“Where there’s water, there’s life”.
So much more than a cliché. Water, a constant presence and vital for everyone to derive sustenance and energy from but also to fall in love with the beauty of the places where they discover it. Two informative books on the dialects of Chiavenna and Gordona refer at length to the rivers, streams, canals of Valchiavenna, both published in recent months. Make a note: Laurentius Clavennensis (Parôi, mòdi de dì and štòrî de &´na Ciavéna che gh&´é pü, with revision by Carolus, 2023, Chiavenna) and Ferruccio De Agostini (Vucabulari dal dialét e otar ròp de Gurduna, 2024, Gordona).

In Chiavenna, the Molinànca area - so called due to the mills in situ - powered by a large open canal “which starting from Poiatengo, provided the driving force for the industries there and then fed into the Mera at a point just before the bridge that leads to Oltremera”. It was also a meeting point for the lavandéer (washerwomen) at work who Laurentius reports would share news and gossip in latter-day “Internet Point with free and open access-style”, sometimes struggling to preserve their own livelihoods: as in Mrs Clelia Viola “trade union rep. ante litteram of the category”, who with unceasing and combative spirit “worked to make sure that the water was clean”. At the Bögia (Boggia) in Gordona, fathers would look out for smooth and regular pebbles to take home to their daughters who would use them in their game of i sass literally “I sassi” or stones. It was a game only between girls, “with five pebbles, as round and equal as possible, and using these to play a series of skill games in sequence without making mistakes”. The first level was called a ügn (to one): “you threw the pebbles on the ground, then took one and threw it in the air, in the meantime you took another pebble, catching the one thrown and so on, taking care not to disturb the others” De Agostini goes on to describe a further fifteen levels including a bat al cĥiöor (a heartbeat) where you had to strike a collected pebble against the heart before catching the next one thrown into the air.