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| Barthélemy Lauvergne: Tórshavn in 1839 (from Voyages de la Commission scientifique de Nord: en Scandinavie, en Laponie, au Spitzberg et aux Feroe, pendant les années 1838, 1839 et 1849, sur la corvette La Recherche) |
The book has the following basic structure:
a) an historical, geo-climatically, administrative, ethno-anthropological and linguistic introduction to both Faroe Islands and Carnia;
b) the singling-out of the ethno-cultural identities of the two communities: Faroe, a small community-nation; Carnia, a strong regional identity.
c) the two communities amid tradition and change:
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| Samal Elias Joensen-Mikines: Pilot Whale hunt [grindadrap], 1942 |
- the Faroe Islands: the bygd and the traditional self-sufficient community economy (fishing, farming, cultivation, fowling, grindadrap). The changing economy connected to: 1) the sea: deep fishing, ship-building; 2) tending towards the new frontiers of tourism;
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| From the top of the winding access road, overlooking the extraordinary village of Tjørnuvik, Northern Streymoy, embedded in a typical Faroese botnur (narrow valley) (© Franco Pelliccioni) |
- Carnia: a modern post-industrial economy, which keeps still strong ties with the mountain habitat (wood industry and handicraft, farming, cultivations), but that is also tending towards a stronger touristic development;
d) the Great Faroe Crisis of the 1990s and emigration.
Carnia, land of centuries old temporary and permanent emigration (till the 1960s and 1970s);
e) two case studies in comparison: the isolated communities of Mykines (Faroe) and Sauris (Carnia).
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| Stavolo [shed] and in the background the bell tower and the church of S. Osvaldo, Sauris di Sotto (© Franco Pelliccioni) |
I should add something more about the last section of the book. I have naturally thought that it was necessary to focus some more details of the two situations. As we have just seen, our two "worlds", the Atlantic-one, and the Alpine-one, are enough comparable between them. According what represents their main characteristic: isolation in the course of ages. So, bringing selected pieces of different cultural realities, and trying to focus them, is a manner, according me, to try to reach a greater comprehensive picture of the entire frame.
Isolation has strongly affected both the communities of the sea-island of Mykines and of the land-island of the valley of Sauris. And just for this reason, it has been practically impossible for me to reach that Faroe island. But not Sauris!
Both places are heavily menaced by strong depopulation. Both are looking for a new chance to survive in a future selected tourism. Both are still experiencing a strong relation man-environment based upon respect. So strong is this attitude, that nature in Mykines must be still be valued in all its great importance!
Both communities have complied totally with their traditional patterns of spontaneous architectures, perhaps more than other places, in the Faroe, as in Carnia.
Both their peoples may tell outsiders their long, dramatic, life histories. Made of hardship for islanders and for somari (donkeys) - the Sauris men - and dangerous work (especially for the Mykines islanders and fishermen).
Both have experienced weeks, sometimes months, or no contact at all with the outside world.
Moreover, it should be also said, Sauris it is, not only an "island" and highland (the highest hamlet is located 1,400 metres above sea level8) within the archipelago Carnia: in its turn made of several, little or wide, valleys, places, towns, villages, within the autonomous Friuli-Venezia Giulia region.
Sauris, as a matter of fact, represents also an ethno-cultural and linguistic separateness from any other parts of Carnia. Because it is a German-speaking community, founded in the XIII century by Bavarian farmers. And the place was reached by a military road for the first time in the history only during the Great War. A normal road was builded later, in 1934. Because the four villages, who made this community, were so poor and so unimportant that they couldn't afford, not even with an outside help, the costs of a road!
...
The distance of the Faroe islands from Denmark, and their rough and wild landscape, that have preserved them from an intense colonization from the European country, combines itself with the obstinacy, the perseverance, the courage, the attachment of the Faroese people to their own language and roots. And still: the notable isolation of the archipelago from the rest of the world, as well as of each village and island from all other villages and islands: all this meant that, respect to other archipelagos, the traditional heritage of the original culture, as well as the same life style of these small farmers-breeders and fishermen, have endured very well the wear and tear of time.
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| Faroese dance â Viðareidi [Island of Viðoy], by Franz Emil Krause (1836 - 1900) |
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| In the roykstova. Photo of Johannes Klein. Nationalmuseet, Denmark |
Much is also owed to the oral tradition, an important “school of life”. That has been able to let go by, almost undamaged, the "witness": the past, the fantastic one, but also the real one. In the roykstova, in an intimate and moody atmosphere, between hot flashes and sparkles of flames, they would have been again alive the heroes of a mythical past, and those nearer to us and truer. All of them, however, would have offered to the bystanders a small gem of life, of culture, of what in the incoming times would still be the Faroese life style. Marked with wisdom, honesty, courage, yet perseverance. Here, between myth and reality, each new generation was informally inculturated. Slowly learning those that were the authentic values of the structure of the Faroese Atlantic Maritime Culture.
...
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| A Carnian cjargna (kitchen) |
Somebody has defined the Friulan-Carnian culture as a "civilization of the fogolâr" (fire-place). As a matter of fact, like in the Fær Øer, the kitchen with his fireplace has always had an important rôle in the community sphere. "The union, the meeting that happened between peoples of every age, and of more than a family, around a fire-place was and still partly is today a determinant element of our culture. Because in these evenings unions were consolidated and traditions were handed down. These meetings happened almost every evening during the winter periods (...) The host family (...) set out an ample kitchen and in this all settled (...) The men spoke about what did happened to them abroad, of the plans for the following year, of the jobs to do (…) the boys, that were busy with their games (...) instead were a sort of big sponges that absorbed everything!"
Just in those same occasions, but also in others, in the "fredde serate invernali trascorse nelle stalle a fare la "file" (vegliare) i vecchi, Dio li abbia in gloria, (che) narravano leggende e miti di cui la tradizione orale carnica è ricchissima" [in the cold winter evenings spent in the stables to make the "file" (“keep watch the old people”), God bless them, (that) recounted legends and myths of which the Carnian oral tradition is rich].
From: ARCHIPELAGOS AND ISLANDS AT THE MIRROR. SEA-ONES (FAROE and MYKINES, DENMARK), LAND-ONES (CARNIA AND SAURIS, ITALY)
E-Book, paper version in colour, I and II ed., and in black and white, 111 pages, 90 notes, 105 images (66 belong to the Photo Library of the A.)
,%20LAND-ONES%20(CARNIA%20and%20SAURIS,%20Italy).jpg) |
| Colour I Ed. https://www.amazon.it/dp/1521472084 |
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| "black and white" https://www.amazon.it/dp/1095009621 |
1. Preface
2. An ethno-anthropological approach to two cultural distances
3. Historical-geographical introduction
3.1. The archipelago of the Fær Øer
3.2. Carnia (Cjargne)
3.3. Discussion
4. The ethnic-cultural and linguistic identities
4.1. Fær Øer, a small "community-nation"
4.2. Carnia, a strong regional identity.
4.3. Discussion
5. Man-environment relationship
5.1. In the Fær Øer: the sea and the islands
5.2. In Carnia: the wood and the mountain.
5.3. Discussion
6. The two economies between tradition and change
6.1. Fær Øer: the bygd and the traditional community subsistence economy
6.1.1. Fishing and grindadrap (the community whale hunting), fowling, cultivation and breeding
6.1.2 The changing economy: oceanic fishing, shipyards and tourism
6.2. Carnia: the traditional economy, the alimentary self-sufficiency
6.2.1. The Carnian modern economy and the wood: industry and craftsmanship; tourism
6.3. Discussion
7. The great existential crisis of yesterday
7.1. The great Faroese crisis of the 1990s and the emigration
7.2. Carnia land of temporary and permanent emigration up to the 1960s and 1970s
7.3. Discussion
8. Two “islands” at the mirror: Mykines (Fær Øer) and Sauris (Carnia)
8.1. Mykines (Fær Øer)
8.2. Sauris (Carnia)
9. Bibliography
9.1. Fær Øer
9.2. Carnia
