Nyelvtudományi közlemények 91. kötet (1990)

74 TAMÁS HOFFMANN
an attic and separated off. This new area was not heated by an open fire,
but by a tiled oven, the stove. The stove was heated from another room. The
essence of this innovation lies in the fact that combustion products don't
pollute the air of the room any longer. Surely, in the beginning, this solution
worked well in the bath-houses, and the advantages experienced were flrst
applied to Castles, manor-houses and the houses of townsfolk. Finally, as
it usually happens, the more comfortable living standard found its way to
the house of peasants as well. This innovation spread from Northern Italy
to the north. In the Castles and manors of thirteenth Century England the
first chimneys were built, and somewhat later stove-heated rooms as well.
In the Alpine zone the habitability of peasant houses was increased by the
stove only by the end of the Middle Ages, and even then only sporadically.
But even where rooms were built, people didn't always want to better their
living circumstances, and every-day circumstances. On the contrary: a main
reason for building was prestige.
In régions of Southern Germany, where by the end of the period well-todo
peasants built houses with rooms other then the kitchen; this was needed
to assure a représentative area. In this représentative room the table, sometimes
reaching a height of one meter, an armchair and at least two benches
aside the table, ail had their place. The armchair and table were séries
products of the end of the period, and the carpenter himself could thank
his specialization to this cuit ural need. Materially, the sawmill provided
the preconditions for the work of the carpenters, since semiprocessed goods
stepped into the place of carpentry techniques used previously. The room,
furnished according to dining demands stemming from the dining rooms of
townsfolk and nobles, is a différent world within the peasant-house. This
room was not used for cooking, nor did anyone sleep in it. In other words,
life functions separated from each other where the house had a room such
as this. Actually, this was the most important innovation which changed
the life conditions of the Middle Ages. Yet we must add, that this happened
with limited validity, and on small patches of the continent, about one-tenth
of ail of Europe.
At the same time another innovation appeared around the peasanthouse,
the two-storied granary. Earliest examples of this type can be found
in areas where besides there was a separate room, and where the house
was built together with the stalls and haylofts. Originally the granary was
a separate building in ail areas of Europe where, because of high ground
water, the harvested crops could not be stored in pits in the ground, such
as in the end north of the Alps up the Scandinavia, an the Russian Plains.
The building of granaries was customary as far back as the Bronze Age.
The innovation of the Middle Ages was it's increased capacity, which was put
into practice herein. The architecture of the two-story granary stems from
Nyelvtudományi Közlemények 91. 1990.