The hearth has been considered a symbol of warmth and comfort in the house from time immemorial. It warms the owners in the cold and gives them hot and tasty food. We are accustomed to taking a stove or a fireplace for a hearth, but is there anything else that can warm us in the cold? Of course, and this is the stove, the "younger brother" of the fireplace among the peoples of the north.
Meaning
In fact, a stove is a small hearth or stove for heating a small space in the dwellings of the indigenous inhabitants of Yakutia. Most often it was installed in yurts-booths. These are houses built of thin, 10-12 cm in diameter, wood in the form of a small hut. It was in such dwellings that the fireplace was installed. What did the nomadic tribes find so special about this simple design?
Stove design
First of all, it is worth talking about the dwelling in which the fireplace was built. Yurt-booth was built in the form of a trapezoid or a truncated pyramid. All logs were placed obliquely to the frame, then it was all carefully smeared with clay mixed with manure, holes for future windows were previously left.
Kamelek has the appearance of a small smeared fireplace, because during the construction of more solid dwellings it became necessary to cover open fires so that the smoke would be pulled out into the street through the chimney. Smeared with clay, like the booth yurt itself, the fireplace from the wide base at a strong angle goes up, gradually turning into a pipe, which the Yakuts called weles. Firewood is laid vertically in the hearth, there is a place for drying clothes and shelves for kitchen utensils on the side. This design heats the room very quickly, since the hearth is open. But just as quickly, the room cools down, as soon as it goes out. Therefore, people around the clock kept the fire in the fireplace. The place next to this cozy "stove" was considered the best. The owners of the house and the most honored guests were usually located here.
