Cseri Miklós, Füzes Endre (szerk.): Ház és ember, A Szabadtéri Néprajzi Múzeum évkönyve 10. (Szentendre, Szabadtéri Néprajzi Múzeum, 1995)

SABJÁN TIBOR: A takaréktűzhely meghonosodása a magyar parasztságnál

THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE RANGE IN HUNGARIAN PEASANT HOUSES The earliest data concerning the manufacturing of ranges date from the end of the 18th century when Hungarian foundries already produced them or their east iron components. By the middle of the 19th century the use of cooking-ranges had become universal among the bourgeoisie. Based on archival data, the author describes the pace at which the inhabitants of Keszthely, a market town, began to use this device. The first ranges appeared in the 1850s in major public buildings. They became widely used very quickly, and in the late 1860s and early 1870s some of them also appeared in village mills and pubs around Keszthely. In certain regions ranges appeared quite early in peasant houses. In Transylvania, the North-Eastcrn and Northern parts of Hungary mention was made of their use in peasant homes as early as the 1850s. just like in the dwellings of the German inhabitants of Southern Transdanubia. In other places the range gained ground only in the second half of the 19th century or on the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. In some villages of Southern Transdanubia. where people were conservative in respect of interior decoration, the range became established only between the two world wars. Different types gained ground at different times. Initially peasants preferred brick or adobe ranges as these were inexpensive. Craftsman-made, finished and portable kitchen-ranges only appeared at the beginning of the 20th century. These consisted of a cooking part and a raised oven. Ranges whose oven did not rise above the cooking place became widely accepted between the two world wars, but only in portable versions. The small, „ship's ranges" (hajótzhelyek), assembled fully of cast iron parts, sometimes included no oven. Modern kitchen-ranges, enamelled on four sides, were introduced in the 1930s and became predominant by the middle of the century. The type of range preponderant in the peasant houses of a region was distinguishable from its counterparts in other areas. The plain little devices constructed by the hearths in Transylvania were called heater („ft") or „platten". In the Great Hungarian Plain such simple ovenless ranges were constructed in the room at the side of the oven, stoked from outside, which had no parallel anywhere else. In Northern Hungary the ranges, built beside ovens stoked where they stood, also had a characteristic shape. In Western Transdanubia, the Balaton Uplands and in the Little Plain in North-Western Hungary, kitchens were built where the closed flue, the kettle, the oven and the range formed one unit. The last was richly decorated with metal-work sometimes of artistic finish. These ensembles were often covered with glazed tiles. The place of the range in the home also differed from region to region. In the Great Hungarian Plain it was first constructed m the room by the oven stoked from outside, or by the stove. Sometimes there was no range in the kitchen at all. In the winter cooking took place in the room on the range, and in the summer in the kitchen over open fire. In those parts of Transdanubia and the Little Plain where, in contradistinction to houses typical of the Great Hungarian Plain, there was an oven in the kitchen, they never constructed a range by the stove in the living room. They only made a range in the room after the stove had been taken apart, often utilising its tiles for the new device. In these territories a range stood both in room and kitchen. In the winter they cooked in the room and during the summer in the kitchen. In Western Transdanubia the ensemble of cooking and baking appliances, already mentioned, became preponderant. The kitchen, thus modernized, became the scene of cooking in all seasons. In Northern Hungary and Transylvania the range found its way first to the room to stand by the side of the oven (stoked in the same place) or of the hearth. With this the heating devices of former times disappeared from the rooms. Ranges and their components were made in foundries and locksmiths' shops. In their sales ironmongers took part, from simple country shops, to chain stores present all over the AustroHungarian Monarchy. The route of the range to Hungary is shown by the migration of experts within the iron industry. Linguists agree. The majority of technical terms are of German (Bavarian-Austrian) origin. The appearance of the range in the peasant home was the effect of following bourgeois models. Traditional interior design underwent major changes in Hungary at the end of the 19th century. A characteristic protagonist of these processes was the range, entering, as a product of capitalist industry, the universe of objects surrounding the peasants.