Ancient
joiner's work-shop tools:
a collection of pieces of the 17th, 18th, 19th centuries
and of the beginning of 20th.
(Part Two)
The
first shop is the WHEEL-WRIGHT's or WAINWRIGHT's one, it comes
from an old and known Begamask family, who has produced and
repaired wood carts for generations; it is the Ubiali family
from Mozzo. The cart is one of the oldest inventions, which
were realized with wood for the man's service, to make easier
his movings and his goods' transports. The cart's wheels were
originally full, and they changed in lighter and more complex
structures.
In 1706 the wainwrighters entered in the blacksmiths' corporation,
sharing with them part of the working systems. Among the various
tools, showed on the walls and on the pavement, stand out
those classical for the wood and iron working and, most of
all, the "primitive" counter for the assembling of spokes
with hubs and with the hoop. A very important specimen of
the 17th century announces as well the presence in the Museum
of a big collection of carts of different shape and origin.
The
MASTER-CARPENTER or SAILMAKER shop is totally transported
from Venice, offering a varied series of known or unknown
tools for the realization of different boats and sails, of
which is also exposed a very explanatory model of hull structure;
the miniature models of some sailing-ships and simple fishing-boats
are also exposed here. The MODEL-MAKER laboratory comes from
a Bergamask industry, the Battagion company, which produced
machines for bakers and pasta factories. It contains many
tools and different wood models, also supporting the industry
for the production of wood prototypes.
Ingenious
is the wooden "combination", which is able to offer different
contemporary services: with the band-saw and the circular
saw, with the planing machine and the drilling machine, with
the grinding machine and the toupie. Another curious "combination"
is the one in the CAGE MAKER shop. This machine was able to
mill, to drill a hole in the little wood poles and also to
sharpen tools with a grindstone. The wood cages, used in open
spaces for hunting, are ordinarily made. On the contrary,
those for canaries are of refined look and technique, being
used mainly at home. In the laboratory there are exposed some
very imaginative specimens.
There
are some models of wood skirting board, those wintry with
leather side are completely closed, to protect from the cold,
and they have strong nails, to avoid slips; on the contrary
the summer models are lighter and with a simple leather band.
All these object belong to the CLOG-MAKER shop, who was an
artisan whith very old origins; it seems even, that they are
dated with the advent of the Christian Era; he was obliged
to live in the woods to find easily the primary goods. In
the last centuries the real shops were not numerous, because
all the farmers, mainly on the mountains, produced the goods
at home during the long wintry evenings: for example clogs,
ladles, handles for tools, rakes, spoons, bowls and many other
tools, which were realized for domestic rural usage; but also
some furniture was created.
Many
houses had a sort of machine, which was called in the Bergamask
dialect "cavra" for its profile vaguely similar to that of
a goat. On this tool the operator, who sat astride, after
having sketched out a stump with the use of particular curved
and sharped axes, proceeded to the realization of tools in
a detailed way; during this work he used particular blades
with two handles, gouges and files. The "cavras" have different
shapes and functions, and many tools are exposed, also used
for making chairs, that were often realized besides by farmers
also by CHAIR-MAKERS, who worked door-to-door moving from
village to village.
The SHOEMAKER shop is shown with wood shapes of different
measures, the typical banquet and stool, and also with many
tools hung in order; this place is interesting for the different
tools and the classical wooden "forms", which were used to
mould footwear.
This
exibition room ends with equipment for the working of grapes
and for the manufacture of BARRELS and VATS. The cooper trade
has old origins too; already practised by the Celts, in 1410
the coopers founded a corporation, also with Statute articles,
to protect an activity very articulated and complex. This
corporation was engaged into the realization of a product,
which was widely used in different productive sectors: from
the wine production to the dairy's one, but also in transports,
preservation and tanning.
It was the guardian of secrets and sedimentary procedures,
acquired and handed down from father to son. Concave or smooth
planes, scrapers, axes, gimlets and gouges are very numerous;
the barrels were mainly realized with chestnut-tree or oak
wood. The three examples of wood presses for squeezing the
dregs of pressed grapes are really valuable, to testify the
different criteria of working, respectively used in the 17th,
18th and 19th centuries.
The
last big place is reserved to the expositions of different
machineries and tools used for the wood working and also to
the exhibition of two workshops. Two huge trunk saws, with
their respective long trolleys, stand out in the all expositive
place, from the band-saw and the circular saw, from the toupie,
from the thickness-plane to trolleys used for the transport
of trunks; and also from the last century, a trimming machine
for the saw-mill with a flowing counter on wooden rollers.
The CARVER shop supplies a very interesting split of the techniques
and the tools for this working.
All the exposed material belonged to different artisans, who
operated in the lower Bergamask territory, where this activity
is still now widely practised. Different specimens of pedal
and manual drillings are exposed with careful drawings, and
some finished decorum examples, with several tools for the
marking, the cutting, the painting and also the sticking.
The
LUTEMAKER shop comes completely from Cremona, which is the
capital "par excellence" of the lutemakers; it is maybe the
place that provokes more curiosity and surprise for the evocative
charm it can give off. It sends back to an ancient work, which
maybe more than anyone else marries art and technique, and
is also surrounded by something misterious for the secrets
and the rules that govern it. It is very fascinating, too,
for the charm that music coming from its products has been
raising up for centuries.
This is a learned work, which is perceived through the models
and the little tools used for the finishing working; those
delicate ones, which are made with very little planes to remove
small, particular parts of wood. It is very surprising the
presence of some old paints, British made and contained in
little cases of glass.
The wealth of the Museum is also enriched by a voluminous
collection of furnishing drawings, about 600, mainly realized
in water-colour, that formed the archive-catalogue of the
famous and antique industry "Erba" of Mariano Comense.
Text by CESARE ROTA NODARI - to go back to Part One click here «
|
MUSEO DEL
FALEGNAME
(THE JOINER'S MUSEUM)
Via Papa Giovanni, 59 24030 Almenno S. Bartolomeo (Bergamo)
Italy - tel. +39-035-549198 |
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