Whenever one sees a picture of a hut, one thinks of Africa.
Indeed, huts have been the defining architectural hallmark of Africa,
and throughout the continent, they have been the preferred building
style.
Huts are a form of living space. Huts are usually round,
with a peaked roof. They are usually made of mud or clay, with a wooden
structure to support the building, and a single wooden pole in the
centre, which supports the grass-thatched roof.
Many critics of
Africa claim that Africa can boast no great cultures south of Egypt. By
that, they often mean that there is no architectural evidence of
greatness south of the Pyramids. Indeed, architecture or architectural
remains are the accepted calling card of the so-called 'great cultures'.
While
most of Africa can boast no such fossil evidence, there is reason to
believe that the architectural choices made by the Africans thus far are
neither as accidental nor as simplistic as they may seem.
For
one, most of Africa is warm to hot throughout the year, without an
extended winter period. The most uncomfortable climatic period is the
long rains, during which it rains a lot, mostly every day. However, in
most of Africa, it showers, rather than rains. That means a quick and
voluminous period of precipitation, unlike rain in Europe for example,
which may be a slight but continuous precipitation. In addition, most of
Africa, which lies at the equator, experiences almost equal twelve-hour
periods each for night and day. This is in contrast to for example
Europe, where in winter, darkness may be up eighteen hours long.
As
such, most of life in Africa is lived outside. A shelter is needed only
for the night, against the cold and as shelter from wild animals. There
has never been a need to invest as heavily in shelter as has been done
in Europe for example. Strictly speaking, there was rarely a situation
in Africa where lack of shelter would have been life-threatening. In
many African cultures, nomads, hunters, warriors and messengers were
often away from home for long periods without having shelter.
Huts
are often small, and made of the readily available mud or river clay,
plastered over a skeleton of branches. They were completely inexpensive
in both materials and labour. In many cultures, the women did the
plastering, while the men did the thatching of the roof. Among the
Maasai of East Africa, the woman builds the whole structure, which is
referred to as a manyatta.
Because of this relaxed philosophy to
shelter, the Africans were not enslaved by the acquisition of shelter as
is often the case in the modern world. In today's globalised world,
buying one's home is a lifetime liability that forces one to live
chained to a mortgage, under the Damocles sword of a foreclosure. The
exploitation of this fear in the U.S.A. contributed to the current
worldwide financial crisis.
It is also worthy of note that almost
all the famous architectural monuments of the great cultures were built
by employing slave labour, forced and semi-forced labour. That has never
been necessary in Africa south of the pyramids. In fact, shelter was so
inexpensive that the nomads could walk away from their huts at a
moment's notice and walk off into the savannah - the epitome of freedom.
It
also meant that no family was ever without shelter because shelter was
unaffordable, unlike in today's world where many families become
homeless if they experience a financial upset midway through their
mortgage.
In many parts of Africa, the huts were renovated and
renewed once a year, after the harvest season and before the next rains.
This was the period with the least work and was like a holiday. The
harvest was in, and next agricultural season had not yet begun. The
women renovated the walls of the huts by plastering with a new layer of
mud or clay. White or ochre-coloured river clay was used as a cosmetic
finish inside and outside the hut, as well as on the floor. Communities
that had no access to river clay used a mixture of cow-dung and mud, or
ash.
A good African housewife took this duty as seriously as
caring for her own body. A capable wife could be identified by her
impeccably-kept hut(s). The regular renovation also served an important
hygienic function: river clay is a very clean and wholesome material
that discourages the breeding of insects and other pests. Both clay and
dried cow dung are similar to ash in this respect. Cooking-fire ash from
non-poisonous burnt wood is pure enough to be used as an alternative
for toothpaste.
Renovation also gave the woman a creative outlet:
she could paint whatever motifs on her walls that she wished. The men
re-thatched the hut(s), using grass, such as elephant grass which was
mostly cut by the women. Among the Masaai, the women did the renovation
work as the men were often occupied with the full-time job of protecting
the tribe from lions and other dangers lurking in the savannah.
A
very satisfying effect of this yearly renewal was the psychological
effect. There was an atmosphere of renewal every year; of new life, of a
fresh start, of soul cleansing and a doing away with the past. Every
year. This is a very healthy psychological perspective. Festivals
featuring dancing and feasting also accompanied this period.
In
today's world, acquiring a home has such a finality to it. A sense of
being rooted and captured by one building for one's lifetime.
Because
they were low-cost, huts were also very flexible. One could build a
homestead of huts: one for cooking, another for sleeping, another for
receiving visitors, and so on. Every time one needed a new hut, one
simply built one. Adolescent boys were given a piece of land where they
could build their own huts, a distance away from the rest of the family.
Their privacy was assured, and their activities within their huts were
nobody's concern. A lot of adolescents today would appreciate the idea
of having one's own hut.
Huts are very comfortable and exactly
right for many parts of Africa. This is mainly because of the building
materials used. Both clay and grass are good insulators, but are porous,
and so allow a free flow of air. It is often very hot during the
afternoons in Africa. The hut remains cool and is a welcome resting
place. At night, when temperatures fall, the hut retains its daytime
temperature, keeping the inhabitants warm.
Huts are also very
low-maintenance. A well-renovated hut only needs to be swept once a day
with a straw broom. There was no need to wipe, polish or dust. Accidents
with liquids were undramatic because the liquid was simply absorbed
into the earth. The only real danger was fire, since the thatched roofs
could burn very quickly, trapping the people inside.
Recently, an
architectural team in Switzerland has 'discovered' the virtues of clay
as a building material. Clay is a strong, durable material that is easy
to work with. Applied correctly, it can be used to build structures that
are stable, durable and aesthetic without necessitating the use of
paint and cement. Most important of all, clay is healthy. It has now
been proven that clay filters out toxins from the environment. Modern
building materials like cements, paint, fillers and metals release
toxins that compromise human health and well-being. A building made of
clay or mud is completely eco-friendly, provided the initial source was
safe.
The Africans knew that a long time ago. Huts, made of
natural 'earth' materials, fitted in with their basic philosophy of
drawing on nature for all their needs, and only in the amounts that were
needed. For example, calabashes and gourds were used as containers for
milk, water, local beer, porridge, honey or any other liquid. Cooking
pots were made of clay, as were water pots. Cooking sticks were made of
wood.
Water stored in a clay pot has a pleasant, natural coolness,
and smells of earth. Drunk out of a calabash, it has an additional
woody flavour. Food cooked in a clay pot over a wood fire retains an
inimitable earthy aroma, especially fresh beans or meat dishes.
Sleeping
mats or sitting mats were woven out of rushes or made of animal skin,
as was clothing. Some people constructed a raised clay platform covered
with animal skins or rush mats to act as a seat or a bed. Stools were
made of wood or woven from rushes. Women wore jewelry made from bone,
horn, wood, stone, clay, beads or woven rushes. Foodstuffs were carried
or stored in woven rush baskets or clay pots.
This philosophy of
living in harmony with the bounty of nature led to zero garbage, since
everything was biodegradable. Indeed, until the advent of modernity and
urbanisation, Africa was a continent of natural beauty preserved in its
entirety.
Sadly, present-day Africans are jumping wholesale onto
the bandwagon of expensive homes built of derived materials, which
require a lifetime to pay for and a fortune to repair and maintain. The
materials used in modern buildings trap heat, smells and moisture and
are often derived using procedures that harm the environment. The houses
lack the wellness effect of sitting in a hut built entirely out of the
earth. They are in keeping with the modern day trends of inflated
consumerism, self-definition through possession and a careless disregard
for the planet.
Happily, some are rediscovering the enchantment
of huts. They have been re-designed in some cases to be much larger,
with large windows, or combined in intersecting or interconnecting
structures. A famous hotel in Nairobi, Kenya is built using this
concept, with treated straw used for thatching.
Indeed, more and more people are re-discovering why Africans lived in huts.
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