Thoughts on Eras

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Thoughts on Eras

On first visiting Andalucia, nearly always in winter, I was puzzled to be told that the numerous helipad like circles of flat stones to be seeen were in fact threshing floors. I took the information, but doubtfully; after all where were the wheat fields, the flat land and the young growths of cereal? I have never seen a threshing floor in England and still do not know if there is any similarity. Perhaps the period of England's threshing is too far back in her past for any to remain, perhaps they are all buried under the new milking parlour. I hope these in Spain do not all suffer that fate. They are such beautiful, simple yet intricate, and functional structures in themselves without beginning to account for their locations. They are so numerous that it is hard to imagine their disappearance but certainly their slow deterioration is a fact now that the number in use is minimal.

Imagine a 10 or 15 metre diameter stone paved area half a days walk from the nearest modern day dwelling, but there visible is the ruin to which this era belongs. It is situated on the shoulder of a mountain slope which now supports nothing but scrub. It is not very steep land but steep enough for the constructor to need a one or two metre high supporting embankment under the lower lip and an equally deep excavation at the upper in order to achieve a level result. In a different location say a Cotswold village or Watford town park one would say it was destined to have a maypole or had had a playground round-about on it.

The term threshing floor is really a misnomer, a quirk of dictionary translation. The Spanish era is a winnowing platform. No spaniard in his right mind, and the noble peasant is almost invariably in his right mind, would site threshing floors in out of the way spots a mule trip away from fields and farm. No, these are winnowing areas and so they had to sited in the place on the owners land that most often caught the wind in August.

The smaller eras are no more than a patio like drying area at the side of a tiny living room come tool shed which is easier termed casa de campo. The casa de campo would be a siesta spot if near to the village or an over night or over summer temporary dwelling for the owner peasant. The drying area would receive crops of maize, beans or whatever to be dried to rock like consistency for keeping through the winter for animal and human consumption. These areas often lack the conformity of shape that the builders of the true eras were able to create, working from a central point, obvious from the pattern of the stones, they were able to to form a perfect circle from flat slabs the largest of which form the circumference which usually rose at the lip to aid retention of crop on the surface.

In some areas there are both round and oblong eras, the reason for which I have yet to confirm. I suspect two different methods of threshing and perhaps this is also associated with different ranges of crops; since both types are seen alongside each other it is still rather intruiging.

The structure is as sound as it ever was unmoved in the time it has taken for its owners house to crumble completely. Some shapes and structures it seems were just meant to be right; the eras are such a part and parcel of the landscape they might have grown, having the appearrance, and charm of a product of nature. They stem from a period I suppose when man was part of nature and his structures and life style conformed with it; this can be seen in the era.

The embankment and excavation is formed and supported by dry stone walling the stones and rocks bedded into each other with earth. The surface itself radiates from a central point making pattens dependent on the builders whim and the rock available. Where large flat slabs are available so much the better to make a working suface. Heavy slabs looking like '4 man stones' would be more stable and require less maintenance. Some builders finding themselves in a limestone area with fragmented roundish rock to deal with had a longer job. Time not being a great issue they seem to have made a virtue of the circumstance by making more intricate patterns, the pride in the creation of these monochrome mosaics being visible , tangible and much appreciated by this particular passer by.

As a musing rambler, as on paper, so too in boots, I do not resist the magnetism of the era and hope to meet the ghost of the era builder , complement him and give him the tiny bit of encouragement I know he barely needs, to tell me all about it.

The siting of this one is typical. On the shoulder looking both ways and incidentely at a junction of small valleys where wind or breezes passing up or down in the diurnal rythm of mountains would offer a good chance of winnowing time be it day, night, light or dark since the competion for wind time in the relatively short period of time when the job had to be done was intense. This goes to explain the huge numbers of eras, at least one per owner, since in matters of water and getting the crop safe, neighbourliness probably did not overflow. Its siting like nearly all its brothers incidently provides a splendid view which combines with the emotions exuding from the polished rocks into an experience and not simply a view.

This type of micacious rock has a natural shine but this is polished smooth by centuries of use, it is a black rock and absorbs heat from the sun easily, providing a warm resting place where previously the sweat ran freely during day time threshing or the fingers chilled from midnight winnowing in the cool mountain winds, for always there is the feel of snow in the wind off these mountains all be they within sight of the mediterranean. I have usually to walk around its circumference; compulsive behaviour or force I dont know. I am looking for the best stone on which to sit around the edge but inevitably I am drawn like a dying sun to the centre of the universe from where our builder started, and there I rest, dribbling.

Eras can do funny things to you, despite their functionallity when not in use agriculturally they have had other uses which have embedded themselves in mythology. However you define a witch, one supposes that they existed, needed somewhere to meet, dance and launch from. The era has attributes lending itself to all this, the isolation, shape, wind have obviously suited the occult through the ages and here upto the present generation of grandparents, they know who the witch is even if they have never actually seen her fly from the era. It is strange how one sees ladies who are physically identical to the charicatures of witches in childrens book illustrations, so ideal are they for the part that I can hardly resist the temptation to stop one of them to engage in some pretext of a conversation to see what transpires. It would probably produce nothing; on the one occasion I determined to stop the car on passing one of my witches, and engage in conversation; too late, on looking for her in the mirror she had disappeared.

Jeremy Rabjohns