The Plan of St. Gall a study of the architecture & economy of & life in a paradigmatic Carolingian monastery |
| II. |
 | V. |
 | VI. |
| VI. 1. |
| VI. 2. |
| VI. 3. |
| VI. 4. |
| VI.4.1. |
| VI.4.2. |
| VI.4.3. |
| VI. 5. |
| VI.6. |
 | The Plan of St. Gall |  |
The crafts performed in the annex
The Annex (figs. 419 and 421) is as long as the main house,
but furnished with a single aisle along its southern side
and has a total depth of only 27½ feet. It is subdivided by
cross partitions into three equal spaces, which contain the
workshops of "goldsmiths" (aurifices), "blacksmiths"
(fabri feram̄torum), and "fullers" (fullones) and in the rear
along the outer wall "their bedrooms" (eorundem mansiunculae).
The annex has no separate entrance. It is accessible
through the main building, from which it is separated by a
courtyard 10 feet wide.
423. BOOKS OF HOURS (1460-1480), LABORS OF THE MONTH OF AUGUST
MUSÉE CONDÉ, CHANTILLY. MS. 1362
[courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris]
Coopers work in the village street. Some are hammering hoops of tubs and barrels into final position with wooden mallets and wedges. Others
plane and bevel staves on benches. Two sets of finished barrels are ready for shipment. They have the same shape as the small barrels drawn in
the Cellar of the Plan of St. Gall (fig. I 225) and on the Roman and medieval monuments shown in figs. I 233 and I 234.
The manuscript, once belonging to Adelaide of Savoy, Duchess of Burgundy and mother of Louis XV, is from the school of Jean Foucquet.
It is one of a small group of manuscripts which frame the script with a narrative, rather than an ornamental, surround. (For other illustrations
by the same hand in the same manuscript, see Bouissounouse, 1925, pl. i-xxiv.)
424. LUTTRELL PSALTER (1340)
LONDON, BRITISH MUSEUM. ADD. MS. 42130, FOL. 163
The simple caisson, an old standard for cargo carts, appears on Trajan's column and in the Bayeux Tapestry, attesting the practicality of the
form over many centuries. As farm cart it might with equal ease haul tuns, loose hay, bushels of turnips; the empty cart of the psalter reveals
braided wattle sides that may have been removeable. Its spiked wheels and spike-shod horses indicate this cart type was intended for heavy
work. If not entirely fanciful, the wheel diameter, compared with the size of the draft animals, may afford some notion of the size such a cart
might attain.
To put the workshops of the smiths and fullers under a
separate roof and segregate them from the other craftsmen
by an open court is an extremely sensible procedure. The
fullers need pits for lye and fuller's clay. And the work of
the smiths is associated with enervating noise and high intensity
fires. Their equipment is heavier and requires more
floor space than many of the other crafts. Hildemar lists as
the blacksmiths' tools, the "hammer" (malleus), the "anvil"
(incus), the "prongs" (forcipes), the "bellows" (follis), the
"turning wheel" (rota), the "grapple hook" (foscina), and
the "hearth" (focus),[431]
and tells us that with these they
manufacture "swords, lances, hoes, axes, and files."[432]
The
task of the fullers was to cleanse, shrink, and thicken clothes
by moisture, heat, and pressure. Their work was dependent
on access to open pits where the cloth could be soaked in
water mixed with detergents (fuller's clay) absorbing the
grease and oil of the cloth. There is no indication on the
Plan of St. Gall that this work was mechanized, unless the
fullers were permitted to use one of the water-powered
triphammers in the nearby Mortar House for this work.[433]
| The Plan of St. Gall | |