pope Gregory the Great came into power, he encouraged repurposing Roman traditional festivals into Christian celebrations, and as such, many of these festival characteristics are still involved in carnivals held around the world today.

While festivities like these have long been a part of history, Tuscany’s iconic Carnevale wasn’t officially founded until 1873. What started off as a few wealthy men’s idea for a parade of extravagantly decorated floats quickly turned into a vocal protest from the area’s poorer citizens. Angered by high taxes, these citizens wore masks and overtook the parade, having viewed it as a flaunting of the wealthier class’s luxury while the poor struggled for basic needs. After that, the parade became an annual occurrence for the citizens, who used this opportunity to make fun of politicians and the wealthy, just as the original protestors did. 

  In 1905, the parade moved to the seaside of Viareggio, forming the path for Carnevale to explode in popularity. This is in part due to shipwrights from nearby shipyards who became integral to building the floats as they were available in the wintertime and in part due to the many artists and artisans who would provide creative inspiration for the floats worked along the Ligurian coast. By 1921, the Carnevale became solidified in Viareggio with the writing of its first anthem, Il Carnevale A Viareggio by Icilio Sadun, which gave the life of music to the celebration. And in 1925, a resurgence in crafting with papier-mâché, especially for theater and creative arts, allowed for larger floats, adding to the grandeur of the festivities. 

By 1931, the Carnevale had found its face – the Burlamacco. Designed by Uberto Bonetti after winning a local contest, this grinning, mischievous clown became the official mascot of the celebration. His red and white costume was not just a whimsical choice but a direct homage to the iconic beach umbrellas that line Viareggio’s shores. This moment was more than just creating a mascot, it made the parade and the city inseparable by embedding Viareggio into the festival’s identity. 

Burlamacco is inspired by characters from Italian Commedia dell’Arte. The 16th-century movement relied heavily on masked stock characters and exaggerated performances, allowing performers to embody social satire without fear of direct retribution. At the heart of Viareggio’s carnival is this type of satire, with deep roots in Tuscan theatre. 

The employment of satire in Carnevale represents a sociological mechanism for cultural negotiation, working as a dynamic dialogue between the power of the haves and the resistance of the have-nots. It is a place where artistic expression becomes a nuanced and celebrated part of social critique, where, metaphorically, citizens are able to speak truth to those in office through the protective veneer of artistic performance. 

Many levels of symbolic interactions are addressed through the use of satire, mostly tied to Italian cultural codes and norms. The papier-mâché are not just caricatures, but they are social texts, full of complex narratives that decode and reframe political and social tensions. The extravagant styles and makeup play with beauty and fashion standards, flipping on its head the idea of what can be beautiful or appreciated. The giant floats depicting political shifts provide a space for expressing collective anxieties and critiques of the state of the world. Their humor is almost like a pressure valve, allowing communities around Italy to process these social tensions through laughter, gathering, and artistic expression.

 It’s not just breaking down political leaders for laughs; Carnevale works as a process for social reflection. The satire found in Viareggio is its own dialogue, encouraging attendees to constantly think about the social critiques happening in front of them. It is a unique expression of Italian art, something both deeply serious but fundamentally playful, that has lived on since the 16th century.

The parade paused for five years during World War II, but when it returned, it was stronger than ever. In 1954, the Carnevale was no longer just a local tradition; it had become a national event, broadcast across Italy on television. As the post-war world evolved, so too did the Carnevale’s themes. The 1960s cemented the parade’s political edge as Cold War tensions escalated. Floats now carried larger-than-life caricatures of U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower and Soviet Union Leader Nikita Khrushchev, reflecting global anxieties of nuclear war through humor and exaggeration. 

Due to an increased interest in participation in the parade, the Viareggio National Lottery was established in 1984.  The Lottery opened up admission to float creators from all around Italy and democratized who had access to participate. This expansion reinforced the Carnevale’s role as a stage for national discourse, where artists and designers from different regions could bring their own interpretation of politics, society, and satire to a massive audience of visitors. The Carnevale di Viareggio had become integral to Italian identity, it was no longer just a regional celebration but a cultural touchstone for the entire nation. 

Finally, in 2001, the Cittadella del Carnevale was completed, a space that is dedicated to housing the craftsmans’ workshops, a museum, and educational activities centered around the parade and its history. More than just a marketplace, the Cittadella is a physical manifestation of the Carnevale’s deep-rooted connection to Viareggio. By providing a permanent space dedicated to the culture and community that sustains the event, artisans can work on their projects all year round, building a stronger community among themselves as they interact and work together. The hundreds of thousands of people who visit from around the world turn the Citadella into a cultural hub, sharing a love for Carnevale as they eat, buy, and discuss aspects of Italian culture. 

In 2025, float contestants had a lot to comment on: geopolitical tensions, an increasing reliance on technology in the first years of AI, and constant shifts in social issues happening around the world. The first-place float depicts a female pope – a powerful visual metaphor that challenges centuries of tradition. It’s a quintessential example of the Carnevale’s satire, using humor and artistic expression to probe serious social questions and answers. It’s Late, It’s Late, It’s Late came in second, capturing the modern anxiety around time, commenting on society’s obsession with productivity and the constant race against the clock. A feeling Georgetown students may know well.  Not everything is so serious, though, as the winners of the masquerade category Dream Boy Dream features a multigenerational family, celebrating the persistence of childhood dreams and intergenerational nurturing of hope. The winner of the Isolated Masks category plays with this theme as well, featuring a cuckoo bird leaving its iconic clock, flying away to find its dreams. They both carry a message of hope. Despite all of the issues happening today, there is still room for finding your place in the world, even if you feel like it’s too late. Carnevale di Viareggio embodies this – the constant buzz of creation, the insane outfits and makeup that take months to create, and the celebration of true human imagination – and reminds us all that the whimsy of our dreams is still celebrated.