MUSEUM OF THE FORTIFIED PEASANT HOUSE OR OF THE MALAVILLA FORTIFIED HOUSE
"Take from history,
give back to history"
Piercarlo Ferrari Architect
"Se non la salviamo adesso non lo faremo più", dissi un giorno a mia madre. Era il 2009. "Non c'è tempo: dobbiamo prendere la Malavilla dalla storia e restituirla alla storia, come aveva detto il papà . Restituirla ad una comunità che veda in essa una parte di sè, un monumento alla salvaguardia di storia, paesaggio, identità ". Posta a pochi passi dal complesso della Rocca di Valle di Castrignano e visitabile con una passeggiata di pochi minuti attraverso i campi, la Malavilla di Riano è uno splendido e intatto esempio di casa-forte tardo-medievale, parte del complesso di fortificazioni poste a presidio e difesa del Castello di Castrignano e della Via Longobarda, una delle vie romee che attraversava questo territorio. LA STORIA La Malavilla è un edificio di origine tardo medievale appartenente al tipo edilizio della casa-forte, pressochè scomparso nel nostro Appennino. Malavilla, Malpasso erano nomi che identificavano nelle vecchie cartografie luoghi non sicuri a causa del brigantaggio o altre insidie. La casa-forte è un tipo edilizio che precede la casa-torre: è una sorta di anello di congiunzione fra rocca e casa-torre cinquecentesca. La filosofia costruttiva dell'edificio, generalmente a tre piani in sasso locale, pianta rettangolare e copertura in piagne di arenaria a due falde, è incardinata sui concetti di difesa e autosufficienza. L'aspetto stupefacente della Malavilla, nonostante la sua antica origine, è il fatto di essere stata concepita secondo un progetto esecutivo unitario: ognuno dei dettagli costruttivi dell'edificio è stato realizzato durante la costruzione secondo una volontà precisa e predeterminata e mai aggiunto successivamente. Il piano terra era adibito a stalla per l'allevamento di pochi animali che potessero garantire la vita delle persone che vi abitavano. Il piano primo costituiva il vero spazio abitativo raggiungibile dall'esterno attraverso una scala retrattile che garantisse la difesa dell'edificio. Il secondo piano era adibito a letto, ma anche piccionaia per l'allevamento dei colombi. Era anche l'ambiente da cui monitorare il territorio della Val Fabiola, dominato dal Castello di Castrignano, e i due passaggi alla Val Parma e Val Baganza, attraversati dalla Via Longobarda, una delle Vie Romee che univa Parma a Roma, attraverso l'Appennino.
Che cos'è la Malavilla?
Il percorso museale
Piano terra: la stalla
The Malavilla is a building of late medieval origin belonging to the fortified house type, which has almost disappeared in our Apennines. Malavilla, Malpasso were names that identified unsafe places in old maps due to brigandage or other threats.
The fortified house is a building type that precedes the tower house: it is a sort of connecting link between a fortress and a sixteenth-century tower house. The construction philosophy of the building, generally three-storey in local stone, rectangular plan and double-pitched sandstone roof, is based on the concepts of defence and self-sufficiency. The astonishing aspect of the Malavilla, despite its ancient origin, is the fact that it was conceived according to a unitary executive project: each of the building's construction details was created during construction according to a precise and predetermined will and never added later.
The ground floor was used as a stable for raising a few animals that could guarantee the life of the people who lived there. The first floor was the actual living space, reachable from the outside via a retractable staircase that guaranteed the defense of the building.
The second floor was used as a bed, but also as a dovecote for breeding pigeons. It was also the place from which to monitor the territory of the Val Fabiola, dominated by the Castrignano Castle, and the two passages to the Val Parma and Val Baganza, crossed by the Via Longobarda, one of the Vie Romee that connected Parma to Rome, through the Apennines.
Piano primo: lo spazio abitativo
Through an external retractable staircase, you reach the first floor, the real domestic environment of the fortified house. The trapdoor in the vault in the southwest corner also had a removable ladder that, once retracted, guaranteed the defense of the building. In fact, in the absence of a vertical connection, even breaking down the door on the ground floor, no one would have been able to go up to the next floors. At the same time, the trapdoor guaranteed the possibility of reaching the animals on the ground floor to look after them and to feed themselves, without having to leave the building, thus avoiding exposing oneself to attacks or dangers.
The domestic space or "fire room" as it was called by Lucio Gambi, sees the presence on the northeast side of a three-story sandstone sink with drains for the water to the outside and a window with the "balie" on the southeast side used mainly by women to sit and carry out some work under the daylight. Despite Gambi's happy definition, the Malavilla does not show any traces of a chimney: this element, to which we today attribute a particular antiquity, actually became widespread in rural buildings only from the mid-1700s. Before this period, other types of fireplaces existed, consisting of holes in the wall (sicconia) or in the roof, through which the smoke, produced by the fire lit directly in the room, could flow outwards.
Piano secondo: la piccionaia
The second floor was designed and used for different functions: being the driest place in the house, it was used as a sleeping area but also as a place to store grain.
The character of a living space is confirmed by the presence of the latrine located on the north-west side, with a drain on the facade, a very rare element and difficult to find in other buildings in the area. However, the second floor was also used for two other very important functions: first of all, pigeon breeding, essential for the self-sufficiency of the building which could thus count on meat, eggs and guano (used as fertilizer). Secondly, the defensive function of monitoring the territory, both for its safety and, in all likelihood, for the control of the territory in favor of the feudal lord of the place with whom the owner was certainly in a relationship of economic dependence.
In fact, the Malavilla is not a building born by the will of the farmer: it is a rich building, built with selected techniques and materials that certainly required a client with high-level economic possibilities. For this reason too, it was built in a strategic point of the valley: in direct visual communication with the Castrignano Castle, visible in a north-east direction, and with the two passages of the Val Baganza and the Val Parma, it certainly constituted a sort of garrison for the control of the territory.