Vigo: Horreo, mills and pigeon lofts

Within the ethnographic heritage of granaries and mills are very important for the role they played. The barn and grain store and mill as transforming those seeds into flour to make bread.

The Granary

The barn is a typical Galician spikes used to store grain and corn harvests. It dates back to Roman times where there were already similar constructs and their presence had an ostentatious character by being who possessed greater this, how long was the granary over.

The barn, also called broom, Canastro, cabazo or cabaceiro, has a simple construction and distinct parts. Its main body is a rectangular chamber, in most cases, and this may be of stone, wood or stone mixed-wood.

Inside the grain is stored safe from soil moisture through the stone pillars that isolate the camera from the ground, and safe from rodents through the inverted circular bases with legs, llamdas in Galicia "tornarratos". The camera is protected from the rain with a tile roof that generally have ornaments and crosses in the upper parts. On the side of the camera unless there is wide a door to get inside.

Today, the barn is losing its functions, but thanks to its beauty is still retained as a purely decorative element.

Watermills

Ever since man discovered the use of ground grain or flour managed to move from manual stone mill to mill Neolithic moved by the force of water.

The river is diverted for irrigation canal or from a dam or a natural jump, so it takes up a water tank from which water is penetrated hard to make it move the millstone that grinds the grain . The water is then diverted to the river denuevo.

The mill generated cornmeal, rye or wheat which is then used to make bread. Each person could take the grain of his harvest to the mill and grind as the mill was collective or private property would make a small payment for grinding grain.

The pigeon or 'Pombal'

The pigeon appears in the ethnographic heritage Galician lesser extent than the barn. The reason is the poor performance that drew the practical exploitation of the same. The pigeon meat was not highly valued compared to other poultry and the dove looked more like an animal to admire. Besides the manure generated by the pigeon was scarce and too many pigeons could be counterproductive for seeding the field. Therefore make great lofts as a roofed stone towers are considered a symbol of social status and reserved for large solar upper classes and Galician country house, which as the saying goes: "loft, chapel and stately cypress is ".

Anyway the modest rural house could have small terraced lofts requiring less maintenance and constructive effort. Being the great lofts reserved for the manor as a symbol of social status and power, of course, of meat for consumption.