Inspiring Identity: how heritage connects community in Southern Slovakia – Lišov Múzeum
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Inspiring Identity: how heritage connects community in Southern Slovakia – Lišov Múzeum

The museum champions the lifestyles of people in the years current and previous, and the skills and knowledge linked to this are being upheld, celebrated and rejuvenated. Lišov Múzeum is less a museum about archaeology and artefacts and more a museum about a way of life, and a community. It feels like it preserves less of a specific time period, but looks towards history as more of an template for our modern world, assessing what we can learn from the past to improve what we do today, which on a much broader scale allows us to asses our own identities in the process.

Traditional Buildings & Community Heritage in Lišov
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Traditional Buildings & Community Heritage in Lišov

The purpose of this report is to share the knowledge I gained while working with the Lišov Múzeum in October 2019. As a member of the Technical Outreach and Education team at The Engine Shed, I wanted to focus on the traditional building materials and skills, as well as the importance of community engagement in Lišov.
This report is primarily visual, with key points written out. The idea behind this is to be able to share this information with colleagues, or others who may be interested, in an accessible format. The ability to share information visual and through activities or tactile learning is important to our team and for our work with the public.

Exploring Community Heritage in Southern Slovakia
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Exploring Community Heritage in Southern Slovakia

I was especially interested in the ethnographic display in the museum which included some flax heckling boards. I have been working on an 18th century flax mill near Glasgow and so it was great to see how the hand heckling technique worked. One handle was for the foot and the other for one hand. The flax was then thrashed against the heckling spikes to straighten the flax fibres ready for spinning. This technique would have been used in Scotland prior to the construction of water mills. Apparently there were a couple of water mills in Lišov in the 19th century, but they have been demolished. Corn mills were often used for other purposes such as flax mills and saw mills. Flax was grown in this area in the past and according to Jacob there are old flax soaking ponds in the area.

Forests, Mountains & Meadows in Eastern Slovakia
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Forests, Mountains & Meadows in Eastern Slovakia

Again there was an overwhelming diversity of flowers – a carpet of colour and endless new species. Highlights included Clematis recta; Anemone sylvestris which looked like a poppy; birds nest orchids and broomrapes; cornflower; a carpet of bugle; salvia; dianthus; martagon lily; lily of the valley; and Solomon’s seal. The diversity and sheer number of flowers was magnificent, and something we simply do not have in Scotland. The management of the meadows has now been mechanised and the meadow is cut in late June/early July. Previously it was cut by hand and used as hay but nowadays it is baled.

Archaeology at Lisov
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Archaeology at Lisov

Near Lišov is a c200km long linear monument, part of a massive network of similar sites stretching from the Czech Republic to the Black Sea. This section near Lišov runs approximately North-South and was once thought to be defensive, however a number of theories have been proposed to explain its massive construction. They are thought to be Neolithic and their relationship to tributaries of the Danube, and the Danube itself appear to be important. The monument is reminiscent of the Cleaven Dyke, Perth and Kinross, a complex earthwork comprising a pair of parallel ditches (c.45-5om apart), with a central bank, running for 1.8km through woodland and for a further 350m as a cropmark.

Slovakia: Website Report on Lisov Museum
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Slovakia: Website Report on Lisov Museum

The rural museum opened in 2015, so it has only been operating (and flourishing) over the last 3 years, under the care and love of locals Adriana Patková and Jakub Dvorský, our young guides who accompanied us throughout our stay in Slovakia.

I fell in love with the museum from the beginning and the ideas it stands for. It may display historic objects and furniture in a traditional way at times, but many of these are actually donated by the locals or passionately collected by Adriana. This way, the museum acts a depository for the local heritage and for holding people’s memories and identity. Moreover, it acts as a space for keeping alive ancient traditions, like for example burning the Goddess Morena, symbolising death and the winter, and sailing it down the river to welcome spring.

The Role of social, cultural, economic and political issues and factors in raising awareness and promoting traditional, vernacular, architectural identity, and construction methods, techniques and associated crafts and skills, Lišov, Slovakia.
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The Role of social, cultural, economic and political issues and factors in raising awareness and promoting traditional, vernacular, architectural identity, and construction methods, techniques and associated crafts and skills, Lišov, Slovakia.

Vernacular architecture, construction methods, techniques and associated crafts and skills, is a lesson of the past for the future.
Architecture established and resulting, including from construction approaches, is a unique component of a locations’ culture just as much as its language, music, art, literature or food. Architecture is also the most visual of those cultural components; conveying a unique image. This is called “genius loci,” the “spirit of a place”.

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