Footstool from Skårup
Footstool (frontside) containing embers to keep the feet warm. The stool is from Skårup in Southern Funen and is now at Møntergården in Odense. Photo: Jens Gregers Aagaard.
Footstool (backside) containing embers to keep the feet warm. The stool is from Skårup in Southern Funen and is now at Møntergården in Odense. Photo: Jens Gregers Aagaard.
Intro
It was cold in the old houses. A pottery footstool containing embers gave welcome heat beneath the long skirts, and a bedwarmer was good to have under the cold quilts in the absence of a bedfellow.
A place to live
The lay-out of dwellings has changed over time, but it has always met people’s basic requirements: a roof over their heads and a place to sleep and eat. In the past, home and work were one and the same, but nowadays most people of Funen live far away from their place of work.
The farm, 1800-1850
Around 1800, most people on the isle of Funen were farm dwellers. A typical farm had a farmer and his wife, their children and a number of farm hands and maids. The inhabitants of the farm, Fjeldstedgården, shown here, belonged to the better off section of the rural population. The farm consists of a main house and three wings and is half-timbered with an internal post construction. The walls are constructed of wattle and daub and the roof is thatched. Today, Fjeldstedgården stands in the Funen Village, but its original location was in the village of Fjeldsted in western Funen.
This location is part of the exhibition 'Funen – at the centre of the universe', at Møntergården in Odense. Read more about the exhibition on our website.