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Anyone know what these are??

Happyinharrogate

Active Member
Time of past OR future Camino
Camino Frances 2021 and Camino del Norte 2023
Travelling from Sarria to Portomarin we came across lots of these structures which we can’t decide if they’re shrine type things or animal coops? Anyone know what they are? There were so many of them on most properties and haven’t seen them previously on the trail. Anyone know what they are???50D32521-1828-448B-A689-3E162237B997.jpeg
 
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Lots of information here, including etymology that relates the word horreo to the English word horror.

 
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They are storage houses for vegetables/grain. The lower edges (Above the foundation pillars) are extended to hinder mice etc. entering the storage. Very common in Galicia. Spanish name is Horreo (plural: Horreos).
Thanks Alex
 
etymology that relates the word horreo to the English word horror.
Quote from the blog: "The Latin word horror, -oris (meaning horror, as in English, but also shuddering, shivering, or chill) has the same root because those buildings were dark and cold."

😂

I think that's folk etymology, or, in this case, blogspot etymology.

There doesn't appear to be any common root for Latin horrere (to tremble, hence English horror) and Latin horreum (storehouse, hence Spanish horreo).
 
There doesn't appear to be any common root for Latin horrere (to tremble, hence English horror) and Latin horreum (storehouse, hence Spanish horreo).
:oops: I knew I was wrong as soon as I saw in my alert notifications that @Kathar1na quoted my post. If she doesn't already know something she does know how to find out.
 
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Travelling from Sarria to Portomarin we came across lots of these structures which we can’t decide if they’re shrine type things or animal coops? Anyone know what they are? There were so many of them on most properties and haven’t seen them previously on the trail. Anyone know what they are???View attachment 110167
I believe they are used to dry corn.
 
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The corn crib we had on the farm (in Canada) wasn’t nearly as pretty as these treasures. It went out of use as soon as the combine could remove the corn from the cob, and it sits on a tilt now as a remnant of the past.
 
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Lots of information here, including etymology that relates the word horreo to the English word horror.

Thank you so much, @Rick of Rick and Peg! I was transported away from the day-to-day of COVID-19 restrictions, back to Galicia and remembering the first time I saw them on the Via de la Plata in the Fall of 2008. What a nice break from the current COVID-19 sadness, to a time when things were so much more free and perhaps even taken for granted. Given the opportunity to safely return to Galicia in future, I shall treasure the experience even more than I did the first time. Again, thank you for sharing this wonderful article.
 
Travelling from Sarria to Portomarin we came across lots of these structures which we can’t decide if they’re shrine type things or animal coops? Anyone know what they are? There were so many of them on most properties and haven’t seen them previously on the trail. Anyone know what they are???View attachment 110167
These are "hórreos", traditionally used to store grain like corn, so it's a kind of raised grain store. They stand on a plinth often supported by stone pillars with a disc on top of each pillar, or similar structure, to prevent vermin getting up over the plinth and into the store. Many are used as tool sheds for the garden etc. Some miniature ones have been made as post-boxes or ornaments in the gardens of rural houses.
There are also many hórreos at the seafront in Combarro, about 6km outside of Pontevedra on the spiritual variant of the Portuguese Camino.
 
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Technical backpack for day trips with backpack cover and internal compartment for the hydration bladder. Ideal daypack for excursions where we need a medium capacity backpack. The back with Air Flow System creates large air channels that will keep our back as cool as possible.

€83,-
Travelling from Sarria to Portomarin we came across lots of these structures which we can’t decide if they’re shrine type things or animal coops? Anyone know what they are? There were so many of them on most properties and haven’t seen them previously on the trail. Anyone know what they are???View attachment 110167
Thats where the trolls live. I should know. I've been accused of being a terrible troll
 
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So, after the success of getting my last question answered, here’s another one. On the road down to Palas del Rei there were these all the ways down the side of the road, they have an angled mirror on the inside but really can’t work out their function or why so many??? Who knows what they’re for?
 

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Travelling from Sarria to Portomarin we came across lots of these structures which we can’t decide if they’re shrine type things or animal coops? Anyone know what they are? There were so many of them on most properties and haven’t seen them previously on the trail. Anyone know what they are???View attachment 110167
They are grain stores, the air can flow through the store to keep it in good condition, the legs are designed so rodents cannot climb in and eat the grain.
 
So, after the success of getting my last question answered, here’s another one. On the road down to Palas del Rei there were these all the ways down the side of the road, they have an angled mirror on the inside but really can’t work out their function or why so many??? Who knows what they’re for?
Could it have been some sort of outdoor lighting for the property?
 
Ideal sleeping bag liner whether we want to add a thermal plus to our bag, or if we want to use it alone to sleep in shelters or hostels. Thanks to its mummy shape, it adapts perfectly to our body.

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Down bag (90/10 duvet) of 700 fills with 180 g (6.34 ounces) of filling. Mummy-shaped structure, ideal when you are looking for lightness with great heating performance.

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I think you all are missing the fact that he’s since posted a new picture and question. Scroll back to #28
 
Do you think after 100 people write and say what they are, people will stop commenting what they are?
You mean to say that you know what they are? What are they? I don't have a clue. My uninformed guess is that they are some outdated art installation. I didn't notice them when I walked on the road towards Palas de Rei, did you perhaps see them? I also looked for them in Google Streetview but no luck so far.

I've moved on from the first question, together with @Happyinharrogate and @Smallest_Sparrow, but it is of course possible that not everyone reads all the messages in the thread before they reply ... ;)😎🤭
 
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New Original Camino Gear Designed Especially with The Modern Peregrino In Mind!
Back in 2016 we found ourselves mingling with a crowd of British hikers "doing the Camino" by way of a long weekend starting from Sarria.
For all the interest they were taking in the landscape they might just have well stayed at home in Surrey except . . .
Two ladies who were avidly talking down their hostess at a party they had both been to when one suddenly turned to me:
"You've done this walk before (we'd chatted at a coffee stop). Those funny little sheds with the crosses on the top, is that where the locals store their dead (relatives)?"
I was SO tempted . . .
 
The one from Galicia (the round) and the one from Castilla & Leon. Individually numbered and made by the same people that make the ones you see on your walk.
Two ladies who were avidly talking down their hostess at a party they had both been to when one suddenly turned to me:
"You've done this walk before (we'd chatted at a coffee stop). Those funny little sheds with the crosses on the top, is that where the locals store their dead (relatives)?"
I was SO tempted . . .
I walked with a young American woman who had several years earlier studied for a year in Madrid. While visiting Galicia with her host family that's exactly what the son of the family told her, as a joke, which she believed, and even repeated to others. By the time I met her she had learned their true purpose of course.
 
Travelling from Sarria to Portomarin we came across lots of these structures which we can’t decide if they’re shrine type things or animal coops? Anyone know what they are? There were so many of them on most properties and haven’t seen them previously on the trail. Anyone know what they are???
The English equivalent that used staddle stones to support a structure or deck containing beehives, grain store, larder etc.

340px-Staddle_stones%2C_Somerset_Rural_Life_Museum.jpg
 
St James' Way - Self-guided 4-7 day Walking Packages, Reading to Southampton, 110 kms
The English equivalent that used staddle stones to support a structure or deck containing beehives, grain store, larder etc.

340px-Staddle_stones%2C_Somerset_Rural_Life_Museum.jpg
Those mushroom caps were apparently meant to keep out rats but since we now know they can swim up pipes and through toilet bowls . . .
 

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