Annibale Grasselli Barni

Annibale Grasselli Barni is a journalist and writer, born to a rich landowning family in Cremona in 1870. He deals with various topics, writes a collection of verses and biographies of Vittorio Emanuele III and Margherita di Savoia, but deals in particular with the Italian colonial question, dealing with the aspect of expansion in Libya.
He landed in Sardinia, in Golfo Aranci, in 1899, when he was just twenty-nine years old, and he did not find the town as fragrant as the name would suggest: “In truth, it does not respond to the poetic name they gave him, since the fragrant flower of the Hymenaeum, of the golden fruits, had long since left these shores to go in search of better auras.” He is a rich young man, who can afford these trips of exploration (he has some anthropological ambitions) and above all of pleasure, since the main objective is hunting: he moves with a guide, a pack of dogs and, armed with everything he can, he starts shooting right from the ship: “On board there are two other hunters from Pistoia who go hunting in Tortolì; one of them is practical in Sardinia, but he seems too optimistic to me, the other more taciturn inspires me greater confidence and tighten my confidence relationship with him. He shows me his weapons and when I got on the bridge with a magnificent Martins, with the captain's permission, we started shooting the seagulls at the ball; but, strangely enough, the seagulls seem quite smart, they keep away from the steamer; I can barely snatch a wing pen from someone less shrewd than the others, a meager trophy, who, given the difficulty of shooting, can satisfy me in part.” The journey continues set up in this way, with the gun always in hand, in wheelchairs, stagecoaches or more often in long walking marches. The Barni crosses the entire island, up to the Gulf of Cagliari. It is a hunter's paradise, with weapons, ammunition and prey in unlikely numbers, especially woodcocks, which are the most demanding due to their sudden flight. He shoots at every type of animal, indeed, in truth, at every shadow: “After killing a few woodcocks, in the bottom of the valley, already shrouded in the evening shadow, I make a couple of words to a hare and a woodcock; while I write down, I shoot a shadow that passes quickly over my head: a superb mallard falls heavily among the mastic spots”. The original title of the book, in 1905, was “In Sardinia (between one shot and another)”; it was reprinted in 1911, with a preface by Deledda, without the specification in parenthesis.

Update

25/6/2026 - 13:09