For the first time, more than 500 years after the founding of the Fabbrica di San Pietro, two women have joined the staff of the sanpietrini maintenance workers of the Vatican Basilica.
They are Lisa (26 years old from the province of Padua) and Miriana (21 years old from Reggio Calabria), both of whom have a background in art studies and have attended the course for decorators, plasterers and masons at the Arts and Crafts School of the Fabbrica di San Pietro.
The presence of women is not new in the Fabbrica's long and ancient experience of work and art, but in no case until now had female workers entered the body of sanpietrini. In fact, the presence of female mosaic workers in the Vatican Mosaic Studio attached to the Fabbrica has been consolidated for years.
In the past, in the 1500s, widows and orphans were employed as workers, almost always owners of a family business inherited from a deceased husband or father, to whom the Fabbrica guaranteed the same economic conditions and working treatment that had been granted to the male head of the family. As time went by, women were hired in the Fabbrica's various craft professions, but until now none had managed to enter the sanpietrini.
