Liviu, Marta - Szőcs Péter Levente (szerk.): Andrid. Ghid cultural şi istoric (Satu Mare, 2011)
Ethnographic values
Ethnographic values One of the ethnographic items that mark the past of the Ier Plain area is the traditional architecture. Being a marshy plain, the basic materials used in building houses were: clay, wood, reed and bulrush. Country houses of the eighteenth-nineteenth century were built of clay walls made by ramming mud with the beetle in molds. The first types of dwellings belonging to the commoners had either a single room or one room and a kitchen. Later these buildings were expanded to two rooms and an entrance hall (with food pantry) and completed with a barn following the house. Houses stand perpendicularly to the street, with the clean room towards the street and the living room in the rear. At the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, the houses were built of beetled mud and clay bricks, mixed with chaff. More recently, burnt bricks were used in constructions, interspersed with clay-bricks. In order to protect the houses from bad weather, a porch was built in front of them. After the 1970’s, most of the traditional houses suffered modifications due to the changing of the roofing material from reed to tile (asbestos), or tin. The double front windows were replaced with a window in 3-4 glass openings. In recent years many houses replaced their wooden doors and windows with PVC windows. Many preserved, however, their structure of beetled mud or clay-bricks, because they are cool in summer and warm in winter. During the first half of the twentieth century, the basic occupation of the people living in the plain was agriculture. In the marshy area, besides the traditional agricultural products, flax and hemp were also cultivated. In addition, another basic occupation was fishing. The raw materials for textiles were processed and manufactured in peoples’ households. Flax and hemp threads, after a prior processing, were bleached and weaved on a loom. After the autumn agricultural works, almost every Cu bivolii la arat, fotografie de arhivă Szántás bivalyokkal, archív felvétel Ploughing with buffalos, archive photo Grup de treierători Cséplők Flailors group 45
