“The incredible story of snow and its disappearance”: the story of the cold as a privilege, even in Sardinia

Going around the bookstores often means being literally overwhelmed and getting lost among the covers, titles, faces of authors. It is difficult, however, not to be intrigued by a book entitled " The incredible story of snow and its disappearance " (Aboca, 2022, pp. 200). And the author, Alberto Grandi , really offers us a surprising epic for us accustomed to the cold of our refrigerators and the ice of our freezers.

For millennia, in fact, the snow, the ice, in short, everything that allowed to "cool" have been real treasures. In all the great civilizations of history - from the Assyrians to the Egyptians, from Nero's Rome to Imperial China, from the refined courts of Renaissance Italy to the Versailles of the Sun King - having the opportunity to take advantage of the cold was a luxury and a privilege for a few. . From here arose the need for an enormous production, collection and trade activity dotted with logistical challenges that presented considerable technical problems and which were completely overcome only in the second half of the nineteenth century, with the invention of the machine for artificially producing. ice.

Those who controlled the cold chain thus ensured a privileged social position and also great wealth . One example among many is also found in Sardinia . In the town of Aritzo , in the Nuoro area, the collection and marketing of ice represented for centuries an important source of income for the families who managed it, under a regional monopoly. Those involved in these activities, called niargios , filled the neviere by carefully pressing the snow, until the end of March, then covering them with ferns and branches. This ice was then recovered, from May onwards and throughout the summer, transported by horse, donkey and mule during the night. The caravans left in the late afternoon, supplying the residences of the lords, hospitals and inns of much of Sardinia.

Events like this are present in large numbers in Alberto Grandi's essay to which we ask to summarize why ice and snow were so sought after until not so many decades ago:

“The cold was for a long time the only medical device that was really effective in controlling body temperature. Since ancient times it has also been one of the simplest means of storing perishable food, even if it was an expensive system because it was not always and not everywhere easy to find snow and ice. It was therefore preferred to conserve by resorting to salting and smoking and drying ".

Snow and ice were synonymous with luxury at the time, right?

“Ice and snow also served to refresh food and drinks. And this could only be afforded by those who were very rich, given the difficulty of finding and storing the "raw materials" for cooling. Ice was a real status symbol, as were spices in the Middle Ages. A further element to take into account is that snow and ice were also used to prepare particularly sought-after gastronomic specialties such as sorbets, granitas and then ice creams ".

At some point, ice and snow become part of a thriving industry ...

“It happens especially since the nineteenth century when the first technologies for producing and storing ice in an artificial way were developed. A thriving refrigeration industry was born, which responded to the growing needs of the food and hospital sectors. Industrialization and technological innovations had made it possible to finally overcome the great problem linked to the ice market: its instability. In fact, we had to submit to the vagaries of the climate and it was not easy to transport ice over long distances or store it for a long time ”.

But all this cold that we produce industrially, even with our home refrigerators, what impact does it have on the environment?

“The impact is there, it is undeniable. The cold industry is energy-intensive and the paradox is that in order to have so much artificial cold we are risking losing the natural cold, as evidenced by the almost disappearance of snow at certain altitudes and the melting of glaciers. The hope is that the cold industry will intervene to reduce its impact on the environment. In the past, it has already succeeded in eliminating, starting from the 1980s, chlor-fluoro-carbides (CFCs), the compounds widely used as refrigerant gases and among the main causes of the ozone hole "

But today is the cold still an industry and is ice a status symbol?

“It may be surprising, but it is. Snow must be artificially produced if we want to ski. It is therefore now a playful product. The ice market is then expanding after decades of stopping as everyone produced it at home. Now it has returned to being synonymous with ostentatious well-being and an element of refinement. Presenting a dish immersed in ice is considered chic and now you can find it again in the supermarket as it has not been used for years. There are hotels made entirely of ice and competitions for sculptures made of the same material. Indeed, in Japan it has come to offer not only cubed ice, but also in spheres made by hand by very skilled artisans… in short, ice spheres, I imagine, with exorbitant costs ”.