Epiphany is celebrated on 6 January: a religious festivity that, as often happens, has also developed its own profane declination over time. Just as the birth of Jesus, on 25 December, was later joined by the figure of Father Christmas, in the case of the liturgical feast at the beginning of January, popular culture in Italy has seen the emergence of the Befana - an elderly woman capable of flying on a broomstick.
The festivity is linked to the theophany, a word that comes from the Greek theophàneia, and is composed of theos, 'god', and phàinein, 'to manifest'. It is therefore the manifestation of divinity. Another similarly used term is Epiphany, from the Greek επιφάνεια, epiphaneia, meaning "apparition".
