and in Copenaghen-Roskilde-Lejre: Ole Dziegel, Marketingschef, Roskilde-Egnens Turistbureau; Laila Jurs Jensen, Marketing Manager of the Wonderful Copenaghen Convention and Visitors Bureau; Lars Schaldemose of the Danish Tourist Board; the Director of the Arp-Hansen Hotel Group; Prof. Angelo Carriere, Director of the Italian Cultural Institute; Tryggvi Johansen, Head of the Faroese Representation; Mr. Ørhuus, of the Management of Nationalmuseet; Mette Olsen, Historian of the Historical Archaelogical Experimental Center .

"Archipelagos in Comparison: Sea-ones (Fær Øer, Denmark) and Earth-ones (Carnia- Friuli- Italy); Islands in Comparison: Sea-one (Mykines), Earth-one (Sauris). an Ethno-Anthropological Approach to Two Cultural Distances", paper read at the International Seminar: "Two Distant Regions Compared", held at the Danish Academy in Rome (Det Danske Institut for Videnskab Og Kunst I Rom), October 21, 1997

(The idea suggested to me by the Danish Academy in Rome: to compare the far away situation of the Faroe Islands, there, in the Northern sector of the Atlantic (far away from our Mediterranean setting, but far from Denmark, too) - with a similar or, at least, in some ways comparable-one: from an historical, political, ethnical, geographical, economical points of view [taking in due course any possible differentiations and variations], was really very interesting and stimulating. As anthropologists (comparison is a fundamental part of the Method of the Anthropological Sciences!), we are well prepare to compare cultural realities belonging to more or less distant societies of the world. So I have had the wonderful and amazing opportunity to introduce in this paper the up-to-date situation of Carnia, a small region of the Alps, in North-Eastern Italy. If in the Faroe Archipelago I carried out in 1995 a socio-cultural survey, a supposed short visit to Carnia, in the summer 1996, resulted at the end (as intensity, massive observations, great amount of data collected, the several concerned people approached -local historians, ethnologists, so-called key-informers: old people, and so on- ) as an unexpected, also if very informal, cultural survey of that beautiful Italian northern region. And the task to compare these two worlds worked very well. It deepens itself the more I went through the relevant literature, when I started at home to prepare the paper. And easily I went through things, situations, "valley and sea islands" histories. So here we may speak of two Archipelagos and two islands at the mirror: sea-ones (Faroes and Mikines), land-ones (Carnia and Sauris). To better compare both realities, I have singled out some useful indicators or problematic areas. Some of these "keys" are of minor value. Some work for both cultures. Others only for one of the two cultural worlds. But the possible comparisons (and of course, differentiations) between the two "archipelagos" are many. I will just write down some of them, one after the other, in no chronological or importance order: isolation; transport and communication difficulties, in general; presence and persistence in the centuries of their own languages; poverty and past deprivation; emigrations (during the past, and today); same demographic consistency; Great Communities Crisis, of yesterday and today; importance and vitality of their specific cultural traditions; economies connected to the habitat (with the minor, but for this not so less important, contemporary presence of trølls and sbilfs). An then: strong relation Man-Environment; persistence of a rich spontaneous architectural apparatus; strong community identities; administrative autonomies; farming; climatic similarities: heavy rainfalls; tendency towards the growing up of a sort of selected tourism; strong presence of oral tradition and of "evening fire tales", as ways to transmit (especially during the near past) to the incoming new generations cultural elements and folk-lore. The paper has the following basic structure: a) an historical, geo-climatical, administrative, ethno-anthropological and linguistic introduction to the Faroe Islands and Carnia; b) the singling-out of the ethno-cultural identities of the two communities: Faroes, a small community-nation; Carnia, a strong regional identity. c) the two communities amid tradition and change: the Faroes: 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; Carnia: a moderm post-industrial economy which keeps still strong ties with the mountain habitat: wood industry and handicraft, farming, cultivations; but is tending towards a stronger touristic development; d) the Great Faroe Crisis of the '90s and emigration. Carnia, Land of centuries old temporary and permanent emigration (till the '60s and '70s); e) two case studies in comparison: the isolated communities of Mykines (Faroes) and Sauris (Carnia). In this short summary I should add something more about the last section of the paper. I have naturally thought that, for euristic reasons, but also to better understand each situation, it was necessary to focus here 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, in bringing, within the discussion, selected pieces of different cultural realities, and in trying to focuse them, is has been a manner, according me, to try to reach a greater comprehensive picture of the entire frame. Isulation has strongly affected both the communities of the sea-island of Mykines and of the valley (land-island) 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 in a future selected tourism a new chance to survive. 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 Faroes, as in Carnia. Both their peoples may tell outsiders their long, dramatic, life histories. Made of hardship for islanders and "somari" (donkeys) - the Sauris men-, 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 1400 metres above sea level) within the archipelago Carnia: in its turn made of several, little or wide, valleys, places, towns, villages, within the Friuli region. Sauris represents an ethno-cultural and linguistic separatness from any other parts of Carnia, too. Because it is a German-speaking community, founded in the XIII century from 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 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)

-Italskur antropologur vitjar í løtuni, by Beate L. Jensen, Dimmalætting (Torshavn),1 August 1995, 1 and 11

From the Dimmalætting Photo: Interviewing in the Dimmalætting Office (Torshavn),

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