Pistachie - Pistachié - Size Puce (Flea) / Chip

Pistachie - Pistachié

He wears a cotton cap and has evidently dressed rather quickly as his trousers are held up by a single strap of his bracers. 

He is a figure drawn from numerous early Christmas plays, especially Antoine Maurel’s Pastorale, but others as well, and each portrays him with a slightly different personality. In the nativity he carries presents to the Christ Child. A farmhand, he is timid - even a little fearful - and not very bright, but he is jovial and a willing helping hand. In Maurel's Pastorale he adds comic relief to the play when it takes the entire village to rescue him after he falls into a well trying to fetch Margarido's donkey some water. And, he is renown for being a womanizer. His name, derives from the pistachio tree,

Enjoy our blog entry on Pistachié, who is considered to be the No. 10 "Essential" Santons for a Provençal creche.

Provençal Figurines by C. Galtier and E. Cattin, translated by John Lee (Editions Ouest-France, 13 rue du Breil, Rennes, 1996) provides a list of the top 20 Santons "essential" to the Provençal creche.