V.17.6
HOUSE FOR GOATS AND GOATHERDS
LAYOUT AND DESIGN
Ista domus cunctas nutrit seruat q· capellas
This house feeds and shelters all the goats
The House for Goats and Goatherds (fig. 489) lies near the
House for Cows and Cowherds. Its layout is that of
the standard house of the Plan. In the hexameter explaining
its function, the word domus appears in the sole context
of the Plan where it means the entire building. The
living room bears no inscription. It is reached through a
vestibule that divides the eastern aisle into two separate
chambers used as "bedrooms of the herdsmen" (cubilia
pastorum). The lean-to's and the western aisle of the house
are designated as "stable" (stabula). The building is 57½
feet long and 45 feet wide. The living room measures 37½
feet by 25 feet.
Columella recommends that not more than 100 head of
goats be kept in one enclosure. He advises the goatherd to
sweep out the stable every day and not allow any ordure or
moisture to remain or any mud to form. The she-goats
should be covered in the autumn, sometime before December,
so that the kids may be born when spring is
approaching and the shrubs are budding.[640]
He devotes a
whole chapter to the making of goat cheese.[641]
MANAGEMENT OF SIZE OF HERD
The House for the Goats and Goatherds could easily
have sheltered one hundred goats. It was probably used
primarily for the purpose of milking and breeding the
goats. Shortly after the young were born in the spring, and
had gathered sufficient strength, they were no doubt taken
out to pasture by the goatherds, a breed of men who,
Columella stipulates, should be "keen, hardy, and bold . . .
the sort of men who can make their way without difficulty
over rocks and deserts and through briers . . . men who do
not follow the herd like the keepers of other breeds of
cattle, but precede it."[642]
The rooms in the eastern aisle of
the House for the Goats and Goatherds on the Plan are
large enough to accommodate, besides the permanent goatherds,
a considerable number of extra hands who during
the warmer months of the year took care of the herds that
were out to pasture.
MILK PRODUCTION
Modern farming manuals state that two reasonably well-bred
goats will supply an average household with all the
milk it requires and most of the butter, each goat being
able to produce 250 gallons of milk or 100 pounds of
butter per year.[643]
If the House for the Goats and Goatherds
sheltered one hundred goats at a time, these animals must
have contributed considerably to the monastery's daily
supply of cheese.
In layout, design, and dimensions, the House for the
Goats and Goatherds is identical with the House for
Visiting Servants (figs. 402-403), which relieves us of its
reconstruction. The same holds true for the two remaining
buildings of this tract, which we shall discuss presently.
