Vajont, Erto and Longarone

The old river port of Codissago lies on the left bank of the River (Fiume in Italian) Piave.   
Una (my bicycle) and I arrived for the first time in Codissago  late on the evening of 29th August 1998.  I was visiting my old friend Umberto Olivier.  

Barbara checks out Umberto's pose.   [© Peter Alexander Gray 1998]

Please note that I have already posted in this blog here information concerning Codissago.  
The photograph on the right was taken outside Umberto's house in Via IX Ottobre, Codissago.   I stayed there that night and the next morning Umberto took us both on a tour round the villages surrounding the Vajont dam.

Umberto is a native of Longarone, and was in Milan on a business trip when the terrible events of the Vajont Dam Disaster of October 1963 occurred. As a result, he was the only member of his family to survive.







The events leading up to the disaster and the aftermath are the subject of Renzo Martinelli's film 'Vajont'.  The film features the attempts of the communist journalist Tina Merlin to alert the government to the effects of the construction of the Valont reservoir next to Monte Toc which, up to the night of the 9th October, had exhibited signs of an imminent landslide. This was in the form of movement cracks on the north face bordering the lake, and cracks forming in the walls of building in the villages around the lake.

At 10.39 pm more than the usual number of people were in the three inns of Longarone watching the football match between Real Madrid and Glasgow Rangers, when the disaster happened.

260 million cubic metres of rock (marked 'FRANA DEL MONTE TOC' on the map below) slipped off the north face of Monte Toc into the reservoir causing huge waves, big enough, for example, to take the roof off the schoolhouse at Casso.  Most of the small villages around the lake were reduced to rubble.  

If you examine the map below carefully you will see a shape like a crescent moon, but black in colour.  This is the barrier of the original reservoir.  The lake (Lago del Vajont) itself has been shifted about two kilometres east as a result of the vast landslide.  

To extract water from the lake, engineers have bored a tunnel (dotted blue lines) through the debris of the landslip; today the Vajont reservoir provides water for HEP (hydro electric power) and also water for the irrigation of crops.

Map showing the location of Castello Lavazzo, Codissago and Longarone [Carte e Piante Turistiche Tobacco sheet 21]

Below the reservoir, to the west, Longarone was wrecked and buried under mud.  Codissago was also severely damaged.  Over 2000 people died.  Tina Merlin's book Sulla Pelle Viva tells the whole story on which the film is based.

Lago del Vajont and Erto, San Martino and Pineda [Carte e Piante Turistiche Tobacco sheet 21]

Umberto drove us both around the Vajont valley in his car.  After 35 years, life had returned to some sort of normality, though pain and resentment were still there to see. 

Erto in 1998  [© Peter Alexander Gray 1998]

SADE (Società Adriatica di Elettricità) - the Italian energy monopoly - built the dam  despite warnings that the entire side of Monte Toc was unstable and would likely collapse into the reservoir if the filling were completed.

Construction was completed in 1963 and in March of that year the dam was transferred to the newly constituted government service for electricity, ENEL. During the following summer, with the reservoir almost completely filled, tremors and cracks in the ground were continuously reported by worried local people.  All the authorities, including the government, ignored the reports.  The sign on the wall in the photo above says SADE + ENEL + Government = 2500 dead.

Today, much of the site of the old town of Longarone has been redeveloped as industrial units bringing greatly-needed employment in the form of light manufacturing.   The timber industry is still much in evidence, too.  There is a new church in the town which is also a memorial to the people in the area who died in 1963.

I'm sorry that the subject of this month's post is such a sad one.  In the next post will continue the journey south along the riverside towards Belluno.

Note: This blog supports readers of The Door of Perarolo, a historical novel set in Cadore, Italy in the early nineteenth century.  You can examine feedback from readers in the UK here and in the US here.  The Door of Perarolo is a Kindle ebook comprising 140 chapters.  It can be downloaded from Amazon sites worldwide.  The launch post of this blog gives further details.  The second post provides links to maps, etc.

From Rivalgo to Codissago

The last post has brought much correspondence.  

Initials over the gate in Rivalgo [Courtesy Franco Baldissarutti]

I must thank in particular Giancarlo Soravia in Venas di Cadore, Vittorina in Il Covo dei Zater in Perarolo, Franco Baldissarutti in San Stefano, and Enzo Zanvettor from Ospitale who was visiting Perarolo recently and spoke with Giancarlo on the subject of the initials over the gate at Rivalgo. 

In the last blog taken from my audio diary of August 1998 I stated that the initials over the gate (the wrought iron gate on the opposite side of the street from the church) were 'CJM'.  I was wrong.

In fact they are 'CSM' and stand for Cristoforo Svaluto Moreolo.  The name 'Svaluto Moreolo' is one of an ancient family of the Cadore region.  I had no idea that a chance observation would throw up so much discussion!  A big 'thank you' to Carlo et al!

Rivalgo looking north [Courtesy Aldo De Bastiani]

In the 19th century the Svaluto Moreolo family owned sawmills in the Piave valley, and had property in Venice.  Cristoforo's initials CSM appear on a well there bearing the date 1887.

I am recently indebted to Aldo De Bastiani for giving me permission me to use his fine photograph of Rivalgo, showing the church and the gate on the right.  

Since the last post blog post Franco Baldissarutti has contacted me again to say that the gateway has now been demolished (the house that stood in the grounds beyond was demolished many years ago).  I would assume that this was to allow the road to be widened,which in turn would be of benefit to the facade of the church which is subject to wear and tear from debris thrown up by through traffic.

My audio diary from that Saturday in August 1998 tells me that it was approaching  5.00 pm and the light was fading fast - the Piave flows through a valley flanked by mountain ranges  on both banks.  

Una (my bicycle) and I had a quick look at Ospitale before pressing on downriver (see the previous post for details of the great rock in the river, Sas Levado, upstream of Ospitale).

The Piave valley between Rivalgo and Ospitale [Tabacco Carte e Piante  Turistiche Sheet 21]

The tiny church at Ospitale
[© Peter Alexander Gray 1998]

My diary records that '...there is a little stream (the Valbona) running down through Ospitale 'in terraces'.  Beautiful hills everywhere...'  I took one hurried photo of a tiny church, then pressed on down the Piave.

The photo (attribution unknown) below shows a better view.  This is part of Ospitale is Sottospitale (Lower Ospitale). 

There exists another larger church further up the hill, but, that evening, time was short  and I needed still to visit Termine before heading finally to Codissago to stay the night with my friends there, Umberto and Barbara.

On old maps the name of the town is shown as 'Hospitale' (the letter 'h' - rarely used - is not aspirated in spoken Italian).   Umberto Olivier told me (the next day) that Ospitale gives its name to the word 'hospital'. The name of the village itself originates from an ancient hospice (the building still survives in Upper Ospitale) intended for pilgrims and wayfarers passing through.

The Piave valley between Ospitale and Codissago
[Tabacco Carte e Piante  Turistiche Sheet 21]

It was time for Una and I to set off downriver again.  What a day!  From Cima Sapadda to Calazo... then Pieve, Perarolo, Ospitale...  I was exhausted!

I permitted myself a quick visit to Davestra, but there wasn't time to photograph any of a most interesting village, before Una and I were away again heading south to Termine.

Termine is so-named because it is situated at the southern  limit of the region where the Cadorino language is spoken in Cadore.  Immediately south of Termine, the language that was spoken in the 19C was Bellunese.  With the coming of television in particular, the Italian language has become dominant throughout Italy.

But local languages are still important, and there are many institutions dedicated to the recording and preserving of these languages.  Anyone speaking Italian and interested in knowing more about the Cadorino language should visit Carlo Soravia's quite exceptionally detailed blog.  There you will find also links to much fascinating information about the history and culture of Cadore.

For those of you who have been following the Scottish referendum this year, let me say Scotland, as a nation, has confirmed it is happy to remain part of the United Kingdom.  We have, as in Italy, many local languages.  I prefer to call them languages, as they are not dialects of English.  The language still spoken in the region of Scotland where I live (the Moray coast) is Doric.  It is not related to Gaelic,  other than it imports 'loan words' - as do all languages.

I digress!  Let me say I am once again indebted to Franco Baldissarutti for writing to me and sending me a photo - in this case of Termine.

The church at Termine looking down the street
 [Courtesy Franco Baldissarutti]

Here is Franco's photo of the wonderful little church there. My diary of 1998 states, 'It is the smallest church - the building is square but the corners are cut off!'

At 6pm the light was really bad - but this was the most remarkable little place of worship I had seen so far on my journey down the Piave valley, so I had to try and take a photo.

The church of S. Maria Maddalena
looking up the street  in the half light
[© Peter Alexander Gray 1998]

Above is my own attempt on a darkening Saturday evening in August 1998.  Then it was down the Piave again - not the easiest stretch passing by the cliffs under Castello Lavazzo with heavy traffic roaring past - over the Ponte Malcolm and so into Codisaggo.  I have already published a lengthy post about Codissago in this blog.  You can read it here.  The next post covers the stretch of river from Codissago to Belluno, and also says a little about that saddest of subjects - Vajont.

Note: This blog supports readers of The Door of Perarolo, a historical novel set in Cadore, Italy in the early nineteenth century.  You can examine feedback from readers in the UK here and in the US here.  The Door of Perarolo is a Kindle ebook comprising 140 chapters.  It can be downloaded from Amazon sites worldwide.  The launch post of this blog gives further details.  The second post provides links to maps, etc.

Downriver from Perarolo towards Codissago

It was time to leave Perarolo behind and head down the Piave valley on my bike.  The water level in the Piave will no longer support rafting, due to the complex system of dams that have been built which draw off water for crop irrigation and for HEP (hydro-electric power).  

A rainy Perarolo looking south [© Peter Alexander Gray 2012]

However, we can find from records what it was like to travel on a commercial raft leaving Perarolo for Codissago.  

The travel writer Napoleone Cozzi described such a journey made in August 1898, and his description has never been bettered:

Of the first moments, there remains only a confused memory: the sharp command of the head zattiere, the strike of oar that with resolve directs us in the middle of the river, the chorus of the salutes and the wishes that rise from the bank; at the first bend Perarolo disappears.

Napoleone Cozzi's 19C sketch of a three-section zattera

What a feeling! What a profusion of ever-new wonders, how many unexpected beauties, what lights, what coolness!

The zattera normally follows the principal trunk of the river; now it winds in narrow or wide curves, silent and fast; it passes out under a rock of lead, it pushes through the foliage, it goes into a gorge, then exits free into a wide river basin.

At the bottom, at the opening of the valley that catches the eye, the last violet crags seem to compete among themselves to be first to show their details; they are made grey, they offer the cleanest contour, the most definite shades; they cast on the margins of still water their trembling reflections, they pass quickly, showing patches of blossom, scrubs of firs, unexpected rivulets, landslides, paths, valley dwellers, ravines, torn banks, vagueness in all the forms; they disappear at a turning to reappear later behind us, distant, with their forms made smaller, confused, with the forests pale, with their lines lost among the light shades.

We pass rustic cottages, isolated or in groups, pass flour mills, bridges, sawmills; valleys supply secondary tributaries that add to the increasing greatness of the Piave, with cascades, with a last fall or by just gently flowing down through their flat beds of gravel. 

Up there aloft, on the road that follows the line of the river... holidaymakers look us bewildered, answering our mimed greetings with the waving of handkerchiefs.

Heading downriver         [© Peter Alexander Gray 1998]

The road which I cycled in 1998 followed the same river, but was a much wider, modern road.  The flow of the Piave being much reduced nowadays can make the river (lower left-hand corner) more difficult to photograph from the road.

I hadn't time to stop and look at the famous Madonna della Salute chapel at Macchietto, as I had set off from Cima Sappada the morning of that same day (August 1998), and visited Pieve and Perarolo en route.  

The Piave valley between Macchietto and Ospitale
Carte e Piante Turistiche Tobacco sheet 1

The travel writer the Reverend Robertson, travelling north through the valley in the late nineteenth century, wrote:

The next two villages, Rivalgo and Riccorbo [sic], have a place in both ancient and modern history. Both are mentioned in documents of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries in connection with the wood trade, and both are famous in the struggle to throw off Austrian rule in 1848. Just outside the former place is another obelisk of red stone.  

Obelisk from 1848.  The names of the Cadorini were added 150 years later

It was difficult to realise, as we drove along amid scenes of peacefulness and beauty, the terrible fighting that took place here so recently. As we approached Riccorbo [sic] there was just room for the road to pass under the cliffs that overhung the Piave. Here the leader Calvi barricaded road and river, and had the cliffs undermined as at Tovanella, and men stationed with levers to hurl the shattered rocks upon the enemy, When the Austrians with disastrous results. In the pause that ensued a flag of truce was displayed by the enemy, and Calvi caused hostilities to cease, and prepared to speak with the Austrian General Sturmer, when the cry of treachery arose. Under cover of the flag the Austrians were scaling the cliffs above. The Cadorini fought with redoubled energy, and the Austrians, 5000 strong, were forced to retire. General Stiirmer praised the heroism of the Cadorini, and was more than astonished afterwards to learn that they were not regular soldiers, but only undisciplined mountaineers.

In my diary of 1998 I wrote: 

It’s half past four and I am at Rivalgo.  Looking around, the whole place has been blasted by [debris thrown up by] passing road traffic.  What a great shame – it was was clearly once a quaint old town. 

The church at Rivalgo - image © Franco Baldissarutti

The church at Rivalgo.Image © Franco Baldissarutti

There is a very small church; on the left of it is a square tower with the bell in arches.  Tiled roof.  Entrance to church archway with square windows on either side arches and metal grill with circles set into it - all metal.  Frescos on the front which is a creamy colour.

I am most grateful to Franco Baldissatrutti for permission to use these images.

There is one more entry in my diary relating to Rivalgo.  

Huge iron gate to my right [on the opposite side of the road] with CJM on the top – wonder if it is someone descended from the Malcolm family of Longarone?  

Gate at Rivalgo with initials 'CJM'
Image © Franco Baldissarutti

I've flipped Franco's original image (taken on the other side of the gate from where I was standing in 1998) so as to make the initials 'CJM' more easily recognised).

The diary continues:

Looking down the valley there are sand quarries.  I’m only about a third a way down [the valley towards Codissago] so need to press on towards Ospitale.

There is a huge rock in the river north of Ospitale - the Sas Levado.  

The Sas Levado [© Peter Alexander Gray 1998]

Here the zattere were pushed into a narrow channel, where rocks and submerged branches could damage the craft.  Once past the Sas Levado the rafts plunged down into safer waters - if they were still in one piece!

Franco Losso in his informative article Da Codissago a Perarolo says 'Along the first stage [from Perarolo to Codissago], with so many risky points, the Sas Levado was, for the zattieri, perhaps the one of the most imminent danger...  

All Napoleone Cozzi's beautiful watercolour illustrations (the full-size portfolios) are held in the collections at the Centro Regionale di Catalogazione e Restauro dei Beni Culturali.

There were numerous cataracts and falls along the river.  Napoleone Cozzi's trip was a good one:

But these impatiences, this restlessness, these nervousness, are compensated at some points by exuberance, the most beautiful, the most grand of the journey, that don't have comparison, that raise above every

superlative, over every well-worn cliché: The falls!

They are five of it or six of them.  What a strange impression the first time!  That double near Longerone is sublime!

By now at a certain distance, the

course of the river seems truncated by a dam that crosses it leaving a narrow outlet over which the enormous liquid mass falls with a roar. Looking within into one’s thoughts the whole desire is to believe that the zattera will surely be held back or diverted by whoever known means one can devise, from who knows what providential source.  Run free instead and dare the Devil! It is an unworthiness; it must be a big a colossal jest or a madness without name; the zattèri must be crazy. There is by now no escape; in a few moments we will be absorbed, swallowed. Speed still increases, the roar becomes more and more deafening. You want to cover your face with your hands, would want to rebel and make a desperate jump for  the fleeing gravel banks.

We are there: The two front men leave the oars, they turn them and fix them with ropes; the first part of the zattera squeals, it folds up, it falls, to disappear. Behind us upright, fierce, impassive as the god of the storms, the head zattiere directs a last stroke of the oar, then lowers it and now also secures it.  Here is the instant: Gods of the abyss! The support goes from under us; fingers grab on to the beams, become entangled with the ropes, with the cords, and with a big cry of passion we sink, intoxicated with emotion, licked up by a wave of foam, wound by a downpour of silver spray.

The stretch between Perarolo and Longarone lasts a couple of hours and is the most beautiful in life.  It is a mix of enchanting feelings that are happening fast and continuous. It is a dream radiated by delicious images. It is a jubilation, of which a single recollection is sufficient to cure all the melancholies of man’s life and it is a wonder that it is not the preferred amusement of half of humanity.

Note: This blog supports readers of The Door of Perarolo, a historical novel set in Cadore, Italy in the early nineteenth century.  You may examine feedback from readers in the UK here and in the US here.  The Door of Perarolo is a Kindle ebook comprising 140 chapters.  It can be downloaded from Amazon sites worldwide.  The launch post of this blog gives further details.  The second post provides links to maps, etc.

July Postbag

A recurring question from readers concerns names - the names of characters in The Door of Perarolo and also place names.

Annie in Hereford has asked me specifically about the
name 'Fortin'.  Fortin in French means 'little fort'.  Not that I would have known that if it wasn't for Nadia, a dear friend who lives in Paris.   My thanks go out to her and Veronique, both of whom helped me with so many things French while writing The Door of Perarolo, especially the proverbs and quotations.

A little fort
My thanks to Le Wooden Toy
 for permission to use this image

Xavier Fortin was one of those people historians never record.  He wasn't famous, he was just an ordinary person.  Someone for sure arranged the transportation of the masts  from the Dolomites to Venice, but it wasn't someone like Tupinier or Maillot.  People in positions of authority don't do donkey-work.  

So I gave this anonymous person a name: Xavier Fortin.  I needed to give him a surname that could be either a French name or an Italian one.  Knowing he was a strong man, I chose Fortin.  

There are many Italians whose last names that have that 'in' ending.  Pierre Cardin is one.  He was born in 1922 in a town near Venice, moving to France after WW2.

Johann Karl Freiherr von Hiller

When writing The Door of Perarolo I worked from my research notes keeping as close as possible to the known facts about Tupinier, Maillot, Salvini, Hiller, Bellegarde, Murat and all the rest of the real historical characters.  

For those Austrian characters that were fictitious I generally used real Austrian names: Reithoffer, Stumpf, Fingerlos, Prieler, Seidler, Erstweiler... and so on.  

For fictitious French and Italian surnames I often used names that had an amusing translation - did you translate them, I wonder?  

I also added one new separable verb to the German language (new additions to the language are encouraged in Germany) and one new collective noun to the English language.  Did you spot these, too?  If so - well done!

The exceptions I made to the rule of using real names as regards Italian surnames relate to those surnames belonging to families living in Codissago; the surnames of the zattieri di Codissago survive to this day, and I didn't wish to cause any offence to the good people of that town.  So I limited myself to the use of first names.

The church of Santi Pietro e Paolo in Tarvisio

As regards place names, over the years the names of many towns have changed.  In the time frame covered in the narrative of The Door of Perarolo Tarvis  was a town  in Austria.  Nowadays it is renamed Tarvisio and is part of Italy. 

Illyria, a province of the French Empire until 1814, in modern times is part of Slovenia and Croatia. Many towns have been renamed.  Karlstadt, for example, is now called Karlovac.  

Many Italian towns that have remained in Italy have had their names changed or modified during the last two centuries.  Some have been foreshortened.

Map showing the route over the Simplon

Duomo d'Ossola ('Cathedral of Ossola' - Ossola being a region of NW Italy) nowadays is called Domodossola.   

This is my map marked (blue arrows) with the route I took when hitch-hiking through Switzerland and over the Simplon in July 2000.

Below is an extract from my diary.  I was following the route taken by the Campbell family (recorded in Beaujolois Campbell's diary) in 1817 -  first mentioned in the New Year postbag.

DOMODOSSOLA

For once Beaujolois doesn't say where they stayed in the town.  I booked into a hotel close to the station (, where I met  the owners, Sergio and Luigia BartoLucci,  and their daughter.  I explained why I had come to their town and they expressed great interest.  

We chatted in Italian most of that evening.  Their hotel, the hall virtually a museum, reflects their strong interest in the history of the region.   They showed me an original document signed in 1809 in Milan by Napoleon’s step-son Eugenio, commemorating the completion of the Simplon road.

Original [Simplon] document from 1809,  in the Hotel Eurossola, Domodossola  (P.A.G 2000)

I explained  that  I was looking for a hotel that would have existed in 1817, in the centre of the town within the old walls.

They told me of two old inns, one of these, now the Pizzeria Terminus, they felt  sure would have been the one.  I was hungry, so that evening I went there to eat a fine pizza.  As I ate I had plenty of time to survey the impressive 14^th century vaulted ceilings, very similar in style to those I saw in the lobby of the Lion d'Or (where the Campbells stayed briefly before travelling to Brig to stay the night, before mounting the Simplon)  at Sion in Switzerland.

Beaujolois, in her diary: 'We slept at Duomo d'Ossola where I heard everyone talking Italian... The beds were large but dirty.  The people looked like rogues...' This is my photo from July 2000. To the left, under the striped awning, is the Pizzeria Terminus.    

 

The church of Santi Quirico e Giulitta, Castellavazzo (P.A.G. 2008)

Here's another example of the way names can change in Italy.  

The citizens of Castello Lavazzo held a referendum in 2011 as to whether to adopt Castellavazzo as their name, which they did!

The town is on the opposite bank of the Piave from  Codissago.  

That's enough about names!  Next month's blog will resume our voyage down the Piave.

PS: Thanks to you all for your comments and queries.  In grateful also to all those who have posted reviews on Amazon sites since the last postbag, the most recent being Mike in Hereford (thanks, Mike!).

Note: This blog supports readers of The Door of Perarolo, a historical novel set in Cadore, Italy in the early nineteenth century.  You may examine feedback from readers in the UK here and in the US here.  The Door of Perarolo is a Kindle ebook comprising 140 chapters.  It can be downloaded from Amazon sites worldwide.  The launch post of this blog gives further details.  The second post provides links to maps, etc.

Perarolo Then and Now

The Door of Perarolo is a novel that spans the first five years of the second decade of the nineteenth century. At the height of the rafting trade Perarolo was a busy little river port, situated just below the junction of the Piave and Boite rivers.  By the end of that century, as the photograph below shows, huge quantities of timber were to be seen stacked along the right bank of the river Piave (the river is the dark area in the bottom left corner of the photo).  I am indebted to the late Bortolo de Vido for sending me this photo during our lengthy correspondence some years ago.  Bortolo was also very helpful in my researches for The Door of Perarolo by providing me with information concerning the priest of Perarolo, don Giuseppe de Vido.

Perarolo at the end of the nineteenth century

[courtesy Bortolo de Vido]

Towards the centre of this view can be seen the church of San NicolÒ - clearly not with the same wooden frontage as seen in the photos in the previous blog post, 'A First Look at Perarolo'.  Nor is the campanile of the same wooden construction.  A further puzzle for the reader of this blog post: this is not the same church of San NicolÒ as the one described in The Door of Perarolo!  The church in the photo above is aligned with its axis orthogonal to the riverbank, whilst the previous church, described in the novel, had its axis parallel to the river's flow.  It was also situated a little further upstream.  To find out more you can read Mario Silvia and Antonella Guzzon's excellent little book Perarolo.

Perarolo in 1890 

[ La Via del Fiume p. 281, permission Cierre Edizioni]

The Belluno artist Alessandro Seffer (1831-1905) painted this scene (above) of life in Perarolo in 1890. This [RH] section of his canvas shows the church and the campanile as it existed at that time.  The bridge shown  in the centre of the painting spans the Boite river while the one to the right bridges the Piave.  The depiction is a somewhat artificial one, in that the rafts (shown of the left bank of the Piave) were built and launched further downstream from the right bank- around the bend in the river to the south, as seen in the Bortolo de Vido's photograph and certainly not at the confluence of the two rivers where the water, when high, was most turbulent.

Perarolo, a little further downriver  

[ La Via del Fiume p. 280, permission Cierre Edizioni]

The left-hand section of Seffer's canvas shows the timber stacked by the river shore ready for the sawmills or for the construction of zattere.  The sawn timber was loaded onto the rafts bound, out of Perarolo, for the next port on the river - Codissago.  The two figures seen on the far shore to the right are washing linen in the waters of the Piave.  It is apparent from this painting that Perarolo was at that time vulnerable to flooding.  In 1884 the scogliera - a defensive wall, visible in the photograph at the start of this post - was constructed to protect the village, after the disastrous floods of 1882.  The floods are not the only dangers: earthquakes in the region are not uncommon; also, the steep slopes of the valleys of  the rivers in Cadore are prone to landslides which can block a river's flow, unleashing a tremendous force of flood when the waters are finally released.

The Reverend Alexander Robertson, D.D., arriving by coach with his 'fellow traveller' (this rather coy description is all we get from him) writes in 1896 as follows:

'... our road gradually descended until  it brought us to the level of the river.  Following its bank a little way, we entered Perarolo at the junction of the Boite with the Piave.  Running up the side of a great mill-race that is taken off the Boite, and crossing it and the parent stream by a strong stone bridge, from which we got a glimpse of the King of Cadore, the giant mountain Antelao, with its crystal ice coronet, we drew up at Albergo Koffler, or Corona d'Oro, a good, comfortable, old-fashioned inn.'

Throughout the region the wooden bridges, often swept away by floods were being replaced by stronger stone ones.  Perarolo prospered around this time, as did many towns and villages in Cadore, from the tourist trade.  

Many small inns and hotels were available to travellers such as Robertson, such as this modest inn at Valle di Cadore (just north of Perarolo and marked on the map below).  The church at Valle is featured on the cover of The Door of Perarolo.  

In Cortina (where a modern-day James Bond skied down a mountainside pursued by an avalanche), towards the end of the nineteenth century, a traveller could choose from many hotels - such as these two in the advertisements section of Robertson's book.  

The sisters Barbaria sound intriguing, but given the choice, I think I would have thrown in my lot with the Ghedina brothers, if only to to find out what a dependence was.

All the hotels of Perarolo that catered for rich English clientele are long gone. But you can find comfortable, affordable accommodation, as my fellow traveller (Sally) and I did in 2012, at Elena and Mirco's Il Cidolo.

Robertson gives us an insight into the state of the church we see in Bortolo's photograph, and also the campanile, which once stood by don Giuseppe's church, destroyed in 1823 by the floods.

'On the right bank of the Boite the witnesses to the catastrophe are the recently-built houses, and an old weather and water beaten campanile that stands deserted and solitary near the water's edge.  The church to which it once belonged went down with the flood, and the one that took its place stands further removed from the river.  I'm afraid it would not take a very strong flood to make it, too, collapse, for its walls and vaulted roof are full of gaping cracks, the result of earthquake shocks to which it has been subjected.'

The Boite valley northwest of Perarolo

[Touring club Italiano: Veneto, Fruili Venezia Giulia map]

The priest of Perarolo, don Giuseppe de Vido was famous in his time for writing 'satiric verses' relating to Napoleon.  When the contents of these verses reached the ears of the French Emperor, the priest had to flee Perarolo to seek refuge for a while near Treviso.  Napoleon relented when he heard that the priest had given comfort and last rites to soldiers dying after the fierce fighting between the French and the Austrians in 1809 and offered him an appointment as Honorary Bishop of Torcello (near Venice) which don Giuseppe refused. He chose to instead in Perarolo. The name 'de Vido' is Cadorino for 'from [the family]Vido'.  'Vido' is 'Vito' in Italian, from Saint Vitus.  Don Giuseppe was born in 1750 in San Vito di Cadore, a village in the Boite valley northwest of Perarolo  - marked at the centre of the map above.  He died in Perarolo in 1826.

Also marked on the map is the railway.  Perarolo station is situated to the south of the town.  The dotted line on the map (lower right-hand corner) shows where the railway line enters a tunnel.  

Part of the Padua - Calalzo railway line on the approach to Perarolo station

[© Peter Alexander Gray 1998]

The ability to bore tunnels through the hillside enabled the railway to go where main roads could not.  This - together with the building of dams for HEP and also to draw off of water for irrigation of crops - meant that the rafting industry, like the coaching industry across Europe, would come to an end.

The end came as WW2 finished.  Already logs from the forests were being loaded onto trains bound for sawmills in the south.  The cidolo at Sacco, upriver on the Piave (where the menadàs worked sorting logs for the Cadore sawmills throughout the nineteenth century) was demolished in 1947.

When I arrived in Perarolo on that day in 1998 I had only the knowledge I had gleaned from reading books such as La Via del Fiume.  I hadn't the advantage of the research I was to undertake during the next fifteen years.  Nor was there in 1998 the great wealth of information that exists nowadays on the Internet.  I visited the church of San NicolÒ and afterwards I took a photograph of the war memorial close by, which commemorates Italy's finest hour in WW1 - when the Italian army triumphed against the might of the Austro-Hungarian forces in the battle that raged along the banks of the River Piave.

But at that time I was totally unaware of the fact that the Italian Royal Family holidayed twice at Perarolo - staying at the Palazzo Lazzaris in 1881 and 1882.  The palace was restored between 1996 and 2002, which explains the many signs work in progress on my first visit to Perarolo in 1998.  As well as the restoration of the Palazzo Lazzaris much other work in restoring Perarolo's fine buildings has taken place.  A 'must see' for anyone visiting Perarolo is Il museo del Cidolo e del legname.

You can learn much about the history of the river post of Perarolo by visiting the museum.  But the last raft has left Perarolo for Codissago - the drawing off of water for irrigation has lowered the level of the rivers.  

The Speck factory stands today on the right bank of the Piave where the zattieri used to build their rafts. Speck is a meat product used in Austrian and Italian cuisine.  The factory creates work for the people of Perarolo and the environs.




In the introduction to his book Through the Dolomites from Venice to Toblach Alexander Robertson called Cadore the 'Scotland of Italy'.  People such as my editor Sally and myself who live in Scotland take this as a compliment!   Recently the Great Tapestry of Scotland was the subject of exhibitions throughout our country.  This month's post of Sally's blog Scotpot  features The Great Tapestry, and is well worth a look.

Next month's post of this blog (The Door of Perarolo) will be the July post bag, in which I will try to address questions from readers, both of the novel and of the blog.  So please do write to me with your queries at dagamrie@gmail.com and I shall try to post answers to all your queries.  Thanks in advance!

Note: This blog supports readers of The Door of Perarolo, a historical novel set in Cadore, Italy in the early nineteenth century.  You may examine feedback from readers in the UK here and in the US here.  The Door of Perarolo is a Kindle ebook comprising 140 chapters.  It can be downloaded from Amazon sites worldwide.  The launch post of this blog gives further details.  The second post provides links to maps, etc.