More than two centuries have passed since a doctor and a crystal hunter conquered Mont Blanc: here are some curiosities about the Roof of Europe (but is it really the Top of Europe?).
August 8, 1786, the day Paccard and Balmat managed to conquer the summit of Mont Blanc from Chamomix, France, is considered the birth date of mountaineering. Both were encouraged to undertake this feat by Horace-Bénédict De Saussure, a scientist from Geneva who launched the challenge in 1760, promising three guineas to anyone who managed to climb the mountain: twenty-six years later, his wish was granted. completed.
TOP OF EUROPE … OR MAYBE NOT. According to some, Mont Blanc is the highest peak in Europe with its 4,810 meters. However, detractors argue that it is Elbrus (5642 meters), in the Caucasus, that holds the European record: the massif is actually located between Georgia and the Russian Federation, eleven kilometers north of the geographical border between Asia and Europe.
CHANGE OF NAME. The name of this famous peak has a troubled history: if in 1603 Saint Francis de Sales, bishop of the Arve valley, mentions the peak he calls Mont Blanc, this nickname was lost for more than a century in favor of Mont Maud or Mont Malet (Cursed Mountain); only in 1742 Pierre Martel, in Voyage aux Glacieres du Faucigny, mentions both names, making a distinction for the first time: nowadays Mont Maudit is the name of a secondary peak, while Mont Blanc is the name by which the massif that divides France and Italy is universally known.
EVIL SPIRITS AND FREEZING. Legend has it that in the heart of the White Lady (another nickname for Mont Blanc) a host of evil spirits and vile creatures settled, which in the past would have tried in every way to break through the walls of the rock massif and break free , causing deadly avalanches and giving the mountain the nickname "The Cursed". However, at a certain point, the mountain, fascinated by these creatures, swallowed everything around it, covering itself with a blanket of ice: it was the year 1300, the beginning of the Little Ice Age.
"THE LIMIT IS IN OUR HEADS". It was news a few days ago: Andrea Lanfri and Massimo Coda, two disabled climbers who ironically define themselves as "two men and one leg" and have three prostheses both, conquered the summit of Mont Blanc: "Yesterday morning at 6:23 I touched the sky with three fingers, at a height of 4,810 meters", Lanfri wrote on his Facebook profile. But this is only the beginning: «Now under the next peak of Monviso!». Lanfri's goal is to be the first amputee climber to reach the top of the world, Everest: "For me it would be an unparalleled dream," he said.
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