{"id":8443,"date":"2015-01-28T17:30:00","date_gmt":"2015-01-28T17:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/?p=8443"},"modified":"2015-01-28T17:30:56","modified_gmt":"2015-01-28T17:30:56","slug":"the-tree-of-life-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/the-tree-of-life-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"The Tree of Life – Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

essiccare<\/strong> = to dry\/desiccate
sbucciatura<\/strong> = to de-husk\/peel
metato\/seccatoio<\/strong> = chestnut drying barn
farina di castagne<\/strong> = chestnut flour
gr\u00e0fi\u00e9 e bigungia<\/strong> = dialect name for a large pestle and mortar
mal\u00e0ta<\/strong> = hemp sack used for removing the husk from chestnuts
vas\u00f9ra  <\/strong>= tray for winnowing the chestnuts, from vassoio<\/strong> = tray<\/em><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n

In <\/strong>part 1<\/font><\/strong><\/a><\/font> of this series we discovered how le castagne<\/strong>, historically one of the main sources of nutrition for many Italian peasant farmers, were essiccate<\/strong> in the metato<\/strong>, or seccatoio<\/strong>. This delicate and time consuming process was only the first stage in the transformation of the fresh fruit into la farina di castagne<\/strong>. Today we\u2019re going to look at stage 2, la sbucciatura<\/strong>. Once again, I\u2019ve taken excerpts from an in depth article that I recently discovered in the online news sheet TuttoMontagna<\/font><\/strong><\/a> and translated them into English for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"castagne<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u2026 armati di gr\u00e0fi\u00e9 e bigungia \u2026 Photo public domain.<\/font><\/strong><\/em><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Appena terminata la fase di essiccazione, finch\u00e9 le castagne erano ancora calde, si doveva subito separare il frutto dalla buccia. Per questo motivo, nei pressi del metato, si radunavano molti uomini che, armati di gr\u00e0fi\u00e9 e bigungia, iniziavano questa operazione per la quale \u00e8 necessario dare qualche spiegazione.<\/strong><\/p>\n

As soon as the drying process was finished, and whilst the chestnuts were still hot, the fruit had to be immediately separated from the husk. To carry this out, lots of men gathered together near the metato and, armed with gr\u00e0fi\u00e9 e bigungia<\/strong>, began the operation. This needs a bit of explanation.<\/p>\n

Da sopra i can\u00eccce le castagne venivano messe direttamente dentro la bigungia (recipiente in legno a forma tronco-conica dell\u2019altezza di 50 cm. circa) dentro alla quale veniva fatto roteare il gr\u00e0fi\u00e9, un bastone di un metro e mezzo d\u2019altezza con un diametro di circa 10 centimetri che verso la base si allargava, per poi tornare al diametro iniziale nella parte terminale, sormontata da una corona dentata in ferro. <\/strong><\/p>\n

From on top of the lathes (see <\/em>part 1<\/em><\/font><\/strong><\/a>)<\/em> the chestnuts were put directly into la bigungia<\/strong> (a wooden container about 50 cm high shaped like a truncated cone) inside which the gr\u00e0fi\u00e9<\/strong> was rotated. The gr\u00e0fi\u00e9<\/strong> was a stick 1.5 meters long and about 10 cm in diameter which widened towards the base, before returning to its original diameter at the end, where it was fitted with a toothed iron \u2018crown\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"castagne<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Using la mal\u00e0ta to de-husk the chstnuts. Photo public domain<\/font><\/em><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Con il preciso movimento che gli esperti raccoglitori riuscivano a dare al gr\u00e0fi\u00e9, le castagne all\u2019interno della bigungia si sbucciavano senza rompersi. In epoca precedente, questa operazione si effettuava mettendo le castagne calde nella mal\u00e0ta, un sacco di canapa abbastanza lungo la cui estremit\u00e0 diventava il manico per battere le castagne int e pil\u00f4n, un solido ceppo di legno solitamente a tre piedi. Per evitare che i sacchi si strappassero, venivano unti con una poltiglia di farina, acqua e grasso.<\/strong><\/p>\n

With the precise movement that the expert (chestnut)<\/em> gatherers were able to give the pestle, the chestnuts in the mortar were de-husked without being broken. In the preceding era, this operation was carried out by putting the warm chestnuts in the mal\u00e0ta<\/strong>, a quite long hemp sack whose end became the hand grip for beating the chestnuts \u2018int e pil\u00f4n\u2019<\/strong> (against the pil\u00f4n<\/strong> in dialect)<\/em>, a solid block of wood which usually had three feet. To prevent the sacks from tearing they were oiled with a mixture of flour, water and grease.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\u2026 questa volta erano le donne a dimostrare grande maestria \u2026<\/font><\/em><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Il contenuto della mal\u00e0ta, come quello della bigungia, veniva poi vuotato nella vas\u00f9ra (una specie di grosso vassoio di legno con tre bordi rialzati) dove questa volta erano le donne a dimostrare grande maestria facendo \u201csaltare\u201d con gesto ritmico le castagne che si separavano in aria dalla pula (poi raccolta e conservata per l\u2019anno dopo) e ricadevano, pulite, nella vas\u00f9ra, pronte a proseguire il loro cammino verso il mulino. Ma questa \u00e8 un\u2019altra storia… <\/strong><\/p>\n

The contents of the mal\u00e0ta<\/strong>, like those of the mortar, were emptied into la vas\u00f9ra<\/strong> (a type of large wooden tray with three raised edges), and it was now the women’s turn to demonstrate their mastery by making the chestnuts \u201cjump\u201d with a rhythmic gesture so that they separated in the air from their husks (which were then collected and saved for the following year, see part 1<\/font><\/strong><\/a><\/em>), and fell back, clean, into the vas\u00f9ra<\/strong> , ready to continue their journey towards the mill. But that\u2019s another story \u2026<\/p>\n

to be continued \u2026<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

essiccare = to dry\/desiccate sbucciatura = to de-husk\/peel metato\/seccatoio = chestnut drying barn farina di castagne = chestnut flour gr\u00e0fi\u00e9 e bigungia = dialect name for a large pestle and mortar mal\u00e0ta = hemp sack used for removing the husk from chestnuts vas\u00f9ra  = tray for winnowing the chestnuts, from vassoio = tray In part…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":90,"featured_media":8469,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[656,229368],"class_list":["post-8443","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","tag-castagna","tag-italian-chestnuts"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/90"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8443"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8496,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8443\/revisions\/8496"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}