Chamois

Chamois are mountain animals encountered in two sharply different contexts: as models for Bruno’s climbing and as hunted wildlife brought to Barma. The contrast gives them a distinct place in the narrative. They are first observed as living, moving animals whose skill Bruno tries to learn; later, one is killed and processed for food, bringing the practical and violent dimensions of mountain life into view.

Presence on the Mountain

The first reference to chamois occurs high on Grenon, where Bruno has taken a steep gorge toward the crest. Pietro watches him climb rapidly on all fours, choosing handholds and footholds as he goes. Bruno explains that he learned the technique by watching chamois and deciding to try moving as they did. He acknowledges that his adaptation is not perfect, but the exchange establishes the animals as more than distant features of the landscape: their movement has been observed closely enough to become a source of practical knowledge.

The scene does not describe the chamois themselves at length or specify where Bruno watched them. Its emphasis is instead on the way their movement enters human experience. Bruno’s climbing is distinctive because he borrows a method from an animal he has seen, responding to the mountain through observation and bodily imitation rather than formal instruction. For Pietro, who watches Bruno from the crest, this is part of the friend’s increasingly singular way of inhabiting the terrain.

Movement and Human Imitation

The chamois matter in this episode through their example. Bruno’s explanation makes animal movement a kind of informal teaching: he has watched, tried to reproduce what he saw, and continues to refine his technique. The scene leaves the animals’ own activity largely outside the narration, while still making their physical competence consequential. What they do on the slope becomes a pattern Bruno can attempt, though the text does not suggest that he has simply mastered it.

That distinction keeps the episode grounded. Bruno’s imitation is not presented as a transformation into an animal, but as a practical experiment shaped by observation of how chamois negotiate steep ground. Pietro’s thought of Omo servadzo, the wild man, registers how unusual Bruno’s style appears to him. The phrase describes Pietro’s impression of Bruno; it does not replace the animals with a fantasy. The chamois remain the source of the movement Bruno has studied, while the scene’s attention rests on the human effort to learn from it.

The Chamois Brought to Barma

Much later, two hunters arrive at Barma to speak with Bruno. They are the cousins from whom he bought the farmstead, people Pietro has not seen for more than twenty-five years. One leaves a black bag at Bruno’s feet. After the hunters depart, Bruno takes a dead female chamois from it. The encounter links the animal to hunting and to the network of relationships surrounding the farmstead: Bruno has apparently remained in contact with the former owners, although Pietro had not known this.

Bruno prepares the animal with care and experience, treating the work methodically. The episode makes clear that the chamois is being processed for use as food, rather than remaining only an emblem of mountain freedom or a model for climbing. Pietro also notices that Bruno’s handling of the task carries more force than the work requires, and understands it as an expression of anger he has held since Pietro’s arrival. He does not stay to watch the work to its end. The scene therefore presents both a practical activity and a point of strain between the two men, without making the animal responsible for their conflict.

Contrasting Roles and Significance

The two appearances hold different aspects of mountain life together. In the first, chamois are alive on the slope and their movement offers Bruno a lesson. In the later scene, a female chamois has been killed by hunters and is brought to the place where Bruno lives. The contrast resists a single, idealized view of the animal: it is neither only a symbol of wildness nor merely an anonymous resource. The narrative shows how human relations with mountain animals can involve close attention, imitation, hunting, and use.

The change in context also sharpens the contrast between observation and possession. Bruno learns from the chamois without capturing one; the hunters later bring one to Barma, where it becomes part of a practical task. The text does not give the chamois an independent perspective, and it does not establish broader facts about their ecology or population. Its significance is instead specific to these scenes: animal movement shapes Bruno’s way of climbing, while the animal brought back from the hunt exposes the material conditions and emotional tensions of life at Barma.