The Maltese Farmhouse

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Introduction

The typical Maltese farmhouse (Razzett Malti) which I still remember clearly from my early childhood has lost its usefulness in today’s fast, modern world. In fact, we now see far fewer farmhouses for many reasons. First of all because the number of people who are still involved in farming has decreased greatly over the years, and secondly, because transport has improved so much that farmers no longer have to live close to their fields. Today’s farmers prefer to live together with their families in houses which can offer them the use of all modern comforts, rather than in a farmhouse.

As a result of this, many farmhouses were gradually neglected and left to deteriorate, while others were turned into more modern farm buildings for garaging agricultural vehicles or as warehouses. Others were completely demolished to make way for greenhouses or new development and of those which survived, some are now being refurbished. Some of these farmhouses now can hardly be recognized from what they were originally built for, but some of the old style of architecture can still be seen.

The Main Characteristics of a Maltese Farmhouse

Security – Living on an isolated farm, especially before the arrival of the Order of the Knights of Jerusalem in 1530, was very dangerous. Therefore a farmhouse had to be built to provide a certain amount of security for those live inside it. No wonder farmhouses were always built with very thick walls (tad-dobblu) and very few small windows on the street, which were only found on the first storey and never on the ground floor. At ground floor level, the rooms’ only openings to the outside were ventilators (rewwiehiet), built so high up and in such a vertical narrow shape that they could also have been used as a look-out post and from where one could fire a gun in case of an attack.

The front cart-room door (bieb tar-remissa), was always strong and very thick. When locked during the night it was usually also reinforced by placing two long rod latches (saratizzi) from the inside, down each part of the double door, which held the door firm when fitted in their holes in the ground. PHOTO Thick wooden bars would also be set on the inside of the door. Each farm always kept vicious, usually ‘Barbary dogs’ (klieb ta’ l-Gharab) as watchdogs tied on the roof and around the main gate (xatba) for added security as their barking was a very effective alarm for the farmers who would be working in or around the farmhouse.

The Passage and the Gate (il-Passagg u X-Xatba) – A typical Maltese farmhouse was usually surrounded by fields, and it was not uncommon to see a cluster of three or four farmhouses, usually belonging to the same family. Each farmhouse, or cluster, always had a passage-way leading from it to the public road and this would be wide enough for a horse and cart to pass. At the end of this passage-way, one generally found a wooden gate (xatba). This gate was often left open during the day but was always shut at night.

The Main door (il-bieb tar-Remissa) – The entrance to a farmhouse was always through its front cart-room (remissa). The width of this doorway when fully open had to be wide enough for the cart to pass through it. The door was made of thick wood and made in two parts with the right side closing on the left side and kept shut on a latch. The top part of the door was always semi-circular in form, with a low masonry arch around it. Stone masons generally used a low three-centered arch (hnejja rieqda) and never a lintel (blata) for such doorways. This type of doorway is still commonly known in the villages, as the cart-room door (il-bieb tar-remissa), and those surviving today can still be seen fitted with a large locally made lock and key. This type of large key is called, ‘muftieh‘ and its elegant shape has helped many of them to survive, still in use as a house decoration, on a shelve or hanging on a wall.

Other door features – Outside the main door of such a farmhouse, a plain iron ring (holqa tal-hadid) was usually attached on the right side in the vicinity of the latch, as if it were a knocker, but its function probably was to pull the door shut from outside. Around the key hole a metal plate (skudett) was affixed. A curious but common habit was that of piercing a small hole through the front door, a little above the latch, wide enough to allow a string to pass through it. This string then was tied to the latch lever from inside, passed through this hole and left dangling on the outside, so that when the string is pulled from outside, it would lift the latch and therefore open the door. This method was still very much in use with most dwellings in Gozo until the early1960s and was very practical since it enabled one to enter the house without having to use the key or needing those inside to interrupt any chores to open.

The facade (Il-faccata) – On the facade of the farmhouse and close to the door jamb (koxxa tal-bieb), one would usually find a jutting-out stone slab with a hole through it forming a stone ring (marbat). This ring was used to tie up a horse, mule or a donkey, the most common form of transport at the time.

The Cart-room (Ir-Remissa) – On stepping through the main door one would find oneself in the cart-room (remissa). This room was similar to a hall which leads into the courtyard. Besides the cart, the farmers also kept other agricultural tools in this cart-room. On one side of the cart-room there usually was a stone slab (sing. xriek; pl. xorok) held on two short stone pillars to form a bench (bank – pronounced “bunk”) on which the animal’s halter (kappestru) or similar equipment were kept. Hooks (grampuni) were fixed on the walls around the room for farmers to hang tools and equipment on them while a number of sacks (xkejjer) would be found lying around.

The Couryard (Il-Bitha) – In all traditional farmhouses the cart-room (remissa) led straight into the courtyard, which was the central and most important part of a farmhouse. It was usually quite spacious and would always include a well with a stone well-head (it-terza tal-bir) and next to it a stone water-trough (hawt tal-gebel). In the court-yard one would find an exterior staircase (tarag miftuh jew minn barra). This was always supported against one of the side rooms, embedded in that wall (ingaljat fil-hajt) while other doors led to various rooms, mostly animal pens (pl. imwieqel sing. maqjel).

The Cattle-Pen, Stable & Cow-shed (Il-Maqjel u l-iStalla ) – The rooms in a farmhouse where animals were kept, the cattle-pens, stables or cow-sheds, were all generally called il-maqjel though strictly speaking maqjel is more used for the cattle or as a pig-sty. For the other farm animals such as a horse, donkey, cow or an ox, the word (stalla) meaning a stable or cow-shed was used. In each ‘maqjel’ one would find some type of a manger (maxtura). This manger was a low stone wall dividing part of the stable from the rest, so that the fodder would not be tread upon and wasted.

The Fold (Il-Mandra) – In the animal enclosure(Il-Mandra), usually part of the court-yard of the farmhouse itself, the hens, rabbits, a lamb or a kid (a young goat) were left to roam. The hens very often would leave their enclosure as the farmhouse door was usually left open during the day, and would end up grazing along the front passage or in nearby fields. Because of their foul smell, pigs were more usually kept outside the farmhouse.

The upper room in a farmhouse (Il-Ghorfa) – The exterior stairs (tarag minn barra) in the courtyard of a farmhouse lead up to the roof of the ground floor rooms. This part of the roof leading to the upper room (ghorfa), always had a parapet wall (opramorta) built around it and, was called the terrace (is-Setah). Then from the terrace one entered the upper room. The members of the family usually slept either in an upper room, when there was more than one room, or in some other room downstairs, next to the pens. The upper room was used as a sort of a drawing room and there the family would keep its best possessions. For this reason this room was always locked and it was used only on special occasions such as during family feasts, or when giving birth, or when a member of the family was sick. When later a farmer started to have a house in the village besides the farmhouse, the upper room or rooms (għorfa jew għorof) started being used as dry-rooms for fodder.

The Ceiling (Is-Saqaf) – Most of the rooms of a farmhouse (razzett) were roofed by using stone slabs measuring one ‘cane’ or 2.096 meters long (xriek tal-qasba) which then were laid onto the walls across the width of the room and rested on corbels (kileb). This very early method of architecture however restricted the width of the room. Another method of roofing was that of using arches (hnejjiet) and then on top of them, ordinary stone slabs approximately three and a half spans (xbar, plural of xiber) long were laid resting from one arch (hnejja) to the next. Although permitting a wider room, this method still had its restrictions as it was more difficult to build. For this reason, one would not usually find more than one room with arches in a farmhouse, and this would usually be the upper room (il-ghorfa). Because this early architectural method of roofing, restricted the width of the rooms, one understands why the stairs were always built on the outside. This type of early architecture, of building exterior stairs, continued even when large timber beams were later introduced.
The roof (il-Bejt) – The roof was always made out of stone slabs resting on corbels or on stone arches and later on, on timber beams (travi ta’ l-injam). The stone slabs were then covered by about four inches of soft stone chippings (xahx) mixed with fine material and lime (gir) and on top of it all they used to lay a final surface by using ground-pottery(deffun) mixed with a little cement. This latter type of surfacing also served to make the roof water-proof, and was made to slope down towards the stone water spouts (imwiezeb plural of mizieb) which were fixed jutting out from the roof. These water spouts (imwiezeb) poured the rainwater off the roof and were generally fixed in a way so as to direct the rain water towards the well in the yard. The roof of the upper room (il-ghorfa) never had a parapet wall (opramorta) built around it.
Cantilevered slabs (Knaten hergin ‘il barra mill-hajt) – On one of the side walls of the upper room (il-ghorfa) from the outside and overlooking the terrace (is-setaħ), one would often notice a number of stone slabs jutting out of the wall (knaten hergin ‘il barra), Rising at an angle, these slabs served as primitive steps to reach the roof of this upper room. For lack of space inside, these steps would be built on the exterior.

A type of verandah (Logga) – A very common feature in most traditionally built farmhouses was found on the front of the upper storey room (ghorfa) or rooms (ghorof) and overlooking the internal courtyard. This was an enclosed terrace or verandah (logga). In this sheltered place many things were left out to dry such as bundles of fresh garlic or onions, which were hung against the walls; homemade cheeselets (gbejniet) placed and left to dry on square flat reed frames (qannic); jars (vażetti) filled with tomatoes and preserved in kitchen-salt were put on high shelves and left to ripen to be used during the winter months when nobody, in those days, could grow them out of season; pickled onions (basal tal-pikles); olives in brine (żebbuġ fis-salmura), and others. A memorable but rare sight nowadays is that of huge pumpkins (qargħa aħmar) lined all around the roof of the upper room (ghorfa) and on all the other walls around the farmhouse to expose them to the sunshine until they ripen.
Prickly Pear Trees (Sigar tal-Bajtar tax-Xewk) – Farmhouses used to be surrounded by prickly pears trees (bajtar tax-xewk) from all sides as these trees serve as a very good and solid fence against intruders and good shelter to the farmhouses during strong winds which prevail in Malta. During the hot summer months, they also offer some the farm animals some shade from the scourging sun. These trees produce a lot of delicious, good fruit, and their over-abundant, succulent, large leaves could also be fed to animals such as goats, sheep, horses, donkeys, rabbits, and others. The farmer needed only to cut these thorny, succulent leaves early in the morning when their thorns are soft after the morning dew and slice them into small pieces to be fed to the animals.
The fact that these trees needed no attention at all, not even water in summer, which was very important at a time when Malta depended solely on underground wells and reservoirs.
The Carob Tree (Il-Harruba) – Next to every farmhouse one was sure to find at least one carob tree as this enormous tree was very important to shelter the farmhouse during the winter storms and to provide shade during the summer heat. Like the prickly pear, the carob tree is an evergreen perennial tree, requiring no care at all, not even a drop of water in summer and offers abundant large carob pods which are edible to animals and humans. A sweet, delicious carob extract (gulepp tal-harrub) was also made out of these carob pods. Also very importantly, the carob tree was a very good provider of firewood for the stone stove (kenur).
Conclusion
It is a great pity that today the number of such farmhouses has dwindled. Decades ago, probably at the time when their village parish church was being erected, farmers had already started to build their village houses. These new houses were architecturally very similar to the farmhouses and while most rooms on the ground floor were used as pens, those on the first storey were only used by members of the family. Many of these early village houses which once surrounded the parish churches forming narrow, winding crooked streets and lanes, have today disappeared, some to make way for wider roads and others to permit the creation of new village squares, while others were upgraded or reconstructed. The mortal blow, however, came with ‘World War II’ when Malta’s infrastructure was transformed overnight due to urgent defense action. After the war, the restructuring process played havoc with the Maltese farming community. Many farmers emigrated to Australia and Canada while others found alternative work with the armed services or in the construction business.
In 1964 Malta gained its Independence and the island witnessed what was called ‘a building boom’. Since then this boom continued building up momentum, causing the demolition of many ‘outdated’ homes which were considered too primitive for modern living.
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References:
‘Qieghda Fil-Ponta ta’ Ilsieni’ by Guze Gatt.
‘Building Technology transfer between Malta & the Middle East: A Two way Process’ an article by D. Mallia – Conservation Architect.
‘Storja ta’ Malta’ – Zmien L-Inglizi by Henry Frendo.

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(copyright 2011 Edwin P. Borg – San Gwann)
To be used exclusively on www.62582.com and the FAA Heritage website without prior consent of the author.