SOAS Research Online

Abstract

This reflection on ‘juridical rules and paradigms’ in Pigliaru, prompted by Pietro Clemente and inspired by the reading of Gaetano Riccardo’s article, allows me to return to arguments I have discussed elsewhere. In my view, one of the recurrent problems in Riccardo’s article is the lack of distinction in his interpretation of Pigliaru between ‘vendetta’ as such, and the ‘code of vendetta’ itself, as an instrument (or juridical customary rule) which the community adopts so as to control vendetta. Hence, our task is not to reread Pigliaru with a false sentiment of romanticism, but to clarify how for Pigliaru the ‘code of vendetta’ reveals at the very least an effort towards collective and individual moral choices, in line with Pigliaru’s beloved quotation by Machado: «la monedita del alma si pierde si no se da...».