Hotel Description
Immersed in the red land of Salento, among olive trees, Indian figs and fruit trees, situated in a privileged position on a hill, Masseria Uccio enables to enjoy the silence and calm of the countryside.Entirely realized with local stones, the ancient building shows the signs of the time gone by. A small wooden main door leads to a large quadrangular courtyard from which the places once destined to the farmer's various activities develop: the rooms where he slept with his family, the stalls, the sheepfolds, the tool-sheds and a kitchen with a large fireplace for the production of cheese. It is an overall harmonious and pleasing building with its rural characteristics, enhanced by the beautiful star and barrel vaults and by the dry walls built with effort by the peasants only with inserted stones.A light renovation intervention enabled to revisit these areas maintaining their ancient essence. The architectural shapes and the geometries of the place have remained unchanged. Everything has been preserved, respected and enhanced. The work of skilled local artisans enabled to preserve the stone fireplaces, the niches dug out in the walls, the water tanks and the ancient vaults, signs of a humble peasant life which is now far away.History:The Masseria is a typical rural building in the Salento inland, whose origins could be traced back to the 17th century.It is a courtyard-farm built, according to the customs of that time, considering the farmer's needs and the activities he had to realize in this place. It is a real agricultural centre, destined to farming and production, in which the farmer lived with his family, each of them with specific duties and roles. Occasionally there were also sowers, gleaners, shepherds and other workers who helped in the periods of more intense activity. From dawn to dusk everyone was involved in the hard activities required to make the farm work: someone sent the sheep out to pasture, others were engaged in the sowing and others in the threshing. The animals in this farm played a significant role: horses, oxen and cows were needed for the work and, where necessary, they represented also an important supply of meat.The farmer was the boss of this rural structure, a tenant who undertook to give the owner half the harvest and the first fruits of each variety. All the organizational, productive and social life of the farm was focussed on this person: he had to hire the workers and assigned the various tasks, he gave orders and distributed the goods produced. A modest and hard life, marked by the uncertain cycle of the seasons: in autumn men were engaged in the ploughing of the land, sowing and vintage; in winter they pruned the plants and carried out maintenance works; in spring they worked with the cereals and sowable land, and in summer they harvested the hay, reap and threshed the cereals. The threshing took place in a farmyard, that is a portion of land with round shape facing the farm, leveled and covered with chianche sheets of rocky stone, in which the bunches of spikes were put in circle. A peasant placed himself at the centre of the farmyard, and, holding the reins of one or more mules, make them move in circle and step on the spikes with their hooves, thus making the grains of wheat come out.While men had to do the hardest works in the fields, life for women was not easier, as they had to look after their children and realize household and rural works: they prepared bread, pasta, conserves, jams, tomato sauce, spirits, cheese and ricotta, in order to meet the owner's request and guarantee a warm dish to their family even in periods of shortage; they bred rabbits, chickens, turkeys and pigs which animated the large central courtyard, and, where necessary, women also had to help men in the fields.The children, considered a source of wealth because they could work, sent the animals out to pasture and milked goats and sheep.Thus, it was a business based on the family as an essential centre of production, where a poor and difficult life was led, but also marked by moments of aggregation, collaboration and mutual help. |
 Italy |
