Rosa Lotti, The Close Encounter Of Cennina

November 1, 1954 - CENNINA

A 40-year-old farmer, Rosa Lotti in Dainelli, was going to the church of Cennina, walking through the narrow path of a forest. He had a bunch of flowers, a pair of shoes, and one of the socks with him. Just before arriving in a clearing, she noticed a strange "something" protruding from the bushes: when she arrived at the clearing, she saw that it was a large "spindle", very pot-bellied centrally and with pointed ends.

The object was vertically stuck in the ground: it seemed to consist of two cones joined for the bases, with a length of about two meters and a width, in the center, of about one meter and twenty centimeters. It was opaque brown in color, as "covered in leather": in the central part, opposite to one another, there were two portholes and in the middle of these, in the lower cone, a closed glass door.

Two "beings" suddenly emerged from some broom bushes, cutting the road for the woman. About a meter tall, proportionate, with a totally human appearance, they were "beautiful": they appeared "a little old" and spoke in a normal voice, but in an unknown language. Both smiled continuously, probably due to the fact that the upper lip appeared raised. They wore a tight gray jumpsuit, a jacket accolade with shiny buttons, and, on the shoulders, a short cape. On their heads they had a leather-like helmet, with two "disks" in correspondence to the ears: on the face, the shading of a recently cut beard was noticed.

One of the two beings, "the oldest and most dark-haired", began to speak to the witness, who understood nothing ("seemed Chinese"). At a certain point, he took the bunch of flowers and a sock out of his hand, still smiling, examining them, and then going towards the object. The witness followed him, protesting and asking for the return, at least, of the stocking: the little man seemed to understand it and returned a part of the flowers. When he reached the object he put a hand on the door, which opened outwards, and threw in the remaining flowers and the sock. The woman, from about two meters away, saw the inside of the object: there were two small round seats placed in front of the two side portholes, placed in a particularly narrow space.

The being then took a cylinder-shaped object (a "roll" or an "ingot") from the door, brown in color, and with a smooth surface, centimeters long. He held this object at the level of his stomach, pointing it towards the head as if he were going to "take a photograph". At this point, the woman worried enough to move quickly from the place: in doing so, she had the impression that the being was offering him the brown object. After a few meters, she turned and saw that the two beings followed her with their eyes, still standing near the "spindle", talking to each other. Then she continued the journey, arriving out of breath at the church, where she told what she had seen to acquaintances.

The whole experience lasted about ten minutes. After about half an hour, some people, following the story told by the woman, went to the place: they found a hole in the ground, as produced by a large pointed pole, with a diameter of ten centimeters and a depth of about fifteen. In the area, before and after the event, there were sightings of a luminous object seen landing and taking off from the wood where the meeting took place, as well as the observation of a low-altitude flying device always near the area.

Main sources

The Nation 2/11/1954; Il Giornale del Mattino 2-3-5 / 11/1954 + 2/3/1955; GdM 2, 17, 7-9; UFO Newsletter 13, 77, 10-15: UFO in Italy II, 287; Nazione Sera & Corriere della Sera 2/11/1954; La Provincia & Corriere della Sera 3/11/1954; Morning Newspaper 12/11/1954; GRSF report; Pinotti-Sani relationship; UFO News 7, 44, 11-15; NOBLE I, 16-22; GdM 14, 152, 10; Today 15/4/1078; Eva Express 23/3/1978; Grand Hotel 6/18/1978; Panorama 1/11/1973 & 14/3/1978; MANZI I, 50-51; BULGARINI I, 67; S.Becciolini report; FSR 18, 5 + BOWEN I, 63

COMMENT

The first investigation into this, in many ways, "extraordinary" event, was carried out many years later: probably the first-ever was conducted by the Prato group GRSF of Siro Menicucci in 1972, followed the following year by a visit by the researcher Paolo Fiorino.

The tracks that were mentioned at the time were seen only by a few people, but, oddly enough, no photographs were taken of them. A few months later it became known that two children, Amelia (6) and Marcello (9) Torzini, while they were watching the pigs in the same wood, heard voices and saw Lotti speak with the "little men" in the clearing of the meeting. The elder of the two went to call his father, but when he got there everything was over, even if he could see the trace himself. The children, then questioned by journalists, fell into contradiction and their testimony, resulting from a school exercise by Ampelio, remains very ambiguous, so as to cast serious doubts on the authenticity of the story (childhood fantasies?).

According to the witness's husband, a gamekeeper named Rossi who was near the famous clearing (about two hundred meters away), hidden from him by a rise in the ground and vegetation, heard a conversation, but, attributing it to "chatter of women, ”he paid no attention. The evening before the meeting, at Lotti's house, there would be the talk of "flying saucers", a topic in those days of great popularity, given the wave of sightings that was taking place in Italy.

Someone, regarding the woman's testimony, put forward the hypothesis of "hallucination", even more, difficult to prove than others and, in any case, quite implausible in light of the characteristics of the woman's story. A letter received in the "Giornale del Mattino" a few days later, in the form of a postcard set in Rome, referred to the declarations of an anonymous person, according to which he himself was the creator of the staging staged against the witness.

In the area there were many other sightings, preceding and following the observation of Lotti. The latter confirmed, also on the occasion of an interview in January 1993 with a ufology enthusiast, that she had had numerous visits following the disclosure of her experience. One, in particular, referred to a woman from Genoa who would have had a sighting very similar to hers. Also in the course of this new investigation, a man (at the time a boy) was heard who would have directly seen the traces of the Lotti-Dainelli meeting place. It would have been a "hole" about fifteen centimeters deep, all around which there were traces of burning; moreover, there would have been a very strong smell of "overheated brakes" on the site. Since this is the first time that we talk about burns (which should have already been highlighted at the time, as a further, logical, evidentiary element of the meeting), it is legitimate to have some doubts about the validity or credibility of the memory of such witness.

To pronounce on a possible interpretation of this particular episode (probably the most famous of its kind in Italy and rather known also abroad) is not easy, given its characteristics, nor reasonably possible. Unfortunately, the lack of investigations carried out at the time does not allow further information on the witness and on the context in which this story matured and was disclosed. Some unclear points (for example the tracks not photographed) are present in the context of the case.

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