July brings the fiercest heat and some of the shortest nights, a season long cherished by farmers and fishermen. The early summer sun shines intensely through long days when everything seems to move more slowly, and the weight of the great star settles over villages, fields and forests. July is a month of largely forgotten traditions and legends of the old roads, but above all it is the time when the fruits of land and sea can finally be held in our hands: the gift of a sun now fully mature, won through all the labour of the preceding months.