INTERIOR OF THE TRADITIONAL BOSNIAN HOUSE

When we speak about the traditional Bosnian house, we refer to houses built in the period of Ottomans' rule in these regions. Although only few original houses of the kind remained and they have mostly been turned into museums, we can still claim that the Bosnian house existed. Many of them have been reconstructed, at least in terms of the exterior, though there are also a significant number of families that have retained part of the interior as well, or at least some rooms. Houses built in this period were enclosed within high walls toward the street, though mutually connected through gardens. They were divided into selamluk and haremluk, the public and the private part of the house. Selamluk hosted business meetings of male members of the family and get-togethers. Haremluk was reserved for peaceful family life.      

Life mostly went on upstairs, while rooms on the ground floor served as pantries, stables and other accessory rooms. Connection with nature was very important, and therefore – besides front yards and gardens – there were spaces which served as inside and outside ones at the same time; kamarija, a covered balcony on the floor of the house, overlooking the front yard; and hajat, a large, half-opened hallway which served as the entrance to individual rooms.

Interior design of the room in the traditional Bosnian house is very simple and apparently the same in every room, regardless of how many rooms there are in the house. The basic elements which make up the furniture are immovable, i.e. fixed, and their arrangement is always the same. These elements include musandara or okolica, minder and škrabijas. Musandara or okolica consists of wooden compartments along the wall, the front side of which makes up a whole in the form of a wooden wall with a small door for each compartment; in a word, musandara is a closet. It is always found along a whole wall, and its front side is typically richly carved. The richness and the amount of carving on the front side of the musandara reflected the status of the family. Musandara included a dušekluk – a compartment for storing bedding or other textiles; then a small bathroom and a stove, as well as smaller compartments for various small items.

Along the other two or three walls there was a minder or sećija – a sofa for sitting the basis of which was made of wood, very simple, without a backrest. On the wooden basis people put šilteta, small mattresses filled with wool or straw, and over them they spread makats, or felt and cotton cloth. Along the wall, they would put the so-called kalufni cushions, filled with straw and embroidered. Makats are rugs that were used in rich people's houses, typically in rooms which were used less often, while makats of felt, covered with jajgijas were spread for daily use. Jajgijas were made of white cotton cloth and were embroidered along the edges. People used jajgijas for sitting, and narrower ones which were spread on top of the kalufni cushions.

The immovable furniture also included škrabijas – small dressers, which were also the end of the minder, or a backrest, which was put on the side and shelves for disposal. were also carved.

However, a room furnished in this way was still not complete. The middle of the room was completely empty except, of course, the rug which was an indispensable element of a Bosnian house. It was the movable parts of the furniture, which were placed in the middle, that gave a room the purpose. Thus, the same room could be used for several purposed. It was practical for families which had one or two rooms, but fir others as well, particularly in winter, when one room was used for energy savings.

The middle, which was free of furniture, is a suitable place for prayers, particularly those which were often performed in jamaat (several persons pray at the same time after an imam).

Indispensable movable parts of furniture included peškuns, small carved tables which serves as present coffee tables. Since they were small and easily movable, they could simply be placed in front of every guest or occupant. The sofra or the table was also movable. People ate on a demirlija – a big round copper tray, often decorated with savat (a special engraving technique). It was placed on low iron legs– demirs, which are foldable and easily removed. Demirlijas come in different sizes, depending on the number of persons who eat together. People sat on the floor around the demirlija, and after the meal everything was put away very simply. They also slept on the floor, in the middle of the room. When the sofra was cleared away, mattrasses would be spread and the room turned into a bedroom.

Mangala was another indispensable part of the furniture. It is a kind of table and stove at the same time, which was used for keeping beverages, which were kept near the edge around cinders, warm.

Upon entering the house, it was mandatory to take footwear off, for hygienic reasons, because occupants ate, slept and lived on the floor. Another reason is a religious regulation which provides that the prayer must be performed on a clean surface. Regardless of taking footwear off, people performed prayers using a serdžada, a small rug for this purpose, which was turned in the direction of the Qibla. Papučluk is a space for taking footwear off, and the place where slippers were kept, and it was usually found below the stairs.

Housewives always strove to arrange, decorate and enliven the space for living. They always did it in accordance with their possibilities, tastes and “fashion” trends. One of the widest-spread ways of decorating the household was handiwork on the textile.

Such decoration of homes was particularly important in the Islamic culture where, due to religious regulations pertaining to the prohibition of representing human and animal figures, painting and decorating walls with classical European painting was not used. Therefore, other ways were used, such as woodcarving and a wealth of textile items. Upon spreading of Islam in our regions, this phenomenon became “fashion” and was adopted by all layers of population. Each textile item was embroidered and decorated.

Every well-mannered girl prepares her wedding finery, and constituent parts of the finery included presents for the bridegroom and his family, as well as house supplies – bedding, curtains and towels. Besides their use value, all these items had a decorative function. Due to the richness and beauty of embroidery, some of these items served only as decoration.

Besides woven rugs, rich in colors and motifs, curtains were significant parts of a room. Hand-woven and embroidered zarčići were put on the windows.

There were many more embroidered details in such a room. Mahrama or towel was inevitable. Besides its use value, it also had a decorative value in this context. Woven, pirlitani (a special kind of weaving) or made of purchased linen, towels, or mahramas or maramas, are true works of art. Their ends were richly embroidered in colors or golden needlework. Even the ones which were used were embroidered. Short messages or names were often embroidered on their rims in Arabic alphabet, i.e. harfs. They were put over the door as decoration, over trunks, dressers, ewers and shelves.

Although bedding is part of private living space and cannot be considered its decoration, it still occupies a significant place in daily life. Therefore, in the context of handiwork, we must mention embroidered quilts. The whole surface of the face of the quilt was embroidered, and it was wrapped in a thin sheet to leave the face visible. In rich houses, quilts were sewn of silk, and embroidered with gold or silver. Such quilts are known as “srmaliˮ quilts (srma – silver wire with or without gilding).  The fact that they are still a distinctive decoration of space is supported by examples of quilts made for a lohusa (new mother) and the baby in the cradle.

Traditional Muslim families still preserve many of these items. Thus, one can frequently find peškuns, embroidered mahramas, savatli trays and coffee pots as decorations in the modern interior. Somewhere one can also find minders; old rugs are fairly frequent and it is well-known that there are several houses which have been preserved completely, e.g. Bišćevićs' House in Mostar from the 17th century, Begovina in Stolac from the 19th century, and Svrzo's House in Sarajevo from the 18th century, which has been turned into a museum. Hadžišabanovićes' House in Sarajevo neighborhood Očaktanum used to be one of the well-preserved houses of this kind where people lived; unfortunately, it burned in the fire in 2009.

References:

• Grupa autora (2001), Monografija Svrzina kuća, Sarajevo: JU Muzej Sarajeva.

• Hatidža Kapidžić, Svjetlana Bajić, Vez i srmovez u Sarajevu, AIASNA BiH

• http://kons.gov.ba