Open-Air Museums

in Europe
Open-Air Museums
in Europe
By

Jiří Langer

Translator: Vladimír Klíma

Open-Air Museums in Europe

By Jiří Langer
Translator: Vladimír Klíma

This book first published 2022

Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2PA, UK

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Copyright © 2022 by Vladimír Klíma

All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without
the prior permission of the copyright owner.

ISBN (10): 1-5275-8956-0

ISBN (13): 978-1-5275-8956-8
Contents

Preface for the first (Czech) edition vii

Author’s preface ix
Book arrangement xii

DEVELOPMENT OF OPEN-AIR MUSEUMS 1

THE EUROPEAN HOUSE AND ITS CONTEXT 6

Prerequisites for the emergence of architecture 6
Mediterranean innovations in western Europe 15
The Roots of western European traditions 25
Roots of the building traditions of eastern and northern Europe 33
Smoke removal 43
The eastern route of Mediterranean innovations to central 54
Europe

CATALOGUE OF OPEN-AIR MUSEUMS IN EUROPE 66

Austria (A) 67
Belarus (BY) 92
Belgium (B) 95
Bulgaria (BG) 100
Croatia (HR) 109
Czech Republic (CZ) 115
Denmark (DK) 146
Estonia (EST) 175
Faroe Islands (FO) 180
Finland (FIN) 183
France (F) 198
Germany (D) 208

v
Contents
Hungary (H) 327
Iceland (IS) 349
Ireland (IRL) 355
Italy (I) 363
Latvia (LV) 366
Lithuania (LT) 376
Moldova (MD) 386
Netherlands (NL) 389
Norway (N) 405
Poland (PL) 469
Romania (RO) 536
Russia (RUS) 571
Serbia (SRB) 605
Slovakia (SK) 611
Slovenia (SLO) 646
Sweden (S) 651
Switzerland (CH) 697
Ukraine (UA) 707
United Kingdom (Great Britain and Northern Ireland) (GB) 739

Glossary 783
Bibliography 788
List of museums 792

vi
Preface for the first (Czech) edition

Dr Adelhart Zippelius, the founder of the German Rhine (Kommern) open-

-air museum, published his handbook of European open-air museums in
1974. It contains a complete list of the then existing European open-air
museums, totalling 167. Dr Jerzy Czajkowski, for many years the head
of the Sanok Museum in southeastern Poland, wrote the following book
adding many more museums. More than 20 years have passed and in the
meantime naturally, some museums have grown and more new museums
were set up. Our colleagues from the European museums have discussed
the need for a new survey. But none of these plans have so far been carried
out. Now we cheerfully welcome Dr Jiří Langer’s work. His book fills up
the gap for those who take an interest in the history of culture; this will
primarily serve our colleagues in Europe
Jiří Langer knows European open-air museums very well. He gathered
information partly during his research and numerous consultations with
his colleagues, and partly thanks to his activities with the Association of
European Open-Air Museums. He has kept personal contacts, contributing
to the heart-felt atmosphere surrounding our colleagues in various European
countries. One often feels that the same problems face museums in Croatia,
the Czech Republic, Northern Ireland or Sweden. Their common solutions
increase mutual understanding and friendly inter-relations, which all of us
appreciate.
In September 1990, Jaroslav Štika and Jiří Langer hosted a big conference
attended by nearly 100 participants from European open-air museums.
The beautiful and well-kept Wallachian Open-air Museum received,
delighted and impressed us. Museums throughout Europe are pleased to co-
-operate with Czech colleagues from Rožnov pod Radhoštěm.
The Skansen in Stockholm, the oldest open-air museum in Europe was
founded and opened to the public by Artur Hazelius in 1891. The new
improvements meant that the buildings were not moved for protection and
preservation but chiefly in order to be shown to the public for instructive
purposes, if I am to use the words of the former director of the Skansen, Gösta
Berg. Hazelius understood that industrialisation would strongly transform
life in the countryside as well as in towns. The expression skansen is now
used synonymously in some languages with open-air museums. Skans in
Swedish means an old place of defence or a fortress. A fortress such as this
stood on the top of the hill where Artur Hazelius established his open-air
museum. He intended to preserve the old farming cultural legacy and to
open it to visitors. The idea inspired his followers and spread all over the
vii
P r e f a c e fo r t h e f i r s t ( C ze c h ) e d i t i o n
world. Nowadays, the only place this format has not been accepted is South
America.
Travelling people can disseminate this idea and the brothers Alois
Jaroněk and Bohumír Jaroněk from Rožnov pod Radhoštěm, who visited
open-air museums in Århus (Denmark) and Oslo (Norway), started their
work to preserve threatened buildings in their region upon their return home.
Many open-air museums attract tourists in their respective countries.
Vistors can imagine or dream an illusion of people’s past lives. Open-air
museums offer a general view and enable the public to understand better the
culture and history of a country or a region. Open-air museums have been
able to develop their freedom much more easily than more science-based
institutions.
Jiří Langer’s knowledge and style form the basis of this book that is
becoming an extensive and valuable guide for tourists with cultural interests
and will assist cooperation between European museums.

Gunnar Elfström, director of the Swedish

open-air museum Gamla Linköping,
President of the Association of European
open-air museums in 1993–1997.

In June 2011, Jiří Langer and Karel Kuča were awarded European
Union Prize for Cultural Heritage / Europa Nostra Awards in Amsterdam
for their book about wooden churches and bell towers in Europe (2009) and
in October 2019, they were awarded the Jože Plečnik Prize in the Czech
Republic for their lifelong conservation activities.
viii
Author’s preface

At first, I tried to make drawings of the scenery in order to better recognise

villages and their architecture. Then I studied it from the viewpoint of history,
sociology and ethnography. In my younger days, I was fond of walking in
the mountains, and I drew everything I liked. I became acquainted with
villagers. When I started my work in museums, I participated (from 1960) in
designing, planning and building open-air museums in the Czech lands and
Slovakia. I travelled in order to see them whenever and wherever I could,
mostly during my holidays, and observed their relative position among
Czech museums. I have seen about 145 open-air museums, many of them
several times, surveyed their exhibits and asked my colleagues to inform me
about their concept and operation.
As the title suggests, this book deals with the museums in which we
move around without having a roof over our heads. Their settings were
deliberately reconstructed to demonstrate historical lifestyles which
characterised a particular region. Such museums show how people lived,
especially their dwellings, what they consumed and longed for, what made
them happy or sad and how they transformed the surrounding countryside.
Open-air museums differ from one another as they did not always
develop for the same purpose. I cannot classify them by any universal
criteria; each country formed its own structure and in some countries, there
are not only great national or regional institutions but also small museums,
private or village ones, set up by and belonging to local supporters, or major
museums established thanks to the donations or associations subsidised
by local, district or regional councils but also by the government. Nordic
countries especially have many small museums, which are still developing
and deteriorating or stagnating. Consequently, data concerning them can
be neither complete nor exact. Even addresses of many such museums
are almost unknown. But in some cases, they attract more attention than
the village itself. Associations set them up not only to present the regional
culture and history of past generations of local families but also for one
simple reason: their members need a place where they can meet and talk
during the long winter nights.
Present guidebooks enable us to trace the cultural relations of Low
Germany and the Netherlands, Denmark and the coast of Poland up to the
eastern Baltic countries of Norway, Sweden, Finland and northern Russia,
as well as countries lying below the Alps and the Carpathians.
Curiously enough, southern Europe has not yet established open-air
museums. Why? Probably because the Mediterranean did not develop
ix
A u t h o r ’s P r e f a c e
villages and farmsteads similar to ours. The local population perceived
culture as one whole that was not divided according to the privileges of social
classes or residences. Their village houses can be classified as town ones.
Building materials perhaps caused restrictions as masonry houses could not
be transferred to other places for example. This method was so difficult that
it could be applied only to the buildings that were the culmination of many
artistic styles and were transferred only if their existence was seriously
threatened at their original site. Even central and north European museums
avoided brick-built buildings for a long time as wooden houses were more
easily taken to pieces and reassembled elsewhere.
For many years I planned to write a book presenting the most important
European museums of this kind. At last, I managed to carry out my long-

x
 A u t h o r ’s P r e f a c e
-time intention thanks to the initiative of Věra Kučová and Karel Kuča and
the interest of Baset Publishing House – but to a larger extent than I had
imagined. The book aims to capture all museums in Europe if possible.
It would have been hard to make a list of open-air museums which come
close to their complete enumeration (roughly 4000). These museums, like
any living organisms, arise, develop or, unfortunately, decay and disappear.
Compromising, I used my knowledge, special literature, museum leaflets
and consultations with my friends and foreign colleagues. With so many
museums, one cannot find out the present-day condition of all museums
between Iceland and the Ural, between the Norwegian northern cape and the
Balkans. You may, therefore, see much more in some of the museums than
this guidebook promises.
New facts kept enriching my text and I found it difficult to finish writing
this book. It would never have been complete without the assistance of
numerous colleagues. A single man cannot gather so much information
from such vast territories. I wish to remember my friends here from
distant museums who helped me study the cultures of their own countries,
particularly the late Christopher Zeuner and Michael Thomas from England,
Eurwyn William from Wales, Alan Gailey from Northern Ireland, Heino
Wessel Hansen, Liese Andersen, Finn G. Nielsen and their colleagues from
Denmark, Mats Janson, Gunnar Elfström, Kersti Björklef and Lena Larsén
from Sweden, Jakob Agotnes, Ase Tömdel and Ola Setter from Norway,
Stefan Baumeier, Carl Ingwer Johansen and Konrad Bedal from Germany,
Oľga Sevan from Russia, Jurij Hoško from Ukraine, Paul Niedermaier and
Mihai Dancuş from Romania, Endre Füzes and Miklos Cseri from Hungary
and many others.
I wish to thank Karel Kuča for his valuable editorial advice and many
photos, Milena Habustová and Luděk Habusta for helping me acquire and
eleborate data, Helena Bočková for her comments relating to southeastern
Europe and all my friends who offered me minor data (as these informed
the whole) and who sent me photos taken during their journeys: Vanda
Jiřikovská, František Ledvinka, Alena Lenoch, Tomáš Lenoch, Bedřich
Přikryl, Oľga Sevan, Daniel Drápala, Zdeněk Cvikl, Jozef Turzo, Tomáš
Vašut, Heinovi Wessel Hansenovi, his wife Liese Andersen, Zuzana Syrová,
Jiří Woitsch, Miroslav Sopoliga and Olena Krušyns´ka.
My warmest thanks rightly belong to my wife Jaroslava Langerová,
who accompanied me on my travels. I could never have written this book
without her understanding.

Jiří Langer
xi
Book arrangement

This English edition – like the Czech one (2005) – was completed by Karel
Kuča, who also arranged the illustrations, especially photos and maps, and
ensured high research standards, whereas Vladimír Klíma translated the
text from Czech into English. (The revision of the final version was carried
out by Elanor Harris and chapter The European House and its Context
also by Craigmaile McGregor, whose assistance combines English and
ethnography.) Both of us express our gratitude to the editors of Cambridge
Scholars Publishing for improving the utility, shape and look of the
extraordinary work written in Czech by Jiří Langer, who has devoted his
lifelong research and art to his fruitful ethnological studies.
In comparison with the Czech edition, the text of the book had to be
shortened by a third: numerous localities near the museums were often left
out as well as transport information and the activities of the museums. Texts
about museums have been updated and some newly established museums
have been added. Many photos have been replaced with current ones.
The book includes 527 museums in 31 countries. The information
is offered in alphabetical order of the countries and their museums.
The numbers corresponding to them appear on the maps attached to each
of the selected countries. Where the network of museums is excessively
dense, countries are subdivided into lands or regions (in Germany, Norway
and Sweden) also in alphabetical order in order to keep the number codes
of museums, photos and maps as they were indicated in this edition.
The names of sites and museums are given in the original version (Příbram,
Røynevarden and Nowy Sącz). Names in countries using the Cyrillic alphabet
are also given ‘as they are written’, not ‘as they are pronounced’ because
their letters are the same as in the Slavic languages. Latin. International
licence plate country codes with the number code of the museum (like EST-1)
precede each open-air museum in the text and the captions of the images.
The text includes the identification of each museum, the original name of
the open-air museum and the town or village, the name of the district or
the region, sometimes its postcode, the name of the street or the address of
the administrative area. In bold square brackets – [27] – are the numbers
of buildings or areas corresponding to the numbers in the schematic maps
of the individual museums. To speed up orientation, the numbers indicate
some museums that do not have a map in the book.

Vladimír Klíma and Karel Kuča

xii
DEVELOPMENT OF OPEN-AIR MUSEUMS

The origin of open-air museums is generally understood in relation to the

great expos of the second half of the 19th century. Models of buildings
from all continents, mainly from the British colonies, were exhibited in
London in 1851. A quite exceptional deed was the reconstruction of part
of a medieval town assembled from copies of constructions documented in
northern Piemont by the Portuguese architect Alfredo d’Andrade in Torino
(I-2), which has been preserved up to the present time.
In 1873, organisers of the Vienna Exhibition attempted for the first time
to show authentic pieces of regional architecture (nine houses from the
countries belonging to the Austro-Hungarian empire). In 1878, the furniture
of living rooms was exhibited together with figures in folk costumes from
different countries. (Artur Hazelius of Sweden formulated for the first time
the complex concept of folk culture with living people’s activities.) Folk
culture was similarly shown at large exhibitions in Amsterdam (1883),
and in Budapest in 1885, with the interiors of 12 houses from Hungary.
The Jubilee Exhibition in Prague (1891) followed the Vienna example in
constructing a Czech village cottage from the Elbe lowlands. It was used
in 1900 for the opening of an ethnographic collection in Přerov nad Labem
and for starting an open-air museum 67 years later (CZ-6). Similarly in 1894
at the Galician Exhibition in Ľviv, six transferred farmsteads, a windmill
and a church were exhibited.
The Czechoslavic Ethnographic Exhibition in 1895 resulted from the
cooperation of an ethnographer, an architect and many museums through
the principal concept of F. A. Šubert, the director of the Czech National
Theatre, and looked like a scenographic design rather than a reconstructed
village house. The exhibition included 90 buildings and the genuine
ethnographic concept corresponded to the idea of an open-air museum. But
it was impossible to keep buildings at the exhibition site or transfer them to
another place (with a few exceptions). As a result, its concept and valuable
experience remained applicable to later house transfers.
In the meantime, there were more successful attempts in Scandinavia:
Norsk Folkemuseum, Oslo (N-10) still comprises the so-called royal
collection of transferred regional buildings, conceived in 1881 and carried
out in 1888. George J. Karlin’s similar intention (S-12) came to be realised
in Lund in 1891 when Artur Hazelius offered access to his museum, the
Skansen in Stockholm (S-16). He started its construction in 1880, having
spent the preceding 12 years conducting research in the field and collecting.
He founded the ethnographic museum of Nordic countries (the Nordiska
1
D E V E LO P M E N T O F O P E N - A I R M U S E U M S
Museet). Following the principle ‘A day may come when all our gold
will not be enough to create an image of the past’, he initiated – together
with his friends – the Scandinavians’ movement. They did not aim solely
at preserving vanishing houses but also at renewing the disappearing
atmosphere and elements of the old lifestyles. It is worth noting that many
museums of this kind originated before World War I in northern Europe as
well as in the north of Germany (D-86, D-87, D-91, D-77 and D-59) and
today’s Poland (PL-10 and PL-22). Latvian and Lithuanian efforts came
to be successfully realised only after World War I (LV-4, LT-3). According to
Hazelius’s concept, a characteristic farmstead was transferred from each
region of the country (and from small districts to minor museums), while its
natural surroundings were reconstructed as well.
Anders Sandvig prepared an open-air museum in Lillehammer
(N-30) from 1887 with a different intention. He followed a sociological
stratification of the Gudbransdal valley population. He reconstructed a large
part of the historical settlement where constructions were not understood as
evidence of the villagers’ skills but as means of recognising their lifestyles.
He opened his museum in 1904.
This approach was applied in Central Europe to Rožnov pod Radhoštěm
(CZ-9) thanks to the initiative of the painter Bohumír Jaroněk, who from
1912 carried out the old plans using Sandvig’s method even although the
two gentlemen did not know of each other’s intentions. Because of World
War I, the development only started in 1925 and even Jaroněk’s concept was
not fully carried out due to lack of finance.
The building conditions of the open-air museums changed substantially
after World War II. Central and Eastern European countries suffered most
from irreparable losses to their cultural heritage damaged during the war.
Village houses of the time no longer satisfied the increasing housing demands.
As a result, they succumbed more quickly to the disruption of the post-
-war building renovation and economic efforts. This situation made nearly
all European nations develop and intensify their activities for systematic
monument protection and care. Rescuing extant buildings became a priority
for museums and consequently, methods for the preservation of monuments
were employed in order to create open-air museums. Monuments are meant
to be protected in their original places, which prevented the transfer of some
pieces of regional architecture to museums in some countries (including
former Czechoslovakia).
The building of open-air museums was recommended in declarations
issued by the International Committee of the Organisation of Museums
(ICOM). In a polemics with monument protectors, it recognised the transfer
2
 D E V E LO P M E N T O F O P E N - A I R M U S E U M S
of buildings as the most extreme and exceptional manner of saving them.
The so-called original natural setting surrounding most houses had changed
in the meantime. Monuments of regional architecture were vanishing fast,
too. There was sometimes a need to protect the material of different structures
rather than to renovate their architectural shape. Museums displayed them
as the fruit of their technological and artistic skills (which was proclaimed
by ICOM as late as 1977), regardless of their original surroundings from
the 1970s.
Newly established open-air museums began to return to known
museological concepts, thanks to Hazelius, Sandvig and Jaroněk.
The younger generation demanded more complexity in the displayed
elements of reconstructed surroundings. Protected buildings got back
their scientifically ascertained (although vanished) surroundings. Not
only farmsteads but also nearby fields, meadows, orchards and pastures
were renovated. This required considerable care, and so the principle of
reconstruction was extended to the ways of traditional farming, production,
and even demonstrations of dining, customs/usages/unwritten conventions,
festivities and other areas of extinct life.
Wherever there was a choice, only the so-called original material that
had been preserved in the buildings was preferred. This worked better in
northern Europe where fewer wood-spoiling insects live and where fewer
fungi and moulds are active. This was one reason (the other one was where
less damage had been inflicted by the wars) why more old houses have been
preserved there.
But open-air museums are also built in countries where well-to-do owners
have maintained their houses with care even during minor renovations,
whereas cottages belonging to poorer people remained empty after the
war and, therefore, deteriorated and disappeared. In many cases, only later
research showed that some types of houses had completely disappeared and
were not included in renewed settlements by museums.
Nowadays, we look for sources (remains of buildings in reconstructions,
witnesses’ accounts, old photos or drawings, historical official records in
archives etc.) according to which the whole house could be reconstructed.
Historically motivated demands laid on open-air museums have brought
about not only many-sided technological and scientific analyses of old
buildings but also reconstructions of damaged building elements as well as
its whole construction, ensuring the historical core was preserved.
During the last 30 years of the 20th century, many museums
undertook dendrological datations of wood coming from various parts
of the preserved constructions. Thanks to this, we can now determine
3
D E V E LO P M E N T O F O P E N - A I R M U S E U M S
precisely when the individual parts of a specific building originated
from. (D-14).
Ethnographic and experimental historical and archaeological methods
can be combined. Some open-air museums are extended by adding areas
demonstrating medieval lifestyles. The presentation of these conceptua-
lisations become enriched thanks to the principle that constructions dating
from the 4th–7th centuries ought to be shown with increasing precision. This
viewpoint can be applied to more complicated buildings, which serves to
demonstrate that reconstructions of different periods showed how dwellings
had improved in order to satisfy their inhabitants’ demands.
The second half of the 20th century changed the technology relating
to transferring and preserving buildings. Previously, they dismantled the
structure, marked the and examined whether they would be statically
suitable even after the reassembly of the building. Damaged or spoiled parts
were replaced by new pieces (such as laths and roofing). New materials
were used including brick and stone for the retaining walls and paths along
front walls and were imitated with precision. Filling in rotten parts of beams
was gradually abandoned. New beams of the same size and quality were
substituted for old ones. The last decades have enabled the application of
more sophisticated techniques so as to transfer large sections at a time,
e.g. gables, plaster-decorated ceilings, kitchens built in brick and stone and
gates.
The idea of conserving and restoring wooden houses is not different from
what it was 50 years ago. The problems have resulted in a new specialist
field because of the above-mentioned needs. Large museums ceased to use
chemicals that harm human health and prefer physical methods: they apply
heated air in perforated pipes under plasterwork, and this system regulates
the humidity in a building to block conditions that enhance fungi, moulds
and the multiplying of wood-spoiling insects. But many experts (especially
from ecological museums) also desire to reconstruct pre-existing lifestyles
of those communities which led to such conditions. Usually, smoke-
-producing operations repelled insects and regular heating removed
extremes of humidity. When a beam became naturally rotten, it was easily
replaced in the same way (depending on a carpenter’s choice of wood) as
three hundred years ago.
Museums offer knowledge to visitors by displaying the interior furniture
in the buildings. Regional specificity and rich visual art presentation were
researched at first and later on, efforts were made to demonstrate certain
social classes and economic peculiarities. The most advanced museums in
this respect are the ones that display exhibits (including written documents)
4
 D E V E LO P M E N T O F O P E N - A I R M U S E U M S
that recall some people’s fates, in particular the dramatic periods of their
lives, their family interrelations (including generational), interactions
with their neighbours and community conflicts. Visitors can thus perceive
specific historical processes. This presentation requires detailed research
in terms of history and ethnography, both in the field and from archival
sources as the economic and social structures of open-air villages should
correspond to historical reality, including all details concerning interior
furnishings, implements and surroundings. If very old buildings are studied,
e.g. those dating from the Middle Ages or the 15th and the 16th centuries, even
fundamental equipment such as household items can seldom be ascertained.

5
THE EUROPEAN HOUSE
AND ITS HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Prerequisites for the emergence of architecture

The Near East and the African coast of the Mediterranean, has had a long
tradition of continuous cultural development including the apogees of
Greek and Roman Antiquity, and the Byzantine era. The most luxurious
architecture of town and countryside residential houses developed during
those times. The living area was separated from the farming areas, with its
yard building and dung-hill. Common activities of life were centred on the
first floor of the house, while storage and functional spaces remained on
the ground floor. The villa-type house had an open-roofed terrace facing
the recreational garden of the enclosed inner courtyard, or the four-sided
inner courtyard, a large, central entrance kitchen with a chimneyed fireplace
and living rooms arrayed around it. Bedrooms were often only on the
highest floor. Settlements along trade routes led to an intensified use of the
land rather than the occasional use by farmers and shepherds, who were
more peripatetic. Growing wealth attracted nomadic bandits. As a result,
fortifications were added to the most ancient residential places and were
needed until the end of the Middle Ages (even longer in the Balkans).
Strong family farmsteads erected living towers, where they kept their
property and could defend themselves when threatened. Many buildings
of this kind are still standing in Italian towns (San Gimignano, Bologna
and Mantua are among the best-known ones). In the countryside, they have
been mainly preserved in Albania and the Caucasus Mountain range. When
Mediterranean culture was in bloom, north and west European countries

6
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T

8. House dug-in with truss types:

8.1 with straining beams, 8.2 with
a ridge purlin (Iceland),
8.3 with a crown post.
were only emerging from a prehistoric way of life and leaving behind their
improvised struggle for subsistence in their unstable and simple dwellings.
The majority of the population lived in dug-in underground huts with the
only construction being their roofs. Curiously enough, the tradition of dug-
-out dwellings, under certain specific natural and historic circumstances,
survived until the early 20th century (RO-3, RO-7, H-3, DK-8) or mid-20th
century (IS-2, IS-6, IS-8). Only the roof projected outwards, being formed
by the strutting branches of trees with a ridge purlin inserted at the point
of intersection. Grating-like rafters were hung from it to support fern,
heather, broom, reed, straw and bark coverings, together with flat stones,
turf and peat. Similarly, roofed houses were constructed with the use of
straining beams on the ground level, sometimes with low stone and peat
walls, as with cruck construction. They were sometimes used in the Scottish
Highlands (GB-10) from the Iron Age until the early 20th century (and
exceptionally, until the 1960s). This method has been preserved more in
Western Europe, and chiefly on the Atlantic Islands. The pole system, with
the ridge purlin support, was more often applied in the sandy and dusty
soils along the Middle and Lower Danube, and along the rivers flowing into
the Black Sea. [8.1–7]
Prehistoric inhabitants built above-ground structures, and these were
tied together with the two above-mentioned systems. Straining beams,
7
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T

4.1 Cleft post construction

(prehistoric forms in the entire
Europe).
4.2 Pole construction forming
8.4–8.6 Dug-in construction a frame with horizontal board
8.4 with a ridge, 8.5 only open and panelling (Denmark).
roofed entrance, 8.6 a descending 4.3 Post construction with
neck appears over the ground a straining beam truss (Denmark).
(northern Bulgaria).

8.7 The central space of the dug-

-in dwelling is the kitchen entrance
space (southern Romania).
2. Cruck(s) constructions:
2.1–2.3 England (like France),
2.4–2.5 Netherlands (as well as
Belgium).

crucks and poles only supported the roof. The open space under it was, at
the periphery of the floor plan, covered by thin walls tied together with poles
or stakes, placed under low eaves (DK-5, DK-9, NL-5, D-9, D-112). This
system has survived until recently, too. Straining beams, with strong cruck
posts, became the main element of the oldest constructions (the cruck) of
timber-framed houses in Britain (GB-2, GB-13, GB-14), western Germany
(D-82, D-92, D-95), the Netherlands and Denmark (DK-6, DK-16) with
isolated traces elsewhere in Europe (in the Limousin region of France and
8
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T
also in Romania, for example). They were preferable to narrow, single-pile
buildings, which did not need any posts standing in the centre. The second
system using poles made it possible to roof any wide space. Its posts formed
frameworks on which other posts (crown posts) were placed. The whole
frame network developed whereby the structure could be made higher
or wider simply by adding more parts. The structure supported the roof.
The periphery walls were fastened to it on the lower posts bordering the
floor plan, but the inner partitions and cross walls were entirely movable.
Big family communities needed large roofed spaces, chiefly in the cattle
breeding regions, because animals lived alongside people during winter.
The German, Danish and Dutch museums demonstrate best how the latter
system (using poles) evolved into the timber-framed one, by separating the
posts from the truss, although the hall space only had a negligible dividing
arrangement (D-92, DK-5, NL-1). [4.1–3, 2.1–5]
One of the main elements of the construction of slanting curved posts
(crucks) is the tie beam. It connects two slanting posts horizontally at
ceiling height (ceilings were never made in halls) with its ends supporting
lower roof purlins, called wall plates. Post, timber-framed and frame
constructions have this tie beam (Ankerbalken) under the post tops.
The ends pass through chiselled holes in the posts. They are wedged from
both sides and often braced, as this joint makes the whole hall structure
stable. Small-size constructions (such as the Jutland longhouse, DK-8)
use this tie beam as a ceiling beam supporting the cover of the ceiling to
close the wall panels. The lower roof side purlin (called the arcade plate)
supporting the truss, lies on posts over the tie beam. This technological
progress simplified hall construction so much that the tie beam was
shifted over the posts, and as their upper timber joint started to support
the wall plates [5.1–5.5]. They could lie farther from the middle than the
separation of the posts would otherwise make possible. The tie beam of
antiquity became an entablature, which separated the roof structure from
the main supporting posts in the middle of the building. These were not
yet wall posts, but they were no longer part of the roof construction.
A separate truss lay on a high framework and partially hung down to the
lower walls. This process started first in Upper Germany (the Hallenhaus
mentioned in the 14th century, D-14) and later in the Netherlands, from
where it spread northward to Schleswig (Gulfhaus) documented in the
17th century (N-1, D-92, DK-8). Unlike the long halls of Lower German
cattle breeding farms, Upper German halls have a shorter, almost square
floor plan. Their inner framework construction was used elsewhere
in Europe in the farming hall sections of unity houses of all kinds of
9
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T

6.6 Post construction supporting a truss with a ridge purlin, walls are
joined under eaves (southern Germany, mostly 17th century).
6.7 Post construction with a straining beam standing on a tie-beam and
fastening a ridge purlin, with self-supporting walls (southern Germany,
mostly 17th century).
6.8 Rafter truss on a timber-framed supports a ridge purlin on which more
widely open roof slants hang (Switzerland, 18th century).
6.9 Truss is supported by posts and their side purlins with wall purlins
at their ends are braced with frame construction inbuilds inside rooms
(southern Germany, especially Upper Franconia, 14th century).

1.1–1.3 Construction of walls and 3.1–3.2 Separation of wall posts

a truss illustrated on the tiles found from a truss (England).
in the old Roman fortress Carnutum
(near the confluence of the Morava
and Danube Rivers).
construction, and also in large trusses (in the Alps CH-1, D-18, A-4,
A-11). [6.6–9]
This development resulted in separating the upper slanting parts of
cruck posts from their lower straight parts and gave rise to rafters. Their
couplings are connected above and fastened below as a basis for lower
timber joints (wall purlins as basic beams of the truss). Whether they are
supported by posts, on a frame, or a wall no longer matters. Our present-
-day design idea considers roof-supporting walls to be the basis of any
construction. This idea developed in the Mediterranean with stone-built
houses. Antiquity based building-forms also used pillars which, however,
were always separated by an entablature from the truss. One ancient Roman
tile portrays three shapes of roof construction: a ridge purlin supported by
10
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T
straining pieces, posts standing wide apart and a crown post support with
a slanting framework [1.1–3, 3.1–2]
A truss with straining pieces by the walls of the house can be seen not
only in France and Switzerland (F-5, CH-1) but also in the Pannonian basin

D. Roof types: D-1 hipped, E. Steepness of roofs:

D-2 half-hipped, D-3 gablet, E-1 1:2.5=39°, E-2 1:2=45° (in
D-4 gablet with a gable cap, 19th century became a norm in
D-5 double-gablet. central Europe), E-3 1:1=53°,
E-4 1.25:1.5=60°, E-5 1:1=65°,
E-6 2:1. 5=71°, E-7 3:2=72°.
11
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T
(H-5) and in earthen constructions of the Lower and Middle Danube River
basin (H-3, 6, RO-3, RO-7). We can note the combinations of straining
pieces and rafter constructions in some instances. Crucks in England
sometimes did not reach up to the upper crossing, they were mutually joined
by a collar in order to support the ridge purlin. Or they were shortened at
their upper end and connected horizontally by means of a collar, upon which
stood a very short supporting post.
Ethnologists consider roof construction an indicator of technological
advancement. Firm (stone-built or wooden) walls able to support a roof
were the base of old southern European architecture, but too little attention
was devoted to improving the truss there. Regular straining beams and
small crown post supports with ridge purlins were used. Roofs were low
to provide shade. It was only with the increasing timber-framed and frame
architecture in western Europe that relatively narrow and tall roofs received
rafters without ridge purlins, such as log-built architecture with a truss
(called sleg in Poland, samcovaja in Russia and åstak in Norway, which
means a beamed roof). [9.5–7, E1–7]
After the peak of the Middle Ages, the prevailing central European
use of the rafter truss enabled the separation of the roof construction from
the walls and became taller, and thus the ceiling also gained more loft
space. Carpenters would measure the length of the rafters by the wall of
the living room. In some places, they chose a shorter gable wall, whereas
elsewhere an eaves wall was selected. The straddling of the rafters, and
thus the height of the roof, differed everywhere. The highest roofs are in
the east-west part of central Germany, between the Upper Tisa River, in
western Romania, southward to the Danube gate and up to the mountains
in the southwest across Serbia and Bosnia. Such a roof did not push walls
further from each other as much as the low roof did. Consequently, very
firm constructions were not needed so much as they were under trusses.
In the 16th century, Italian builders introduced into central European towns
rectangular roofs (at 90°) with a pair of rafters. This became an obligatory
norm for carpenters’ guilds, which also applied in the countryside. Only the
roofs in the mountains retained the lower-pitched roof rafters. They were
gradually perfected in the following centuries by collars and frameworks
so that bigger spaces could be covered with increasingly heavier roofing
(including not only reed and straw but also shingles, slates and tiles
produced from fired clay). [D1–5]
The four-hipped slant became the fundamental form for the roof.
The post construction of the half-hipped roof developed and became an
architectural sign of the then economically most advanced European
12
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T

9.1 Cleft pole support with a board 9.5 Two-storeyed granary with
roof preserved in west Carpathian a log-built vault (Slovakia).
chalet houses (Těšín region: Czech 9.6–9.7 Log-built house with
Republic/Poland). a log-built and purlin roof-ceiling
9.2 Cleft pole support and a frame (Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia).
construction (Denmark).
9.3 Combination of log-built
and post (pole) constructions
(a reconstruction of a Celtic house,
Slovakia).
9.4 Log-built construction with
a crown post support truss
(Austria).
countries, just as it became a sign of modernity, too. It spread (in the 17th–18th
centuries) to the vast territories of northern and central Europe including the
Baltic regions, to become fashionable in houses of any building material or
construction type. Gabled roofs were more often constructed where beam-
-vaulted (sleg) and rafter trusses were built. Log-building was managed to
shape the vaults rounded towards the centre from four sides under a hipped
roof. Gabled roofs developed into hipped ones in two ways: the gable is
enlarged either from below to become a half-hipped construction or, from
above, to become one of the myriad variations of a gabled roof (SK-11).
Decorated gables became a prestigious addition to the gable cap. The most
beautiful ones to have survived are in the western Carpathians, where there
are sometimes hints of a partially roofed hole near the ridge of the hipped
roof, which helped smoke to escape (RO-12). This function is connected
13
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T
with the origin of the roof gable where smoke canopies led smoke from
a firebox into an under-roof space [9.1–4]
Log-built constructions can be found in archaeological finds throughout
central Europe in the late prehistoric and protohistoric periods, other than
the above-mentioned constructions. Framed constructions panelled with
beams and a small number of completely log-built constructions have been
found in large, fortified residential sites from the mid-1st millennium BCE
in Biskupin (PL-1a) near Toruń. Even though walls are basic elements of
log building, slightly more recent Celtic residential sites (SK-3) contained
solutions where the main weight of the roof is supported by poles around
a log-built construction. Eave purlin beams lie upon them, while rafters are
in turn supported by a ridge purlin braced by two crown posts, placed upon
log-built walls. Log building techniques, essentially capable of supporting
the roofs of inner spaces, were enclosed by log vaulting. Their proximity
depends upon the height of the curving, i.e. on how close to other beams
they are (over eaves-orientated walls) in the vault. Beams are less frequent
under low roofs in northern Europe. The ridge purlin is set between the
two gables at the top. Two eave purlins are set at the bottom and a side
purlin is placed in the middle. Boards, and sometimes more coverings,
are laid on them. Closer beam vaults enabled builders to daub plaster
in the other area or cover the roof from above with birch bark and turf
(N-5, N-11). Rooms with such vaults usually have no ceiling. Vaults can
therefore be perceived as inclined roof ceilings (tak, in Norwegian, means
both ceiling and roof). Even this system does not take walls as bases for
separate roofs.
Comments on European regional architecture are usually concerned
with northern Europe and in the most mountainous areas. But this idea
is not quite correct. Log-built construction covered the whole of eastern
Europe down to the Black Sea steppes. It included the central European
lowlands, the Carpathians and most of the Alps, but did not reach the
Balkan Peninsula or the Pyrenees Mountains. Medieval peoples tried to
gain the largest possible areas of land for farming, to the cost of the forests.
Where they had destroyed forests, they substituted earthen dwellings for
wooden ones (e.g. in the Danube River basin). There is a sharp demarcating
line in central Europe between timber-framing and log-built construction,
regardless of natural conditions. Elsewhere, there is an intermediary stage
between these two construction systems in the use of frame walls, which
have horizontal plank panelling or timbers or (pole construction) with tenon
and mortice joints in the posts preserved in northwestern and southeastern
Subalpine regions (D-4, CH-1), in Greater Poland (PL-6, PL-12, PL-21,
14
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T
PL-22), Ukraine (UA-2, UA-3, UA-5), Romania (RO-1, RO-3, RO-12),
in southeastern Jutland (DK-3), Gotland (S-2) and elsewhere. The frame
wall method of construction preceded both timber-framing and log-built
construction, as proven in many places in Europe.
The regions where dug-out dwellings occurred before the early
20th century has demonstrated how much care had to be devoted to the
building of earthen walls and the insulation protecting them from external
(climatic) and internal (earth) humidity. As soon as the building of light-
-structured houses began on the ground, all older knowledge and experience,
gathered and passed on from one generation to another, was applied to
the building and maintenance of dug-out dwellings. Everywhere (even in the
mountains), but chiefly in intermittently flooded lowlands, a lot of attention
was paid to the riverbank, in the form of elevation and fixing to the ground
(20 to 30 cm above the level of the yard). A wall with posts or a frame
supporting the truss could be erected on the bank. Even western European
hallenhauses and barn houses in north-eastern Europe stand on the bank,
which is, however, completely hidden behind these buildings, concealing
all the typical functions of the farmstead. In central, eastern and south-
-eastern Europe and some places in the Alps, the bank exceeds the floor
plan of enclosed rooms and makes it possible to build a roofed (sometimes
an arcade/colonnade type), open living space. The humidity of the wet
ground that had been frozen over threatened northern (and many eastern)
European dwellings. Buildings in many regions were therefore constructed
either on pillars or underneath log-built constructions containing storage
spaces with ventilation holes. Such houses already had wooden floors on
an elevated ground floor from the medieval beginnings of building culture,
unlike houses with banks where floors were earthen (central Europe until
the mid-19th century). Only after dwellings had been erected over cellars
and stone-built constructions had become widespread, were houses built
upon foundations that were really solid underneath.

Mediterranean innovations in western Europe

The integration of the northern barbaric regions into the southern
(Byzantine-Roman) economic sphere forced the founding of the first states
and the building up of early medieval societies on bases differing from those
of Classical Antiquity. The great cultural contrast between the dwellings
of the advanced south and that of the simple, close-to-nature north caused
the penetration of Mediterranean architectural elements northward. There
were two routes: the western one, leading via eastern France to the middle
15
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T
Rhine River basin, and the eastern one, passing through the Balkans to the
Carpathians, the middle Danube River basin and the north-western Black
Sea coast.
Northern rulers and leaders had equally ambitious housing aims to
those of their southern counterparts. The oldest brick-built architecture
of monasteries, the royal courts of the southwestern towns and the first
medieval states of Europe are early expressions of these efforts. Josef
Schepers (1908–1989), professor at Münster University, conducted
research into the oldest innovations in western European architecture.
Cattle breeding in the north, in some places infiltrated by the traditions
of Celtic and Roman crafts centres, started, from its southern regions, to
substitute hall, pole-demarcated spaces, for people and animals in separate,
two-storeyed brick-built dwellings (sometimes continuing to retain their
wooden frames). The upper floor was used for living, the lower for kitchens,
washing and storage rooms and walkways with galleries and terraces, their
garden areas being used for recreation. The yard was separated from them
and fenced-off to include the other farm outbuildings, mainly cowsheds.
Examples of this solution were in northern Italy and south-eastern France.
Brick-built tower houses and two-storeyed palaces appeared in castle areas
and in towns where they had either full gable walls or a wall overhanging
the arcaded entrance space. The latter type was the main innovative process
in Lorraine in the 12th to14th centuries, south of the line; Lille – Maastricht
– Koblenz – Frankfurt – Nuremberg – Passau, and frequently occurring
to the west of it and even sporadically in the east. Towards the mid-Rhine
River basin, the importance of the main living room on the first floor, with
a hearth increased, whereas in central Europe the oven was in the group
that developed into a blind stove heated from the neighbouring kitchen
(D-14). This process was considered significant. Mediterranean elements in
the High Middle Ages continued to the Lower Rhine River basin, including
the valleys of the Lower Mosel and the Lower Mainz, appearing even in
the Subalpine regions. These innovations were introduced gradually, first in
large cities, and later in small towns and wealthier villages around them, but
they started in the wine growing regions. The important part of the house
was the wine cellar and its entrance, usually dominating the architecture
(F-5, CH-6 southwest of the country and Engadin). Stone-building was first
applied in villages in the kitchen area with a chimney, and the periphery
walls, but the inner structure remained timber-framed.
People living in the countryside considered it important to separate
living from farming (stabling livestock and other animals and storing
hay and straw). The hall space (at the heart of the house) included a wall-
16
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T

5.1–5.2 Post (pole) construction supporting a rafter truss; walls are added
(northern Germany).
5.3 Tie-beam on posts supports crown post with the purlin of a truss;
periphery walls are added (northern Germany, chiefly from the end
of the 18th century).
5.4 Tie-beam becomes a cross-joint of posts and bears the basic truss
beams of a wider truss; outer walls are added (northern Germany, chiefly
19th and 20th centuries).
5.5 Pillars support the roof construction; the frame supports the rafter
roof (northern Germany, mostly the 19th and 20th centuries).
-enclosed chamber for sleeping (or only a chest bed). Growing requirements
transformed it into a living room with a stove. The space around the
fireplace (from which the stove was fuelled) became ever more significant
within the house. As soon as it became separated from the barn and stalls by
means of a wall, a separate dwelling developed. It was a two-part unit with
a smoke kitchen and a clean living room, which had a ceiling. The chamber
was developed for sleeping, partially under the truss or on the first floor.
The kitchen had remained open to the truss until it was joined with a chimney.
The formation of two-unit, tall buildings is confirmed by the uninterrupted
main timber-frame posts, joined with the upper wall beam (D-46, D-108).
[5.1–5, 7.1–7, 7.10].
The oldest Hallenhauses, dating from the 16th century in the Lower
Rhine River basin and western Lower Saxony, demonstrate that their thick
frames of strong oakwood posts do not need oblique braces or supports
to withstand side pressure (D-60). They were painted in the same brown
colour as the daubed covering of their walls. As late as the 17th century,
the post ‘grid-style’ framework became less dense in the interior of
Westphalia, Hesse, Swabia and Franconia, and the main construction lines
17
T H E E U R O P E A N H O U S E A N D I T S H I S TO R I C A L C O N T E X T

7.1 Six inner posts support the truss, 7.6 Three-unit living part is
the space is enclosed and divided separated from a threshing floor
by frame-and-plank walls (Upper and cowsheds by an entrance
Franconia, 14th century). passage (German and Austrian
Alps, from the 17th century).

7.2–7.5 Three-unit living part developed by separating a barn-cowshed

hall (northern Germany, 15th–18th centuries).
became ‘broken’, and oblique directions were emphasised to form richly
decorated fronts. The blackened network of beams contrasted with the
white walls. High steep gables are most decorative in Upper Franconia,
also Swabia, Thuringia and Egerland (Cheb region CZ): (D-1, D-8, D-14,
D-26, D-32, D-37, D-41, D-46, CZ-5 and others). The large porches over
the entryway space offered still more opportunities for decoration. They
had date inscriptions and finely carved and painted ornaments (prevalently
18