Municipality of Rimella

Rimella and its

In the search of an ancient population, its culture and history through ancient houses and churches Copyright Geo4MAP s.r.l. Novara 2015 from map “Gran Tour della Valsesia” printed in co-operation with Region Museum G.B. Filippa

Giovanni Battista Filippa, born the country in the world. in 1778, conceived and built The collection continued after the Museum of Rimella. the death of Filippa to the interest of Don Gaudenzio Cusa. The Filippa, from 1807 to 1811, did military service and The material is mainly divided took part in the Napoleonic war into two categories: the first campaign in Spain. Discharged includes things to look like in 1812, for serious illnesses, paintings, prints, medals, he died in 1838 at 61 years. He weapons, ornaments and a endowed the community of a rich collection of coins from “cabinet of antiquities and rare the V-IV century BC to 1900; things”, where he collected the second includes books, and classified specimens of parchments (the oldest numerous fossils, coins, books, dates from 1396), ancient in order to inform a community, documents and catalogs. where the majority of members The Museum of G.B. Filippa would spend his life within the is open to public tours during confines of the valley, about the summer months and by what was happening outside appointment.

page 1 The home heirs Vasina

The ethnographic museum, stone and wooden partitions; the ethno-linguistic archive, only the third floor is entirely the Walser Documentation of wood with perimeter Centre and the Rimella Walser walls made of load-bearing Study Centre are located in the horizontal beams stuck house of Vasina heirs inhabited orthogonally (blockbau). until about forty years ago by Felicita Vasina and probably The galleries, as is typical in until 1930 by his family who the architecture of houses of then built a stone house a little Rimella, are closed by vertical further upstream. timber framed almost at full It’s a typical Wlaser house of height. Rimella built on three floors, to climb on the ground with Characteristic of this house access directly from the are the chràfu, sort of hooks outside. The ground floor was obtained from the bifurcation of used as a stable (der Gadu), the branches that were used to the median plan was where the scatter the hay for faster drying. family lived in the the kitchen (tsvirhüüsch) while the upper The house, now owned by the floor was used as a barn (der municipality of Rimella, was schtàdàl). the subject of a careful and complex restoration. The basement and ground floors are bearing structures in

page 2 The Ethnographic Museum

It is the museum of the is mainly realized in the man and his mountaun. that Grondo fraction), extraction, highlights the characters transportation and laying and the core values ​​of the of stone , the agricultural experience of the material life cycle (the pasture, hay, into its surroundings. fertilization of peeling fields tree ....), work in the woods. The museum explores the culture of the mountain of It is not neglected issues Rimella with its ingenious related to food, to natural technology and versatile remedies against disease. preserved virtually intact until the beginning of our time by The museum exhibition allowing for centuries the uses both material culture, material survival of the Walser both panels of ethnographic community. documentaries with direct testimonies of the people of The topics covered are: Rimella. the milling business (which

page 3 The ethno-linguistic archive

Thanks to the law n. 482/99 of Rimella. since 1990 “Regulations concerning the publishes, annually, the protection of historical linguistic magazine “Remmalju” minorities” the Municipality of on the reality of Rimella Rimella has created the Archive ethnolinguistic Walser “which The CSWR involved in all also includes a specialized initiatives aimed at promoting library on Walser language. the oral and written language of the Walser, which include The documents collected are a the Ecomuseum management database in electronic or paer and Walser library, providing form informatic and paper of contribution to the promotion all existing materials on Walser of historical, archival, language, understood both in bibliographical and cultural technical and linguistic sense, promoted by “Municipal both literary. Administration for the protection of the Walser The Association Centro Studi language”. Walser Rimella (Study Center Walser Rimella) was founded in 1988 to safeguard the ethnic and linguistic heritage

The Walser community

page 4 Ancient Houses and Churches

Path 1 Media difficulties - not recommended with rain (Chiesa, Villa Inferiore, Grondo, Roncaccio Superiore, Roncac- cio Inferiore, Pianello, Riva, Sant’Antonio, Sant’Anna, Chiesa)

From the square in front of Right along the river, shortly the parking, passing between after taking the steep path to the eighteenth-century Parish Roncaccio Superiore Crossing church dedicated to St. Michael old beech woods, you proceed and the Ossuary Chapel and towards the Natural Park Alta Museum G.B. Filippa, you take Valsesia. With steep ramps the old path and borders the stone you will come to the Parish house. village. Upper left Roncaccio you Continuing you cross the descend to Roncaccio Inferiore provincial road and, going back on the route of GTA. Then take for a few meters, continue the the path to Pianello. cobbled path downhill to Villa Inferiore. You come to the stream alongside a former mill and Further along the provincial is wading climbing towards road is again cross and go Pianello. Reaching left the down to the Fractional Church paved road, cross the Rio of Grondo dedicated to St. Scarpiola. Ambrose. After the bridge on the right, Being next to the Oratory, on the ruins of an old lime kiln. the right, you switch between a Walser house and one of the You advance to the bridge old mills of Grondo on the left. for the Riva fraction, after which you reach the Chapel of Continuing on the right you will Santa Liberata. Once at Riva come across another building Fraction, continue crossing the of interest that has the typical Rio Bach, whose path leads to “lobie” of Rimella. the homonymous mountain pasture and Rifugio CAI Alpe After crossing the bridge over Helo and, beyond Dorchetta, the Landwasser continue. to Bannio in Valle Anzasca.

page 5 Go straight instead and you to the group of houses around come to Saint Anthony. After the oratory dedicated to the visiting, the village continue Virgin Mary and St. Anne. along the right bank of the Landwasser on the trail to the From this point begins the hamlet of Sant’Anna. return journey to Sant ‘Antonio, from which you exit turning left Across the river you can see towards the Napoleonic period the houses of Ebe, hamlet now bridge crossing it and returning abandoned and you will reach to Pianello, passing the Church the nucleus of the village, the of Painello and continuing into first and second nucleus are the woods until you cross the separated by a 5 minute walk path of GTA returning to the and the latter begins the ascent Church.

page 6 Ancient Houses and Churches

Path 2 easy (Chiesa, Sella, San Gottardo, San Giorgio, Wan, Selletta; Posa dei Morti, Villa Superiore, Prati, Chiesa) From church they walk about the GTA trail, you can see San 250 meters along the carriage, Gottardo, which you reach in a before the cemetery you go left few minutes. towards the old barn still intact with the overhang cantilevered The trail climbs gently in costs; front of circular stone pillars. having crossed the stream reaches San Giorgio. Returning to the starting point, follow the signs along the Crossing the mountain pasture old cobbled path to the Sella to the top and then going in fraction. the opposite direction to the destination, you can reach the Even today, Sella is one of pleasant and scenic pastures of the intact and best-preserved Van and Harness, then grafted villages. You enter the village in the GTA trail, which, after along on the left “Robbo a while, come to the historic house”, now restored, dated town of Posa of the Dead. 1593. From the vantage point you At the junction Sella Low, with can see, between the two the path to Hubal promontory branches dell’Enderwasser, now covered with plants, which the cluster of mountain huts juts into the Enderwasser. of Kaval, erroneously indicated by tradition as one of the oldest To the left the trail to a paved settlement nuclei. road to San Gottardo and continues halfway up watching The path continues towards on the other side the steep and Villa Superior floor, while, after craggy slope of Mount Kaval. a few hundred meters that of G.T.A. descends to the left up Past the votive chapel called to the road. “scisskaplu”, after which goes down to the valley in Balmacco, Maintaining altitude and,

page 7 passing over the village Sella, The tour ends at the end of the it changes slope, reaching the stone staircase, in front of the oratory of Villa Superiore. Parish Church of St. Michael Church in the hamlet. Crossed the fraction passing next to the Chapel of Our Lady of Einsiedeln, and you descend on the ancient paving stone up to Prati Fraction.

page 8 The History of Rimella

THE MIDDLE AGE the thirteenth century went from Switzerland, a small The history of Rimella begins group of those peasants and in mid-thirteenth century shepherds. in a rugged landscape. The They was of lineage German resort is nestled between the language in the framework of mountains in a side valley economic, political, social and of the river Mastallone. religious, which occurred in Europe around 1000, colonized The territory consists of two the canton of , they had valleys, the longest one of the to migrate past the Alpine Landwasser (mainstream), ridge which stretches from north to south for seven kilometers THE MODERN AGE and is joined at the Chapel of Liebu Frouwa tsum Schteg Through a study of notarial (“Noise Madonna”) with documents kept at the Civic the Enderwasser (water Museum in Rimella dating inside), which runs for four from 1396 to 1556, in this age kilometers to the east. In this considerably increased the environment in the middle of number of households.

Partly in continuous relationship with the primitive settlements, part to immigration from neighboring territories; also articulates the dislocation in the villages, in pastures and streams; a representative console that exercised his tenure at the City Residence in village Church governs the community.

The village church (Villa Ecclesiae) was also the center of religious life for the presence of the Parish of St. Michael the Archangel

page 9 Church (1518), the Cemetery 24 notaries in Rimella, in the’ (1431) and Square (526 l). 700 there were 20 prelates In addition to Villa Ecclesiae rimellesi, 37 between notaries and Rondo (San Gottardo), and also lawyers, doctors, arose Villa Superiore (1451), veterinarians, chemists, Sella (1470), Roncaccio pharmacists, captains, (l484), Grondo (1537). engineers, writers, painters In this age, despite the and sculptors. harshness of the work, the Many homes were equipped

obstacles posed by the with carpentry and even today, economy agro-forestry- there are testimonies of cabinet pastoral and living conditions making. often at the limits of survival, the population rimellese, In 1703 there were 214 supported by a deeply felt families with 1062 inhabitants, religious and community in 180l, there were 1,175 spirit, creates a culture rich inhabitants, in 1831 the and original witnessed by the highest population growth with number and beauty of sacred 1381 inhabitants, but fell in buildings and the architectural 1943 to 362 inhabitants and characteristics of the houses 148 inhabitants in 2000. for residential purposes. THE CONTEMPORARY AGE In this age there is a high number of educated people The contemporary age opens expressed by the company with the 800. Rimella inhabited Walser; in ‘500 there were by people who governs with

page 10 appropriate civil and religious To the 800 manuscript structures, with a church “illiterate in the municipality among the most beautiful in of Rimella” Peter Peco testifies Valsesia, a number of other the high level of literacy of the sacred buildings. population. From 1848 to 1881, the Of three functioning schools, percentage of illiterates had as well as a cultural tool of dropped from 39% to 26%, exception for those times, the an increase especially for the Museum of G.B. Filippa. female sex; By comparison, in 1881 the illiterate in the Active also the agro-pastoral Kingdom of were 67%, activities, albeit insufficient 34%, 41% in Novara, to sustain all, and artisanal, 1’88percentage in Cosenza. with sawmills and mills, and commercial. The age instead closes at the end of the twentieth century By contrast, the lines with an image of a different sign of communication were of the country, characterized inadequate, often dangerous, by depopulation, the closure and was the highest emigration of local schools and the slow rate in neighboring countries but inexorable decline of the and abroad. language.

page 11 Culture and society

The Walser people arrived by (from wood sleds and gneiss successive migration of family transport or manure, panniers clans of small and medium for the transportation of hay, size, and when the resources firewood and gneiss, buckets of the place colonized scarce, for milking, churns for cheese younger people moved in and wooden rakes). search of new horizons. The rimellese society was The Walser brought with them based on a system of work their own cultural heritage, and each family was obliged to customs, traditions, customs a certain number of hours of and their Germanic language. work for public works according to the size of the household. Particularly harsh was the In 1300, the inhabitants of status of women in society the individual fractions were rimellese. a form of “Common Consular Instructions”. It was up to the woman raising children, the conduction of the No longer had the heads but house, the work of the summer a community of Attorney fields and look after the cattle represented up to 1394 the in winter when many men community at the Confraternity emigrated to work as artisans of Orta San Giulio. in Northern Europe. Poverty and hardships did not In winter, they also occupied prevent the rimellesi from various craft activities, such ‘500 to’ 700 to develop and as packaging of “scoffoni” care for school and education (typical footwear), spinning and to provide for the spiritual hemp, weaving and knitting, needs of people and materials, and the typical Valsesian puncetto (needle lace).

Many homes were equipped with carpentry and there were skilled cabinetmakers, and also many of the fields of tools, like in the neighboring valleys, were built on site

page 12 in particular for low income emigration. through forms of brotherhoods The men emigrated, during and oratories. the winter months, in the countries of Northern The population came quickly Europe: Switzerland, France, to take advantage of all the Germany and Scandinavia. resources of the valley with For many emigrations became an agro-forestry-pastoral permanent, as evidenced by niche economy that allowed, the registrar of the northern on the one hand a complete European countries, especially autonomy from the outside Switzerland and France. world but only to a limited number of rimellesi: in fact, The rimellesi work in the reached a total of over 1300 building and in crafts inhabitants, from 1600 until the present century it became necessary for many seasonal

page 13 Architecture and Art

The Walser of Rimella They are made of masonry; buildings retain many of the last two to the third in a the architectural features of block-bau wood, the eventual former valleys. fourth floor was the result of cant. The houses are in These are buildings on a stone part still existing old to three pedestal elevate a wooden floors and in part to four. structure whose solidity is guaranteed by interlocking Every village had a building angle of the beams, said to constructed on wedges for “block-bau”: this allowed storage of grain and moisture that the buildings were also away from the animals. built on the steepest slopes, leaving the few land flat or The common elements that better exposed to the fields of distinguish the “Walser house” rye, potatoes and barley. of Rimella are essentially two: its location in the canton How many centers of Valsesia and the composition of its Rimella also gave a significant balconies (lobie). contribution to the Fine Arts. The house is primarily The construction of many perpendicular to climb on the religious buildings gave the bank in which it supported impetus to the development with totally grossed the first of architecture, painting, floor and partially the second, sculpture, cabinet making where the house want fire. and stucco decoration. The plan on the first level By notarial deeds of the ‘500 is open on the front of the and’ 600 it is that the house house, the second is laterally was designed on three levels: accessible where it opens at a stable or cassina, to keep ground level, on the third the cattle, the house of seals floor, which is accessed with the fireplace on the floor upstream, offers the view one with his “pioda” (hértblàttu) floor. to warm up and cook, and finally the peat to store hay If there is a fourth floor, and twigs. attainable by a ladder from lobia below or with

page 14 stone staircase, sometimes The stone roof gable and perpendicular to the front and little projecting, extending, beyond the road. in the higher side spire with a canopy that covers the last The first and sometimes the lobia and is open above until second floor are made of the climax to ventilate the masonry. barn.

Only on the third floor (the barn), and sometimes the second, it is made entirely of wood to block-bau, with load- bearing horizontal beams wood to support the robust construction of the roof.

The horizontal frame is all of raw wood (larch as the block- bau) always means in logs, just slicked on the decking which extend on the sides in support of lobie, and that, for greater stability on the ground floor are supported by pillars round in small pieces or, only if the lobia is not more than one meter in width, to be put into diagonal struts collected at the base of the underlying masonry or stone supports set vertically.

The lobia surrounding the house from several sides; closed by vertical wooden partition full height, sometimes leaving a gap of no greater than 20-30 cm, it is composed of slats fir that protect the facade of the house.

page 15 Informations

The UNI EN ISO 1400 - A way to excellence. Since 2007 Rimella, along with the other four municipalities OSPITALITY and CATERING of Valmastallone can boast the prestigious Certification Fontana Hotel acclimatized, award recognizes Fraz. Chiesa a pristine environment and phone 0163.55200 rich cultural traditions and the will to work together with the Rifugio dei Walser aim of preserving and start the Frazione San Gottardo territory towards management phone 338 9761975 excellence of its environmental www.rifugiowalser.it characteristics. Bar Municipality of Rimella Frazione Prati Frazione Chiesa phone 0163.55229 phone 0163.55203 [email protected] Bed & Breakfast Walser House www.comune.rimella.vc.it Frazione Sella phone 347 3663960 G.B. Filippa Museum [email protected] Frazione Chiesa www.walserhouse.com c/o Municipality of Rimella Obru Huüsch Walser Museum Frazione Roncaccio Superiore Frazione Sella phone 393 7569591 c/o Municipality of Rimella Centro Residenziale per la Centro Studi Walser di Rimella formazione Frazione Sella Frazione Villa Inferiore www.centrostudiwalserrimella.it phone 0331 321305 [email protected] Ass.Tur.Pro Loco di Rimella c/o Municipality of Rimella Rund Bar Frazione San Gottardo Gruppo Alpini di Rimella c/o Municipality of Rimella phone 346 5062475 Unione Montana Valsesia Il Bucaneve Rent a Room C.so Roma, 35 - Varallo Frazione San Gottardo phone 0163.51555 phone 339 8620265

page 16 Rimella is a small country located on the 1000 meters high mountain in the southern slope of Monte Rosa, where, nearly 800 years ago a small group of pastors farmers from Valais has initiated a community Walser subject of increasing interest to scholars, especially linguists, given the documentary value of the ancient language tittschu rimellese.

This migration is part of the displacement context of Walser people through the so-called “high streets”; it seems that they took place because in the Middle Ages the Alps there were favorable climatic conditions with a long hot brackets, between the advance of the glaciers, which had characterized the second half of the first millennium and the so-called Little Ice Age that, since 1800, pushes downstream flaps of glaciers and again makes difficult the transalpine communications.

Ts Remmaljer Terlie ìsch gwörtut en 2004 vàr eswàs tiöt z bruhu ts Remmaljertìttschu en d brivà tsch Gmenj und vàr wélts mànglut. Tiödis ŝchiöhe d gwéne tsch paìs und d àltu ŝchacche. Tiödis schribu biéher vàr grése. Ts Remmaljer Terlie öich kracchut d tittschu schiöl vàr d Remmaljer lit und vàr dei dàs walljunt lérne z schpallu, leschu und schribu ts tittschu.

The language desk of Rimella was born in 2004 to deal with the use of the language of Rimella in documents and for those needs. They do research on the traditions and history of the country. They also write books for children and for adults. The desk also prepares tittschu language courses for rimellesi and for all those who want to learn to speak, read and write the tittschu language.

page 17 Municipality of Rimella