It is winter. The kitchen is humming with activity, as sheep’s wool is prepared for textile production and fires are kept up. The sheep have already been sheared with large iron scissors, and now the wool is being combed, while the fibres are softened and dyed. The household is busy. One member gets out a large iron ladle to stir either the soaked fibres or the coals in the fire. Another inhabitant heads upstairs to find the wooden spindles and the matching clay and rock-crystal whorls, so that they are ready for spinning the fibres.
The kitchen is a rather large room, which covers about 17m2. Set into the floor in a corner are two column drums, one of which works as a crusher. On the opposite side of the room, a hearth sits on the stone floor, with cooking pots, jugs, and jars as well as fine-ware bowls arranged nearby. From the kitchen area, it is possible to enter another room, which gives access to the upper storey. Ascending the stairs would lead to walls decorated with paintings and stucco profiles, while the owners’ belongings placed here include, among other things, fine glass bottles, lamps, a small lead mirror, a belt, jewellery, a purse containing a collection of old coins, and a wooden casket. The casket contains scrap: fragments of broken metal saved for later reuse. Careful inspection might also reveal a lead case holding a thin and well-hidden rolled-up silver scroll engraved with undecipherable pseudo-Arabic letters – a magic spell. Only its owner knows whether it is meant to ward off illness, act as an amulet protecting the family, or bring harm to somebody.
Next door, the neighbours are having their house refurbished. The sound of chipping echoes through its rooms, as craftspeople prepare tesserae for new mosaic floors. They have already finished a white, undecorated mosaic floor on the upper storey, while the walls are ready to receive a coat of plaster before being painted. A staircase leads down into an open courtyard, where a cistern collects rainwater channelled through pipes from the roof. Various rooms open off this space, some boasting arched doorways. In one of these abutting rooms, the mosaicists have cached white tesserae in a large trough. Thousands of these stone pieces have been cut and are now ready to be laid. Due to the renovation work, this part of the house has been vacated by its owners, who have stored most of their belongings elsewhere.
