Keeping an ancient paper-making technique, and the papyrus, alive in Europe.
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NEWSLETTER | APRIL 18, 2025
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An Unbroken Tradition
WAIST DEEP IN WATER, Angelo Mortellaro is dwarfed by the towering papyrus plants that surround him. Graceful, yet sturdy, the stems stretch some five to six meters towards the sky, only for their lush foliage to drape back down towards the water like delicate firework explosions of strands and spikes.
Wading through the pond on his carefully-tended farm just outside the Sicilian town of Syracuse in Southern Italy, Mortellaro examines the plants with calm focus. Selecting those ready for harvest, he uses a small sickle with practiced ease as he cuts the mature plants near the base of the stem, collecting the reeds in a pile on the shore.
Mortellaro’s farm is designed as an oasis with a single water-access point that supplies the entire papyrus plantation. Home to many other plants that thrive in the Mediterranean environment — palm trees, crane flowers, willows, orange trees, prickly pear cacti, and sugar cane, to name a few — it is one of the last remaining papyrus farms in the region. And it is located just a few miles from the only wild papyrus refuge outside of Africa: the Ciane River.
In addition to growing papyrus, Mortellaro also practices the centuries-old craft of papyrus papermaking, an art once prevalent in the region. “My grandfather, Angelo La Mesa, was a papyrus farmer,” Mortellaro recalls. “He used to supply papyrus to local papermakers and I would spend a lot of time with him by the ponds where papyrus grew. I was fascinated by the artisans who used to come by my grandfather’s farm to pick up the stalks for papermaking.”
Today, some 40 years later, Mortellaro is among the few remaining artisans in the area who still make papyrus paper — but he faces growing threats to this endeavor. Pollution has been creeping into the Ciane, threatening the ecosystem there. At the same time, warmer, drier seasons have made it harder for papyrus plants to grow in Syracuse, both in the wild and on local farms.
Reporter Camilla Capasso’s feature about one of Europe’s last papyrus paper makers beautifully captures Angelo Mortellaro’s commitment to keep alive a species and a tradition that are quietly slipping away.
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