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DE LA ESTRUCTURA DOMÉSTICA AL ESPACIO SOCIAL. LECTURAS ARQUEOLÓGICAS DEL USO SOCIAL DEL ESPACIO

Sonia Gutiérrez LLoret e iGnaSi Grau Mira (edS.)

de La eStruCtura doMéStiCa aL eSPaCio SoCiaL.

LeCturaS arQueoLÓGiCaS deL uSo SoCiaL deL eSPaCio

PuBLiCaCioneS de La uniVerSidad de aLiCante

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© ilustración de la cubierta: Fernanda Palmieri (artículo de elizabeth Fentress)

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editores científicos: Sonia Gutiérrez Lloret, ignasi Grau MiraCoordinadora técnica: Victoria amorós ruiz

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este volumen ha sido realizado en el marco del proyecto de investigación «Lectura arqueológica del uso social del espacio. análisis transversal de la protohistoria al Medioevo en el Mediterráneo occidental» (Har2009-11441) del Ministerio de Ciencia y tecnología, y su edición ha contado

igualmente con financiación del Ministerio de economía y Competitividad (Har2011-15720-e), la Consellería de educación, Formación y empleo de la Generalitat Valenciana (aorG/2012/205) y la universidad de alicante.

Universitat d’AlacantUniversidad de Alicante

índiCe

PreSentaCiÓn ....................................................................................................................................... 9Sonia Gutiérrez Lloret e Ignasi Grau Mira

LaS ÁreaS de aCtiVidad Y LaS unidadeS doMéStiCaS CoMo unidadeS de oBSerVaCiÓn de Lo SoCiaL: de LaS SoCiedadeS CazadoraS-reCoLeCtoraS a LaS aGriCuLtoraS en eL eSte de La PenínSuLa iBériCa ........................................... 13Francisco Javier Jover Maestre

Todo queda en caSa: eSPaCio doMéStiCo, Poder Y diViSiÓn SoCiaL en La edad deL Hierro deL nW de La PenínSuLa iBériCa ......................................................... 39Xurxo M. ayán Vila

unidad doMéStiCa, Linaje Y CoMunidad: eStruCtura SoCiaL Y Su eSPaCio en eL Mundo iBériCo (SS. Vi-i aC) ................................................................................................ 57Ignasi Grau Mira

eL eSPaCio doMéStiCo Y Su LeCtura SoCiaL en La ProtoHiStoria de CataLuÑa (S. Vii – ii/i a.C.) ................................................................................................................ 77Maria carme Belarte

deL eSPaCio doMéStiCo a La eStruCtura SoCiaL en un oPPIduM iBériCo. reFLeXioneS a Partir de La BaStida de LeS aLCuSSeS .................................................. 95Jaime Vives-Ferrándiz Sánchez

eSPaCio doMéStiCo Y eStruCtura SoCiaL en ConteXtoS PúniCoS ........................ 111Helena Jiménez Vialás y Fernando Prados Martínez

uTILITaS Frente a VenuSTaS: ViViendaS PoPuLareS de La antiGua roMa ........... 127Jaime Molina Vidal

anÁLiSiS SoCiaL de La arQuiteCtura doMéStiCa roMana en La reGiÓn deL aLto duero: una aProXiMaCiÓn SintÁCtiCo-eSPaCiaL ................................................ 141Jesús Bermejo Tirado

La CaSa roMana CoMo eSPaCio SoCiaL Y reLiGioSo: ProYeCCiÓn SoCiaL de La FaMiLia a traVéS deL CuLto ................................................................................................... 155María Pérez Ruiz

La CaSa roMana CoMo eSPaCio de ConCiLiaCiÓn entre eL ÁMBito doMéStiCo Y La rePreSentaCiÓn SoCio-eConÓMiCa deL doMinuS: aLGunoS CaSoS de eStudio deL conVenTuS caRTHaGInIenSIS ................................... 169Julia Sarabia Bautista

Città Senza CaSe: La doMuS CoMe SPazio PuBBLiCo nei MunIcIPIa deLL’uMBria .......................................................................................................................................... 191Simone Sisani

eSPaCio SoCiaL Y eSPaCio doMéStiCo en LoS aSentaMientoS CaMPeSinoS deL Centro Y norte PeninSuLar (SiGLoS V-iX d.C.) .......................................................... 207alfonso Vigil-escalera Guirado

SPazio SoCiaLe e SPazio doMeStiCo neL Lazio MedieVaLe: iL CaSo di tuSCoLo ................................................................................................................................................... 223Valeria Beolchini

reConSiderinG iSLaMiC HouSeS in tHe MaGHreB ............................................................ 237elizabeth Fentress

CoMinG BaCK to GraMMar oF tHe HouSe: SoCiaL MeaninG oF MedieVaL HouSeHoLdS .......................................................................................................................................... 245Sonia Gutiérrez Lloret

ContriBution à L’étude de L’HaBitat deS éLiteS en MiLieu ruraL danS Le MaroC MédiéVaL: QueLQueS réFLeXionS à Partir de La QaSBa d’ÎGÎLÎz, BerCeau du MouVeMent aLMoHade ....................................................................................... 265ahmed S. ettahiri, abdallah Fili et Jean-Pierre Van Staëvel

ViViendaS MedieVaLeS aL Sur deL anti-atLaS (MarrueCoS). ProBLeMaS de eStudio Y eSPeCiFiCidadeS ........................................................................................................... 279Youssef Bokbot, Yasmina cáceres Gutiérrez, Patrice cressier, Jorge de Juan ares, María del cristo González Marrero, Miguel Ángel Hervás Herrera y Jorge onrubia Pintado

eL aGadIR de id aYSa (aMtudi, MarrueCoS). MateriaLidad Y eSPaCio SoCiaL . 299Marie-christine delaigue, Jorge onrubia Pintado y Youssef Bokbot

aPortaCioneS MetodoLÓGiCaS aL eStudio de La ViVienda iSLÁMiCa ................. 313Víctor cañavate castejón

ProBLeMaS de La Vida Cotidiana: aLGunaS reFLeXioneS teÓriCaS Para un anÁLiSiS SoCiaL en arQueoLoGía de La doMeStiCidad ............................................... 325Jordi a. López Lillo

una ViSiÓn deL eSPaCio deSde La arQuiteCtura. treS ForMaS de CoMPrender LaS diMenSioneS deL eSPaCio doMéStiCo .............................................. 341débora Marcela Kiss

The built up domestic space is a social product that creates society. The house as a “building to live in”, but also as an area for the family, is a privileged so-cial scenario, a means of expression and transmission of social behaviours. However, it is very difficult to understand the social space through empty archae-ological ruins lacking a third dimension (Fentress, 2000, 20), so there is a high risk of casting a historio-graphical image previously made of the studied soci-eties. The understanding of the social space requires formalizing and discussing the formal patterns of the domestic structures and their grouping, before turning to their historical and social meanings.

Using a linguistic analogy (a grammar of the house), we can establish three different levels in the archaeological analysis of the domestic households:

– the morphological level, which tackles the shape of the household units and their transformations.

– the syntactic level, which emphasizes the con-nections between basic structures in an organ-ized spatial structure.

– the semiotic level, which analyses households as a social expression, the materialization and instrument of cultural meanings.

The first level of analysis, in a descriptive version (floor plan, structure, and technical and structural features of the house), is the common one for the functionalist and

1. This text picks up and summarises the concepts shown in a previous work, but does not analyse in depth any of the dif-ferent cases studied. The interested reader can check them in the Spanish version (Gutiérrez Lloret, 2012). English trans-lation by Elena Abad, figures by Victoria Amorós and Victor Cañavate.

taxonomic approach used in the different historical fields of study of domestic architecture, from Prehisto-ry to the Middle Ages. The second level, highly influ-enced by architecture, urban planning and geography, owns much to the increasingly widespread application of theories and techniques for the space syntax analy-sis, allowing for easy recognition of their layout logic beyond the specific cases. This second approach is fre-quently used in archaeology, even though it is usually forgotten that the analysis of spatial connections re-quires as a starting point extensive and methodolog-ically rigorous excavations, and verified stratigraphic sequences. The third level focuses on the social use of the built environment, meaning that it focuses on the connections between these built environments and the social structure that gives them shape through specific architectural features.

However, these three levels are commonly mixed with weak conceptual results. Morphological identifi-ers (as the shape of a house) are shown as social mod-els without clear arguments that would support these statements. Also, spatial and even social interpreta-tions are built on mostly unverified archaeological floor plans. In this regard, we should worry about the high amount of perceptive and spatial syntax analysis based on archaeological floor plans from old excava-tions, unable to recognise activity areas and identify contexts and complex stratigraphic sequences. This two-dimensional planimetry used to represent (some-times also to rebuild and even to invent) all of the important structures regardless of their chronology, which means that diachronic changes in the organiza-tion and use of the space cannot be seen. It is difficult to reconstruct the third dimension, the one that defines the built environment, due to the lack of volume and inner space of most archaeological remains

An archaeological reading of the social use of space is impossible without these previous limits. If

CoMIng bACk To grAMMAr of THE HousE: soCIAl MEAnIng of MEdIEVAl HousEHolds1

sonIA guTIérrEz llorETUniversidad de Alicante

Alors laissant les femmes continuer leur plainte dans la chambre où la petite lampe de jadis finissait de mourir, Oum-Zahr et Messaouda sortirent dans la

cour et, à la place traditionnelle où leur mère avait laissé un monceau de cendres grises, elles rallumèrent le feu du foyer: il fallait préparer le café, car le père

allait rentrer.

Isabelle Eberhardt, Oum Zahar, Au Pays des sables

Sonia Gutiérrez Lloret246

not taken into account, the static image of the domes-tic spaces is reinforced and they end up turning into “models” that define the studied societies anthropo-logically, forgetting their historical dimension. There-fore, deductive anthropological and historical models are casted over the material remains, and archaeology is used only to illustrate the historiographical image of the societies studied, which in this case are from the Middle Ages. In this regard, the multidisciplinary experience of archaeological readings about the social use of the space covered in this study, allows recogni-tion of comparable rationality patterns between socie-ties that are very distant in time and have very differ-ent features (Criado, Mañana, 2003, 105).

The similarities of certain domestic configurations is especially obvious between

protohistoric and High Middle Ages societies, in reference to the changes imposed by processes such as the romanization and Islamization of the

Iberian peninsula. The most important thing is to de-cide whether the similarities are just on the morpho-logical and syntactic levels, or if they also reach com-mon symbolic and social levels. This study provides some interesting discussion points: the stability of certain neolithic households that were organized and occupied on an ongoing basis could be compared to, historical differences aside, the configuration of some High Middle Ages structural elements consisting of scattered structures and buildings giving shape to pro-duction and consumption household groups2. On the other hand, certain Iberian houses with just one hearth can be easily compared to berber housing solutions

2. Compare in this same book the work of Francisco Javier Jover about the neolithic in benàmer, and the work of Alfonso Vigil-Escalera regarding High Medieval peasant settlements in the central and northern areas of the Iberian Peninsula.

Fig. 1. 1. Complex household structures with hearths in different rooms, which are interpreted as matrimonial units inside the same large family both in Protohistory and al-Andalus. 2. Punic and Islamic courtyard houses with the location of

the bathtubs and the latrine.

Coming back to Grammar of the house: social meaning of Medieval households 247

known through ethnography. More complex house-hold structures, such as houses with several hearths, are interpreted as the reflection of different married couples within the same family both in Protohistory and the Islamic world3 (Fig. 1.1).

These examples do not imply any social proxim-ity. On the other hand, they clearly show the limits and risks of a direct social reading (with a semiotic implication) through the similarities between specif-ic architectural expressions (the mere morphological likeness). but we still need to discuss if, for example, certain privacy indicators in the Punic (fantar, 1985) houses of the Ancient history and the Islamic houses of the Middle Ages, do socially mean the same regard-ing control of women and privacy, even though they reduce the importance and accessibility to the house’s central area, the courtyard, using a similar architec-tural resource: a side corridor with an elbow turn. The location of bathtubs in Punic houses at the end of the corridor and their social visibility as a status indica-tor4, would suppose an inconceivable public display in an Islamic house, where the courtyard represents domestic privacy, and the corridor with the elbow turn protects this privacy5 (Fig. 1.2).

The morphology and even the syntax of the gram-mar of the house can be usually compared to speci-fic architectural expressions, but their social meaning may differ. We should not forget that, as linguists warned, the connection between signifier and signified is always arbitrary and, in order to attach a signified to a material signifier, some methodologically refined archaeological comparison procedures are needed. Without this comparison, the interpretation of the spa-tial social use will be constructed over a weak base made from the frozen bi-dimensionality of an archae-ological “floor plan”.

According to this perspective, a methodological consideration is proposed regarding the characteriza-tion of Medieval and Islamic domestic spaces in the Iberian peninsula. The problems arisen from the social use of the space, domestic patterns and their diachrony are discussed, as well as the household as a material indicator of Islamization. A wide chronological frame-work has been obviously established for these consid-erations, which include the analysis of the architec-tural and social expressions in the late ancient times and the beginning of the Middle Ages in the Iberian peninsula.

The disappearance of the house models typical of the ancient times leads to important change processes in rural or urban built environments, changes that can

3. Carme belarte and Ignasi grau regarding the Iberian world; Elisabeth fentréss and myself regarding the Islamic High Middle Ages.

4. Helena Jiménez and fernando Prados in this same book.5. nevertheless, bathrooms (latrines) in Islamic houses are

usual from the 10th century onwards, but they are kept in pri-vate rooms, as seen in baŷŷâna/Pechina in Almería.

be easily read in archaeological records, in the trans-formation of formal designs, their division, change of use, abandonment, etc. In the same way, the accultura-tion and the new social relationships caused by the Is-lamization process in the 8th century Ad, come togeth-er with the transformation of the built environment. The generalization of a new “Islamic” house style shows new social and family relationships. However, beyond the given chronological framework, we have consciously avoided a time axis to arrange domestic spaces and their development. On the contrary, we want to define the spaces first and maybe arrange them in sequences and socially connote them later.

1. MorPHologY: ClAssIfICATIon PossIbIlITIEs for HousEHold unITs

Taxonomy is a descriptive tool that helps to arrange household units in a hierarchized and systematic order according to their morphology. This classification is therefore a mechanism that explains and describes in parallel all modifications or transformations suffered by such structures. If we deepen into the detail provid-ed by casuistry, the classifications of medieval house-holds seem to be varied and adapted to the specific idiosyncrasy of each settlement6.

However, a broader point of view states that, in practice, there are two main basic categories (which could even be universal, since they are used in differ-ent historical and geographic contexts) that define two domestic models:

– the simple, elemental or monocellular house, with just one room

– the complex or pluricellular house, with differ-ent rooms connected

In form and substance, both are the main models for classifying household units. To these models we can apply social signifiers that have to do with the struc-ture of the family, cultural references or even ethnicity (fentress, 2000; boone, 2001; santangeli Valenzani, 2011, 67).

It is interesting to see how both categories do repeat regardless of the historical and social reality they rep-resent, and are used equally in different societies. Sim-ilar classification diagrams are used for protohistoric Mediterranean societies, such as Iberian, where simple and complex houses coexist (belarte et al., 2009, 111), and the social meaning of this variability is stressed

6. see, for example, the classification of households from the Caliphate period (10th century Ad) in the western side of Córdoba (Cánovas et al., 2008 and Murillo et al., 2010), the classification of almohad households (13th century Ad) in la Villa Vieja de Calasparra (Pozo et al., 2002, 164), or the classification of the city houses of Toledo in the late Middle Ages (Passini, 2004).


(sala, Abad, 2006, 40-41). but similar equations are used to describe pre-Hispanic household units in Oaxa-ca (Winter, 1986, 337-40), using formulae that define household units that can be open (abiertas) with just one residential structure, semi-closed (semicerradas) with two separated structures shaping a central court-yard, and closed (cerradas) around a courtyard in a layout that connects structural complexity with social status (Fig. 2.1).

In the sort of medieval contexts we study, they are used to analyse Visigothic, Islamic and feudal domes-tic areas. In this regard, Alfonso Vigil-Escalera (2003, 288) has suggested the regular coexistence of both household models in different Late Middle Ages rural settlements located in the middle of the Iberian penin-sula (Madrid and Toledo), dating from the beginning of the 6th century to the middle of the 7th century Ad: on one hand, the rectangular floor plan construction unit (unidad de edificación de planta rectangular, EPR), which may have inner divisions and juxtaposition; on the other hand, the complex floor plan construction unit (unidad de edificación de planta compleja, EPC),

which shows three or four distinct areas (a long and narrow one closing usually one of the sides) that can possibly have a functional specialization (Fig. 2.2).

Along the same lines and according to his person-al experience in bajo Alentejo, in Portugal, James I. boone suggested a hypothetical model for the evo-lution of rural houses. He applied the space syntax analysis to houses from the transitional period (6th - 7th centuries Ad) to the later Islamic period (11th - 12th centuries Ad) -which correspond to the two equations we have been talking about-, and compares them to the rural house of the post-medieval period (17th - 20th centuries Ad), the one that shows a radical change in household distribution as the kitchen is now the centre of the house and the main access point (boone, 2001, 116, fig. 7) (Fig. 2.3).

nevertheless, André bazzana (1992, 165-8) did already suggest in his well-known study on the Islam-ic house in al-Andalus, that the monocellular house (maison monocellulaire), the simple rectangular house without windows with berber ṭaddarṭ and indigenous Iberian influences, already existed together with the

fig. 2. Comparison of household models: 1. Pre-Hispanic household units in oxaca (according to Winter, 1986, fig. 5), 2. building unit with a rectangular floor plan (EPr) and building unit with a complex floor plan (EPC) (according to Vigil-Escalera, 2003, fig.

1); 3. Evolution of the rural house in baixo Alentejo (according to boone, 2001, fig. 7). 4. Maison monocellulaire and pluricellulaire (according to bazzana, 1992; guichard and Van staëvel ,1995, fig. 48), 5. Maison-bloc and maison aglutinante (according to

bazzana, 2011, fig. 4), 6. Pluricellular and monocellular house (according to Pozo et al., 2002, figs. 18 and 19).


complex pluricellular house (maison pluricellulaire) formed by the juxtaposition of cells around a court-yard, according to the necessities of community life. The latter is considered a universal housing system, at least in Mediterranean countries, showing the model of Islamic house defined by the functional segregation of domestic spaces. both types of house were illus-trated with examples from houses A-31 and u-71/72 in Monte Mollet, Castellón (8th - 9th centuries Ad), ac-cording to the graphic interpretation made by Pierre guichard and Jean Pierre Van staëvel (1995, 46, fig. 8 a and b) (Fig. 2.4). In Islamic societies, this particu-lar scheme refers immediately to the “berber” and “Arab” models suggested by Elizabeth Fentress for the Maghreb (2000), which have recently come back to the spotlight due to the excavations in Volubilis/Walīla (Fentress, Limane, 2010, Fentress in this same book).

Within the past years, André bazzana reconsidered his typological approach considering that “la maison médiéval n’est pas le résultat d’une juxtaposition progressive d’une, puis d’autres pièces rectangu-laires allongées, disposant d’une seul ouverture sur la ‘cour’” (bazzana, 2011, 55). His proposal establishes a distinction between the block-house (maison-bloc) and the agglutinative house (maison aglutinante) according to the original design (Fig. 2.4). The mai-son-bloc is a complex and compact domestic structure, probably of rural origin, with a unit conception and a regular geometric shape, as stated in the classic model of the pluricellular house u-71/72 in Monte Mollet (8th - 9th centuries Ad). The maison agglutinante, on the other hand, is a habitat built in different stages having as a base a first building. House 20 in Miravet, in Ca-banes, Castellón (12th - 13th centuries Ad) is used as an example for this second type, which suggests it suf-fered a “pas exactement connu” process that increased its complexity in at least four different stages having as a base the classic monocellular structure, to which several rooms would be attached in order to give shape to the courtyard (bazzana, 2011, 58-9, fig. 4 b)7.

Though widely spread for describing domestic spaces, the words “simple” and “complex” have a con-ceptual vagueness due to their qualitative approach, which makes them ambiguous and not necessarily synonymous with “monocellular” or “pluricellular”, concepts that are much more morphologically exact. This ambiguity is especially clear in the Almohad houses (12th - 13th centuries Ad) discovered in differ-ent settlements in south eastern al-Andalus. Such is the case of sisāya in Cieza (Murcia), where J. navarro Palazón (1990) defined two models of households according to the number of supporting walls: the el-emental household (with at least a courtyard, latrine

7. This type of house from the 12th and 13th centuries was con-sidered initially as a unit construction, even though inside some of the rooms different phases of paving could be docu-mented (bazzana, 1992, 298-9, pl. CClXII).

and a large room) and the complex household (with several specialized rooms). This is the same mod-el as in Villa Vieja, in Calasparra (Murcia) (Pozo et al., 2002, 164-169), even though both households are technically pluricellular since they show several built structures (Fig. 2.5).

Household architecture in the Middle Ages has a more complex and operational classification that in-corporates new archaeological analysis points of view on domestic spaces. The proposal is based on abstract graphic schemes that connote specific archaeological

fig. 3. Classification of household units and the processes that increased their complexity: 1. Monocellular unit, 2.

Associated units, 3. Added units shaping a “protocourtyard”, 4. Complex units surrounding a courtyard.


examples, but do not represent these literally. Most are patterns rather than specific cases.

1.1. Monocellular unit (fig. 3.1)

A self-contained and multifunctional volume, a built unit with different activity areas inside and no additional spaces, a simple household unit directly accessible from the outside. This model, represent-ed by a structure with stone or mud limits, can be also applied to other structures with a framework made of wooden posts, maybe partially excavat-ed on the ground (Vigil-Escalera, 2000; Azkarate, Quirós, 2001; Azkarate, solaun, 2012; Hamerow,

2007, 31). determining the inner activity areas is essential for its social interpretation (garcía, 2009, 59, fig. 2).

A basic feature of these simple household units (at least for the ones with a skirting board of stone) is the “hearth” as the central element of the room. We under-stand as hearth the place where the fire is lit and, by extension, the structure where combustion takes place. The meaning of this word is so much attached to the domestic environment that in many languages it does also represent both the household and the family living in it (Fig. 4). Although the space where combustion takes place does not necessarily need to have a specific structure, can be portable or simply take place outside the building, usually there is at least one hearth or at

fig. 4. 1 and 2. Plan and photograph of a monocellular household showing the structures and activity areas. 3. Indoor reproduction of a similar house. (9th century Ad).


least one area that can be lit. It can have different lo-cations: in the centre, like in many protohistoric con-texts (belarte, 2009); near the door to provide a secure exit for the smoke, as seems to happen in the domus terrinee in the forum of Caesar in rome (santangeli Valenzani, 2011, 131-2); on the side of the facade wall or in the short walls of the room, always searching the privacy given by the side turn, as in the Islamic house-holds in El Tolmo de Minateda (Gutiérrez, Cañavate, 2010, 131)8.

8. That is, in the inner and dark side of the facade wall; the “dark wall” opposed to the “light wall”, on the other side of

This side location of the hearth and the usual posi-tion of the entry in the long support wall suggest a cer-tain degree of privacy in the households, compared to similar protohistoric layouts, where axial distribution and exposed lives prevail9.

There are two processes that can increase the com-plexity of these simple and self-contained units: the inner division, physically separating a particular area from the household unit, and the annexation or subor-dination of a new space that, in both cases, will have

the door. In the kabylie house, the loom and decorated crock-ery hanged from this wall (bourdieu, 1972, 57).

9. Ignasi grau in this same book.

fig. 5. Examples of associated units: 1. disaggregated household unit in Vitoria-gasteiz 850-950 (according to Azkarate and solaun, 2012, fig. 2), 2. El Molón, Camporrobles, Valencia, 9th - 10th centuries (according to Lorrio et al. 2009, 51), 3. la Vega, boadilla del

Monte, Madrid (according to Alfaro, Martí, 2006), 4. El Tolmo de Minateda, southern side (gutiérrez, 2008).


specific and different uses (rest, storage, etc.). Howev-er, separated and annexed areas work as a unit and are interdependent of each other, keeping the concept of basic unit, since they can only be accessed from inside and never directly from the outside.

1.2. Associated units (fig. 3.2)

Independent volumes that work together. Architec-turally independent units, but functionally associated. Each volume is a monocellular unit with its own entry and no structural subordination to the others, though their specific and different purposes suggest an asso-ciation that adds them into just one household. The structural association of two or more units can be independent (isolated and not adjoined), juxtaposed (usually the adjoining walls are the short ones), or combined.

The most common functional association has the kitchen/living room/bedroom in one unit, and the warehouse/stable/auxiliary facilities in the other one, as ethnographically stated in the Maghreb (boone, 1996, 30, fig. 1.5), though the different cases may vary a lot. The association of two or more volumes socially shapes the “outside” area that connects in space and

function the associated units, establishing with real or symbolic limits the outside area that belongs to the household10. Symbolic limits (location of certain un-seen indicators of social use, or some functional ac-tivities) are evanescent by definition and only rarely leave remains, but some traces suggest they existed: the soil composition or biofacts that show, for exam-ple, livestock farming in the area (pen), the location of siloes and auxiliary facilities in the perimeter, or the discovery of fences that would establish the lim-its of specific areas, such as the ones found occasion-ally in some simple and complex rural constructions of the Early Middle Ages (Vigil-Escalera, 2003, 288; Azakarate, Solaun, 2012). These boundaries given to an empty space are characteristic of nomads settling in an area and creating a small village, and they would al-legedly demarcate the perimeter of the space near the tent, which had a perfectly assigned social use (Cribb, 1991, 387, fig. 7).

10. As seen in the partially closed household unit of Oaxaca, where the ovens, siloes/wells, garbage dumps and burials limit the outside area of the household formed bu two asso-ciated units (Winter, 1986, 39, fig. 5).

fig. 6. diachronic processes: from monocellular and associated units to added units (Tolmo de Minateda). 1. Constructive evolution of a room; 2. southern block in the Islamic district showing the original monocellular units.


fig. 7. The Islamic courtyard house: 1. House I in sétif (according to fentress, 1987, figs. 4 and 5, modified); 2. functional specialization process of the areas: House V4 in Pechina (according to Castillo and Martínez, 1990, modified), House 6 in the

western district of Cordoba (acording to Cánovas ubera et al., 2008, modified), House 6 in Cieza (according to navarro and Jiménez, 2007, modified); 3. reconstruction of the social space in the large house in Castellar (gutiérrez and Menéndez, 2010).


This model of disaggregated household structure has medieval examples in the Peninsula, some cases more reliable than others. Such is the case of some Visigothic rural settlements in the region of Madrid, as navalvillar (Abad Castro, 2006) or la Vega (Alfa-ro and Martí, 2006), whose layout of combined units with different roles (bedroom, kitchen, warehouse, stable, ovens, etc.) delimit an open space. In la Vega, more units were added in a diachronic process. The household unit found in phase 1 in gasteiz (850 – 950 Ad) is a clearer example. There, the limits of the cen-tral open space that draws together and provides uni-tary consistency to the disaggregated household unit are established by the residential area (seen as a long-house), the auxiliary structures in the artisan area, the wells and siloes used for supply and storage, and the livestock pen (Azkarate, solaun, 2009, 104-7). These features are not so clear in lslamic settlements, but some examples as the one in El Molón suggest this associated distribution, especially the b4 and b2 units located between the wall and the mosque in an L layout, and the lined up compartments in sector A (lorrio, sánchez de Prado, 2008, 146-7 and 150-1). However, the structures in sector A could also follow another pattern (added units delimiting a “protocourt-yard”) (Fig. 5).

The main issue with associated units is how to tell them apart from urban patterns with scattered mono-cellular units, since spatial organization patterns in both cases are very similar. The fact that some units have hearth and others don’t, can be useful for estab-lishing associations, as well as the activity areas11.

1.3. Added units shaping a “protocourtyard” (fig. 3.3)

Independent volumes, functionally associated, added in order to delimit an inner space with an open ceil-ing, a sort of courtyard with imprecise boundaries (a “protocourtyard”). The perimeter of this central area is not completely delimited by the construction units, whose distribution is similar to the previous one, but gradually shaped by linear walls that define the move-ment of people and the use of the open space, making it private.

This establishes a centralized spatial distribution grouped around what can be functionally and archi-tecturally considered as the household’s courtyard. The courtyard is a wide area with an irregular outline shaped by the distribution of the built units, the rear

11. A similar solution has been suggested for rome in the Early Middle Ages: in the residential structures subdivided into different areas, those without a hearth can be identified as stables, deposits or, should they have wooden floors, bed-rooms (santangeli Valenzani, 2011, 130) quoting s. gelichi and M. Librenti.

walls of the buildings and the free linear walls, usu-ally added within the last construction phase. This se-quential and diachronic configuration of the household units offers an unusual panoramic view of the built en-vironments dynamics, which counteracts the function-al and structural stillness typical of mainly syntactic analysis of spaces (bermejo, 2009, 57-58).

The pattern was first recognized during the strati-graphic excavation of a large Islamic district in Iyuhh (El Tolmo de Minateda in Hellín, Albacete), whose stratigraphic sequences allowed the recognition of the processes that successively added units to households, and the definition of a new permeability threshold (the “protocourtyard”) between the public outside and the private domestic interior (Gutiérrez, Cañavate, 2010). This hinge space announces the privacy pattern typical of the Medieval Islamic world and the Mediterranean area, and turns into the central piece of the household structure. It is an area halfway between the street and the house, with linear walls that gradually delimit its privacy, but still far from the highly centralized struc-tures that define the Islamic house with courtyard. The total privacy and feminine seclusion in Islamic house-holds is represented by the control of the only indirect access to the courtyard. On the contrary, the “proto-courtyards” of added household units may have more than just one access from the outside. In fact, the main process that increases the complexity of this domestic pattern, and the last one in the building sequence, is usually the delimitation of the “protocourtyard” with the construction of linear walls and mainly oblique accesses.

The different units, with their back walls facing the exterior, are only accessible through the “protocourt-yard”, which is the real epicentre of the household and accommodates the wide range of productive and re-productive activities typical of the domestic life, such as grinding (with hand mills), food processing, textile activity or animal husbandry, both for agricultural use (mules and donkeys) and for food (poultry, lambs and goats). This pattern of household units suggests, as seen in El Tolmo de Minateda (Gutiérrez and Cañavate, 2010, 130-2 and 140, fig. 7), the functional specializa-tion of the different independent units (residence and rest, food processing, storage, livestock farming and crafting, etc.), but also a certain social fragmentation due to the existence of more than just one “hearth” inside each household unit. The fact that there are dif-ferent matrimonial cells inside a large familiar group, living together in the same household unit based upon their relationship, has many social implications. The analysis of several household units in El Tolmo de Mi-nateda stated a strong preference for building the main rooms (kitchen, pantry and bedroom) in the northern and western sides of the courtyard. The doors of these rooms are located in the southern and eastern walls, which turns them into the main façades of the inhab-ited part of the house. In fact, the “protocourtyard” is sometimes closed on the opposite side of the main


facades (east or south) by the rear walls of the main rooms of the adjoining house, which are at the same time facing east or south. The same pattern can be seen in the traditional berber houses in kabylia (bordieu, 1972, 68, n. 75) (Fig. 6).

1.4. Complex units surrounding a courtyard (“courtyard house”) (fig. 3.4)

The architectural units are located around a courtyard, which is completely surrounded by built units and has a bent hallway (zaguán12) where the main entrance from the outside is not lined up with the inner door. This hallway regulates the movement in the domestic group, and at the same time totally guarantees the pri-vacy and control of women in the family. This pattern shows a compact household unit, highly centralized and completely closed to the outside, as seen in the absence or shortage of windows, the only access from the outside, and the addition of a new permeability threshold control (the hallway or zaguán) between the outside and the courtyard, which hierarchizes consid-erably the different levels of structural depth13 (Fig. 7).

The topological chart resulting from the spatial analysis is even more complex than the previous one, intensely specifying the privacy of the courtyard, which somewhat controls and contains all rooms (fentres, 1987, 62). These are arranged longitudinal-ly and do not connect with each other, only with the courtyard. The only exception is the divisions inside the halls to separate the bedrooms, called alcobas or alhanías14 in the spanish literature on Islamic do-mestic architecture. They appear for the first time in the 10th century and are easy to recognize due to the wooden flooring, platforms, partition walls or arcades located at the end of the halls. All of this means that it is a complex household unit with functional speciali-zation, a new domestic model with new features such as the bent hallways, bedrooms and latrines (Acién, 2001, 29), typical of Islamic societies all over the

12. Spanish term of Arab Andalusian origin that describes the covered space inside a house that serves as entry and is lo-cated just by the main entrance from the outside. Dicciona- rio de arabismos y voces afines en iberorromance (Co-rriente, 2003, s. v. Zaguán).

13. The only exception is the addition of a stable to rural house-holds of concentrated and densified farmsteads in the 13th century in the region of Murcia, as siyâsa, where the animal area has a direct access from the outside, independent of the spatial movement symbolized by the hallway and that, therefore, has nothing to do with the privacy and seclusion criteria so important in the domestic space.

14. both words, of Arab origin, name the bedroom or area used for sleeping inside a room and are synonims, Diccionario de arabismos y voces afines en iberorromance (Corriente, 2003, s. v. alcoba and alhanía).

Mediterranean coast from the 10th century onwards (fentress, 2000; Missoum, 2010).

Even though the “courtyard house” has been a constant Mediterranean feature from Protohistory until roman times, the Islamic household model has nothing or very little to do with the axial concept and the social meaning of the roman domus, besides the courtyard. The domus had to show the status of the dominus through control in the hallway and the pub-lic representation features of the elite (Funari and zarankín, 2001; bermejo, 2007-2008; Pérez; sarabia; sisani, all in this book). both rural and urban Islamic households have an absolutely different concept of the social space, seen as a privacy safeguard in the Islamic social point of view (Acién, 1998, 937).

This already complex household model increases its complexity in a twofold dimension with the func-tional specialization of the rooms, and the addition of second floors or algorfas15, extra habitable areas used for living and storage, especially in rural houses, cre-ating even more complex architectural solutions (San-tangeli Valenzani, 2011, 134). both dimensions help with the increasing number of different areas inside the household and their functional specialization for daily domestic life activities: bedrooms for sleeping, halls used as living and dining rooms, kitchen for food pro-cessing, latrine for personal care, pantries and spaces for storage, stables for the animals, and the courtyard as the main area for family life (Adánez, 2003, 40).

The family areas inside the household are therefore diversified, but this specialization does not modify the global and binary gender differentiation of the areas as an “inside” area (private domestic space for women), and an “outer” area (public outer space for men), es-sential dichotomy in the understanding of household areas in the traditional Islamic society (guichard, Van staëvel, 1995, 47). In this same sense and reflecting the opinions of robert brunchvig and Manuel Acién states that urban planning is controlled by a private life that goes beyond protecting privacy, family honour or the role of women. It is the reason why “public areas are negative, while private areas are positive” in urban topography (Acién, 2001, 17).

2. sYnTAX: AssoCIATIon of HousEHold unITs In urbAn PATTErns

The classification of household units as basic units has a descriptive value, but their grouping requires going beyond into a more complex spatial structure. This is

15. Spanish term of Arab Andalusian origin that describes the upper rooms Diccionario de arabismos y voces afines en iberorromance (Corriente, 2003, s. v. algorfa). There are many examples of the domestic use of rural and urban up-per floors from the 12th and 13th centuries onwards (nava-rro, Jiménez, 1996; bazzana, 2011, 55).


what syntax does: analyze the distribution of private and public built elements according to the interstitial space, and the way they group in urban patterns16.

We can consider in a concise way that domestic structures can group according to two basic types of spatial distribution: scattered and adjoining, which may at the same time have a linear, grouped or pat-terned distribution17. The only aim of this classifica-tion is to normalize the descriptive categories of the types of household unit groups, at least in this instru-mental level18.

2.1. scattered spatial distribution

In a scattered distribution, household units are dis-persed over the space and do not share any party walls, being isolated and independent from each other. This type of spatial distribution can use monocellular units (Ponta do Castelo and uxo III), associated units (El Molón), and even added units shaping a “proto-courtyard” (Monte Mollet), in different chronologies (gutiérrez lloret, 2012, 156, fig. 7).

2.2. Adjoined spatial distribution

Adjoined distributions share one or more party walls and can be divided into three types:

2.2.1. Grouped distribution

Household units join in groups and, even though there may be interstices, they establish a relationship based on proximity or physical contact, partially adjoining (Ching, 2006, 189). This distribution can be found in urban settlements such as the pre-Islamic syrian city of Umm al-Jimal (5th - 7th centuries Ad), and rural set-tlements such as the Visigothic village in Cuarto de las Hoyas (salamanca), the emiral farmstead in Peña-flor (Jaén), or the Moorish settlement in l’Adsubieta (Alicante), all of them showing a household unit pat-tern similar to the added units shaping a “protocourt-yard”. Umm el-Jimal is particularly relevant and an example of disaggregated pre-Islamic town planning (Vries, 2000). Alan Walmsley has recently suggested it portrays the ruralization of an urban environment, stat-ing that this model of household with a courtyard was originally a byzantine rural household adapted to the

16. special thanks to débora kiss for her accurate observations on the arrangement of urban fabric and the pattern.

17. More information on this, though slightly different, by francis d. k. Ching (2006, 189).

18. The graphic representation here is just a summary sheet that consciously uses the examples of medieval settlements with different chronologies and social context. There is a detailed study on the given examples by S. Gutiérrez Lloret (2012).

urban context at an early Islamic moment (Walmsley, 2007, 131-32)19.

2.2.2. Linear distribution

The layout of household units with a linear distribution is, regardless of their pattern, a linear sequence or a se-ries of repeated spaces (Ching, 2006, 189) arranged in a way that the party walls are shared. This distribution, typical of concentrated protohistoric settlements, can be found in Medieval rural settlements both Visigothic, as Vilaclara (Castellfollit del boix in barcelona), and Islamic, as the farmstead in foietes d’Alt (l’Almisserà in Villajoyosa, Alicante). In the latter, a rural settlement dating from the 11th Century, nine Islamic complex res-idential units or “courtyard houses” with an urban-like morphology are juxtaposed, illustrating the social Is-lamization of a rural environment.

2.2.3. Patterned distribution

In a patterned distribution, household units are part of a consistent, organized and compact urban fabric that establishes movement axes between the buildings (Ching, 2006, 189). This is the usual construction of most rural and urban concentrated settlements, and can adapt to regular and irregular patterns. It was tra-ditionally assumed that Medieval urban distributions, especially Islamic, were rarely organic and regular, but mostly messy. However, archaeology has stated that in early settlements located in al-Andalus and the East, regular and even orthogonal patterns were frequent (Acién, 2001, 15). All pattern distribution examples are compact, dense and arranged in blocks, which are a group of several adjoined household units delimited by the movement axes. These axes are have a symbolic and material hierarchy according to their road (to ease communication between different sectors of the urban fabric) or residential (to ease the access to household units inside the block) use.

The Šaqunda district in Cordoba shows large road axes, together with baileys and small squares that pro-vide movement to the different household units. They also established the perimeters of the partly undevel-oped large blocks from the very beginning of the con-struction of this district in the 8th century. The distri-bution of the domestic and productive units, typical of a mostly craft district, was a mix of built elements and large open areas, shaping an urban fabric that is difficult to understand, but that shows a clear evidence of planning (Casal, 2008,133).

In Šaqunda, in the city of baŷŷâna/Pechina (Al-mería, late 9th century) and in Villa Vieja (Calasparra,

19. special thanks to James l. boone for drawing my attention to this matter.


13th century), the household units shape irregular areas that usually get into the household area nearby. This feature is a clear example of the introverted charac-ter of households, and maybe of the predominance of collective efforts for planning based on local agree-ments (Acién, 2001, 28; Van staëvel, 2004, 38). on the contrary, the western side of al-rusafa, another district in Cordoba, shows an orthogonal outline with a framework of hierarchized roads (the widest ones are lengthways and used movement, while the more narrow ones are perpendicular and used to access the household units), a well-organized system of waste-water drainage, and regular blocks both in shape and size that have two rows of rectangular coupled houses, juxtaposed, that share the party wall (Murillo et al., 2010, 603-4). The regular distribution of the areas suggests an organized and dense occupation, proved by the lengthwise division of certain households in a second phase of use. This urban planning, which be-gan in al-rusafa in the late 10th century and early 11th, and expanded toward Madînat al-zahrâ’ during the Caliphate, has such a magnitude that we may compare the genesis of this process with other earlier planning models, such as the one in Pechina.

The general thought for the district in Cordoba is that there was an early urban development in the 9th

century with a vague and mainly symbolic official intervention (establishment of mosques and baths), where neighbourhood associations may have played a key role (Acién, Vallejo, 1998, 121-2; Acién, 2001, 28), followed by a later phase where the urban mag-nitude, coherence and complexity of the western city expansion suggests the involvement of the state (Acien, Vallejo, 1989, 133). The state is not so very much involved with the planning of infrastructures (parcelling, layout of roads and drainages, official buildings, etc.), but with the regulation of the build-able land, always applying a set of regulatory meas-ures based on immediate vicinity relationships (Van staëvel, 2004, 32-34).

2.3. distribution and connection patterns

The syntax of Medieval domestic spaces shows dif-ferent distribution and connection patterns that are neither permanent nor chronologically fixed. never-theless, we can suggest certain similarities between the morphological patterns of the household units and their associations (Fig. 8).

Monocellular units are usually scattered and, in cer-tain Medieval contexts, may have a linear distribution.

fig. 8. syntax: association of household units in urban patterns.


The Medieval preference for oblique entries in the longest wall is the reason why the households are con-nected through the shortest walls, so a linear distribu-tion is rare. On the contrary, this distribution will be usual for the exposed life in protohistoric household units, where the different units are juxtaposed along an axis, or adjoined to a defensive wall, sharing the longest party walls (belarte, 2009).

Associated units can be distributed in a wide range of patterns, but there is a preference for partially ad-joined scattered or grouped ones. This distribution is typical of rural settlements in different chronologies and social contexts.

Added units shaping a common space are usually associated in grouped patterns, partially adjoining, or completely scattered. The combination of both pat-terns is frequent, as can be seen for example in the Moorish farmstead in L’Adsubieta (16th century). but they can also have irregular patterns, as seen in El Tolmo de Minateda (9th century).

The complex units surrounding a courtyard, typ-ical of Islamic societies, are usually distributed ac-cording to regular or irregular patterns, both in rural and urban settlements. However, they can also have a linear pattern possibly due to topographical issues, as seen in the farmstead in Foietes d’Alt (11th century). Moreover, even a very unusual grouped distribution, as in the farmstead in Tossal de l’Almisserà in Villa-joyosa, Alicante (garcía gandía, 2004, 85, fig. 2), a farming area with a diachronic use where residential areas seem to move between the 11th and 13th centu-ries. both examples show the presence of the Islamic “courtyard house” in the rural area from the 9th cen-tury onwards.

Archaeology shows that the distribution of house-hold units in compact patterns are typical and predom-inant in urban areas, and in certain concentrated rural contexts with an almost “urbanized” morphology, as in several Almohad farmsteads in the south eastern side of the Peninsula (12th - 13th centuries). On the other hand, in rural and agricultural settlements, the household units are usually scattered (Torró, 2009, 210) or associated, which can even move all over the territory to keep up with the crops (Vigil-Escalera, 2009). There are many different examples, and certain historical contexts can motivate unexpected solutions. such is the case of the castle Castell d’Ambra (Pego), which had a late and short occupation and served as a refuge for people living in the nearby farmsteads. The monocellular domestic morphologies created were very unusual by the middle of the 13th century, and completely different to the coeval morphologies in siyasa or Villavieja (Azuar et al., 1999, 293, fig. 2).

3. THE sEMIoTICs PATH

The most complex area is the relationship between the built spaces and the social structure that conceives

and expresses them with specific architectural designs. This path needs the historical discussion of some prob-lems: the Medieval household models as a status, co-habitation or hybridization element; hierarchy indi-cators, space ritualization, rural and urban settlement division, social or sexual segregation, hearth defini-tion, family structures, etc. We have previously ana-lysed material signifiers, but the future discussion has to deal with social signifieds, and their connection to them is far from being clear. Here is a specific example that may help to better understand the problem: the domestic spaces of umm el-Jimal, the byzantine city in syria that suffered an early Islamization, and even the grouped distribution it shows (seen in a plan), are similar in shape and structure with other Visigothic or Andalusian settlements in the Peninsula from the Ear-ly Middle Ages, such as Cuarto de las Hoyas, Peñaflor, or El Tolmo de Minateda. but just by comparing their architectural and productive materiality, we can eas-ily understand that the built environments are hardly comparable social expressions20 (fig. 9).

Certain material aspects that give us information about the evanescent third dimension of the built space, may also provide important social and productive evi-dence. A good example is the roofing system: the grad-ual replacement of the flat tegula by a curved imbrex that had already been used in Visigothic constructions (7th century), is a very important chronological indica-tor. but the use of tiles in Merida or Cordoba in the 8th century, while rural cities used perishable roofing like foliage or mud, shows the social differences and the productive complexity in built environments that may seem similar according to their morphology.

The morphological patterns discussed provide cer-tain questions that go beyond the purely taxonomic dimension, and suggest domestic semiotic problems. One of the most meaningful facts is the diachronic variability of domestic typologies, which usually fall for a still appearance, somehow anachronistic. Criti-cism against this stillness in the analysis of the built environments, formulated in recent studies (bermejo, 2009; Azkarate, solaún, 2012), sums up to the prob-lem stated by the stratigraphic sequences of El Tol-mo de Minateda (Gutiérrez, Cañavate, 2010). With-out going over already set out arguments, we should highlight that the publication of the first self-contained household structures discovered in El Tolmo de Mi-nateda, turned them into a reference for the monocel-lular or simple household model in the Early Middle Ages (Vigil-Escalera, 2003, 288; Teichner, schierl, 2006, 125-6) (fig. 4). However, the use of the whole

20. byzantine architecture in umm el-Jimal is mostly repre-sented by ashlar multi-storied buildings. The complex ar-chitectural and decorative features show an important spe-cialization in the productive processes. On the other hand, Spanish examples show a very different technical environ-ment with a lesser degree of productive specialization. On umm el-Jimal Project (http://www.ummeljimal.org/).


excavation and the stratigraphic sequence as an ar-chaeological analysis instrument, has been key to un-derstanding the sequence of household units. We may therefore state that the Emiral household unit model found in El Tolmo does not match, at least in the last phase, the classical monocellular pattern. As already said, it does exemplify the transition process towards a more complex structural model based on the addition of several rectangular rooms around an open space, which matches better the third pattern of added units

shaping a “protocourtyard” (Gutierrez and Cañavate, 2010, 133).

The example of the Household Unit 1 in this site (fig. 6) is most revealing. In a first phase there was a large monocellular unit with a hearth inside. In a sec-ond phase, simultaneous from a stratigraphic point of view, up to four units were associated (two juxtaposed and two independent) shaping a shared open space typical of associated units, but it was not yet separated from the public areas and it was therefore passable.

fig. 9. domestic and urban spaces in umm al-Jimal (syria, 5th-7th centuries Ad) and El Tolmo de Minatera (al-Andalus, 9th century Ad).


These independent units state an increased function-al specialization, assigning one of the units (the one facing west but with an eastern entry) to family life, as suggested by the hearth, while the other two units adjoining the original monocellular unit can be used for different purposes (residence or pantry, as sug-gested by the ceramics). The last unit, located on the eastern side and built against the terrace of the next house, with a wide opening usually facing west, could be either a stable or a warehouse. This spatial special-ization reinforces the unitary nature of the structures that should be seen as part of the same semi-closed household unit, according to M. Winter (1986).

The third phase clearly shows the successful evolu-tion to a pattern of added units shaping a “protocourt-yard”, as seen in the wall that flanks the street to the

east, confining the shared space devoted to family life. There is an opening that channels movement obliquely and that, in this specific case, distributes two adjoin-ing households. Another large opening, located in the opposite side of the household, has a wall that stresses the privacy of the courtyard. The partition walls inside the original large room separate, by the middle of the 9th century, the area devoted to resting and sleeping (alcoba) from the living and dining room. The build-ing AI in El Molón (Camporrobles) is a clear example with two different construction phases: a first one with two adjoined and juxtaposed rooms that can be entered directly from the open space in the front, and a second phase that removes the party wall between both rooms and closes one of the entries, turning them into a long single room. Two partition walls separate a small area

fig. 10. 1. Theoretical framework of the akham (according to sakina Missoum, 1995, fig. 6); 2. The akham as diagrammed by Pierre bourdieu (according to E. fentress in this same volume), 3. Volubilis, site d, building II (according to fentress, limane,

2010, fig. 3).


from the rest of the room, whose only interpretation is as a bedroom (alcoba) similar to the ones in El Tolmo (lorrio and sánchez de Prado, 2008, 150 and 151, fig 5.2). This internal division of the rectangular structure and the spatial conceptualization, clearly subordinated to the main room and dependant, reinforces the grad-ual distinction of two functional areas in the residen-tial space (the alcoba as a bedroom for sleeping, and the hall as a living room), introducing a second level of structural depth. This separation will be typical in houses from the 10th and 11th centuries onwards and can be read as a social “Islamization”, the acquisition and generalization of certain Islamic social habits that are reflected and reinforced in the domestic space.

We will not get into a deep analysis of the social aspects suggested by this information, but we need to point out that the same simple architectural expres-sion, as the monocellular unit, may have very dif-ferent interpretations in diverse historical and social contexts. Thus, in the Islamic Middle Ages, its cor-roborated similarities with the self-contained berber domestic spaces studied by ethnography, requires to cautiously take into account (Fentress, 2000, 16-21 and on this same volume) its connections with large familiar structures and a strong kinship-based commu-nity solidarity (fig. 10). On the contrary, similar Early Middle Ages households located in Lazio “costituite da un unico ambiente di piccole o medie dimensioni testimonia que ci troviamo di fronte a residenze rela-tive a una singola famiglia nucleare, all’interno del-la quale era prevista una completa promiscuità degli spazi di vita” (santangeli Valenzani, 2011, 129).

On the other hand, the peculiar additions in the third pattern and the fact that there is more than one room with a hearth in household units, cannot pre-vent us from recognising matrimonial cells inside the same large familiar group, living together in the same household unit according to their kinship (fig. 9). We cannot forget about Pierre bourdieu’s important con-sideration regarding domestic distribution in the kab-yle society:

La cellule familiale est une unité fondamentale: uni-té économique de production et consommation, uni-té politique au sein de la confédération de familles qu’est le clan, unité religieuse enfin puisque chaque foyer est le lieu d’un culte commun (rites du seuil, du foyer, des génies familiaux, etc.). La cohésion est renforcée par l’unité de l’habitat –les maisons des descendants d’un même aïeul étant en général grou-pées autour d’une cour commune- et par la commen-salité. (bourdieu, 2001, 10)21

However, as already stated, “On a parfois fait appel à l’anthropologie pour rechercher l’origine de cette

21. E. Fentress goes back to this statement in this same volume, quoting etnographic comments by Germaine Laoust-Chantréaux at Aït Hichem.

structure domestique, allant même jusqu’à vouloir identifier l’appartenance ethnique des populations concernées. Là aussi, l’archéologie nous avertit du ris-que qu’il y aurait à systématiser de tels parallélismes; le problème est beaucoup plus complexe, ce type de maisons simples (ou unicellulaires) étant documenté dans des contextes aussi bien wisigothiques tardifs qu’islamiques de première époque, et en milieu tant urbain que rural (et, dans ce cas, que le peuplement ait été indigène ou tribal)” (Cressier, gutierrez, 2009, 152). The social reading of the domestic space (its se-miotic dimension) is complex and multi-faceted, and does not allow whatsoever a mechanical translation in terms of ethnicity.

The complex units surrounding a courtyard, the so-called “courtyard house”, refers morphologically to the highly centralized model that E. Fentress (2000, 21) called “the Arab House”. In a more precise sense, this should be considered the household unit typical of Islamic societies (Acién, 2001), since it appears in most of the Islamized societies (regardless of their eth-nic background) all over the Mediterranean coast from the 9th century onwards. The appearance and gradual spread of this new Mediterranean household model, alien to roman tradition, results in a morphological and functional uniformity of the domestic structures that can be seen as the materialization of the complete social Islamization (Acién, 1998, 937-9). In short, we believe that the rhythm of this process is clearly seen in the households (Cressier, gutiérrez, 2009, 151). The main features of the Islamic courtyard house can be identified in house I in sétif (the roman sitifis in Algeria, built between the second half of the 10th cen-tury and the first of the 11th century Ad) and studied by Elizabeth Fentress in her well-known work The house of the prophet: North African Islamic Housing (1987): the distribution of independent rooms around the courtyard, the strong privacy given by the bent hall-way, and the definition of specialized areas (especially the halls, in this specific case with a platform that sep-arates the bedroom; the kitchen, the pantry-warehouse and the stable).

In al-Andalus, from the 8th century onwards in the Šaqunda district in Cordoba (Casal, 2008) and dur-ing the 9th century in Iyyuh / El Tolmo de Minateda (Gutierrez, Cañavate, 2010), some of the built envi-ronments do already show evidence of an interaction between different household patterns, which can be especially seen in the long units open to large roofless areas, though there are similar patterns in Visigothic contexts. It is difficult to guess the functionality of the spaces in Šaqunda, but the 9th-century household units in El Tolmo de Minateda show a clear increas-ing room specialization, with residential units that do still have a kitchen, a social reading very similar to the self-contained pattern of the monocellular house. However, they start to add some auxiliary facilities such as pantries and stables, and even (as in room 2) a common kitchen, which shows a community


dimension independent of the fact that the presence of a hearth in several rooms suggest private matrimo-nial cells within the same household. Either way, the model of Islamic courtyard house is already well de-fined by the middle of the 9th century in urban sites as baŷŷâna/Pechina, showing a hall, a latrine as sanitary equipment, and a bent zaguán for feminine seclusion and privacy. The Caliphate consolidates this model in the city expansions of Cordoba, and popularises the separation of the bedroom from the living room, and the use of the kitchen only and exclusively for cooking activities.

The identification between Islamic city and ideol-ogy does also imply the spread of this new model of complex household with a central courtyard, which gradually replaces other more simple domestic pat-terns. The differences between urban and rural begin to blur, and the urbanistic, morphological and con-structive solutions are so uniform that it is impossible to recognize the urban or rural dimension of many Almohad household units (13th century) through their specific architecture. The household units in the si-yasa/Cieza farmsteads (Murcia) are a clear example of a high level of functional specialization with bed-rooms, living rooms, kitchen, latrine, room for the earthenware jars, pantry and a second storey, besides a stable with a separate entry. nothing, not even the decoration, tells these households apart from other Almohad urban households as the ones in Mértola, Saltés or Murcia.

This diachronic reading should qualify the anthro-pological stillness usually suggested by taxonomic models, which ends up anthropologically defining with archetypes the societies studied. In fact, the Islamic “courtyard house” is one of these archetypes that cross all the history of al-Andalus, casting a long shadow even after their defeat and submission to the new feu-dal order. The distribution of Mudejar and Moorish built environments in the kingdom of Valencia (14th to 16th centuries) are very different from other Medi-eval distributions. but the statement saying that the development patterns of the Islamic household units “were not substantially modified between the first Is-lamic presence in al-Andalus and their defeat and ex-pulsion”, and that these patterns are “on the other hand common to most of the Islamic world and have con-tinued to this very day in the Maghreb and other areas, as shown by ethnographic literature”22, reinforce an idea of stillness in Medieval domestic spaces that is

22. «Por lo tanto, tenemos unas pautas bastante claras de desarrollo de las unidades de residencia que no se modi-fican de manera sustancial entre los primeros momentos de presencia musulmana en al-Andalus y la expulsión de los moriscos. Estas pautas, por otra parte, son comunes a una gran parte del mundo islámico y han perdurado hasta la actualidad en el Magreb y en otras regiones, tal y como lo demuestra la amplia literatura etnográfica» (Torró, 2009, 206),

far from our analysis. beyond morphological similari-ties among the built environments in early al-Andalus and the late Moorish, rural and subdued households, there should be deep differences that we need to rec-ognize regarding the distribution and social use of the space. We have to transcend the syntactic similarities, sometimes more apparent rather than real, that may be subject to comparable spatial solutions, not necessar-ily social.

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