Two brothers and a valley: Federico and Renato Chabod – Vals

A film dedicated to Federico Chabod, with photographs and captions that retrace the salient aspects of his life: his family, his education, his passion for mountaineering, his career, the Resistance, his political commitment. The film is accompanied by Mozart’s music, Chabod’s favourite composer.

The exhibition Two brothers and a valley: Federico and Renato Chabod – Valsavarence is a tribute to two important figures from Valsavarenche, whom throughout the 20th century played an important part in various areas: in culture, politics, mountaineering...
The exhibition includes a film that retraces the most significant moments in Federico Chabod’s life through photographs and captions. The exhibition presents fourteen paintings by Renato Chabod, as well as photographs, personal objects and family mementos. The exhibition is organised by Fondation Grand Paradis with the support of Valsavarenche municipality, and in collaboration with the Historical Institute of the Resistance and Aosta Valley Contemporary Society, and with the Regional Department of Education and Culture. The exhibition has been possible also thanks to the idea and helpfulness of Adriana and Valeria Chabod, Renato Chabod’s daughters, who have handwritten the exhibition captions.

Federico Chabod was born in Aosta on 23 February, 1901.
He graduated in Torino in 1924, and in 1928 became editor in medieval and modern history for the Italian Encyclopaedia. He wrote numerous articles on Europe from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment. In 1934 he was appointed professor at the Political Science department of the University of Perugia. In 1938 he was called to Milan University Arts faculty, and in 1946 to Rome University Arts faculty. In 1947 he was appointed director of the Italian Institute for Historical Studies, by its founder, Benedetto Croce. As director of the Rivista Storica Italiana and of Rome’s Scuola di Storia Moderna e Contemporanea, he was granted many awards, both in Italy and abroad, during the post-war years: he was a member of the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, of the British Academy, received the title Doctor Honoris Causa at the Universities of Oxford and Granada, and in 1955 was elected president of the International Society of Historians.
In 1946 Federico Chabod became the first President of Aosta Valley Region.
He died in Rome on 14 July 1960, leaving some of his most important works handwritten, which his friends and pupils would publish in subsequent years.
Some of his most significant works are: Introduzione e Note in Niccolò Machiavelli, Il Principe, Torino, UTET, 1924; Storia della politica estera italiana dal 1870 al 1896, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1951; L’idea di nazione, Bari, Laterza, 1961; Storia dell’idea d’Europa, Bari, Laterza, 1961; L’Italia contemporanea (1918-1948), Torino, Einaudi, 1961; Scritti su Machiavelli, Torino, Einaudi, 1964; Scritti sul Rinascimento, Torino, Einaudi, 1967; Lezioni di metodo storico, Bari, Laterza, 1969; Lo Stato e la vita religiosa a Milano nell’epoca di Carlo V, Torino, Einaudi, 1971; Storia di Milano nell’epoca di Carlo V, Torino, Einaudi, 1971; Carlo V e il suo impero, Torino, Einaudi, 1985; Idea di Europa e politica dell’equilibrio, Napoli, Istituto Italiano per gli Studi Storici, 1995.

Renato Chabod was born in Aosta on 28 July 1909.
An academic mountaineer since 1930, he completed some of the highest climbs of the time: South of Mont Maudit, North of Gran Paradiso and Aiguille Blanche de Peuterey, the canals of Mont Blanc du Tacul, North of Grandes Jorasse and Cerro Cuerno during the spedition to the Andes in 1934.
He was president of Courmayeur Guide Society, of the Aosta Valley Guides Committee and of the Guide and Porters National Consortium; general president of the CAI (Italian Alpine Club) between 1965 and 1971 and of the CAAI (Italian Academic Alpine Club) between 1975 and 1979 and honorary partner of the CAI form 1979. He wrote and illustrated, through sketches and reproductions of his paintings, the CAI guide Alpinismo, the Gran Paradiso and Mont Blanc guides, Entrelor Peak (history of its mountaineering activity), Camarade prends ton verre and Montagnes Valdôtaines.
Renato Chabod was a lawyer, captain of the Italian alpine troops, a combatant partisan, Regional Councillor, Mayor of Courmayeur from 1965 to 1967, and senator in Aosta Valley uninominal college for the autonomist movement Union Valdôtaine between 1958 and 1968. In November 1967 he was elected Senate vice-president, a position he filled until the end of the fourth legislature.

He died in Ivrea on 22 February 1990.

Two brothers and a valley: Federico and Renato Chabod – Valsavarenche

Gran Paradiso National Park visitor centre of Valsavarenche