A
boô (also spelled
boo or
boe) is an old Saxon building where a farmer could spend the night with his
cattleCattle are the most common type of large domesticated ungulates. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae, are the most widespread species of the genus Bos, and are most commonly classified collectively as Bos primigenius...
if he let them graze far outside the village. The building, which had separate areas for cattle and farmer to live, would have been made with cheap materials. Walls were made of
strawStraw is an agricultural by-product, the dry stalk of a cereal plant, after the grain or seed has been removed. Straw makes up about half of the yield of cereal crops such as barley, oats, rice, rye and wheat...
or braided twigs covered in cow
manureManure is organic matter used as organic fertilizer in agriculture. Manures contribute to the fertility of the soil by adding organic matter and nutrients, such as nitrogen that is trapped by bacteria in the soil...
or
loamLoam is soil composed of sand, silt, and clay in relatively even concentration , considered ideal for gardening and agricultural uses...
; the roof was also made of straw.
The word boô is a cognate of the German word 'Bude' which means 'shack'.
A
boô (also spelled
boo or
boe) is an old Saxon building where a farmer could spend the night with his
cattleCattle are the most common type of large domesticated ungulates. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae, are the most widespread species of the genus Bos, and are most commonly classified collectively as Bos primigenius...
if he let them graze far outside the village. The building, which had separate areas for cattle and farmer to live, would have been made with cheap materials. Walls were made of
strawStraw is an agricultural by-product, the dry stalk of a cereal plant, after the grain or seed has been removed. Straw makes up about half of the yield of cereal crops such as barley, oats, rice, rye and wheat...
or braided twigs covered in cow
manureManure is organic matter used as organic fertilizer in agriculture. Manures contribute to the fertility of the soil by adding organic matter and nutrients, such as nitrogen that is trapped by bacteria in the soil...
or
loamLoam is soil composed of sand, silt, and clay in relatively even concentration , considered ideal for gardening and agricultural uses...
; the roof was also made of straw.
Etymology
The word boô is a cognate of the German word 'Bude' which means 'shack'. The
circumflexThe circumflex ' is a diacritic mark used in written Afrikaans, Breton, Croatian, Esperanto, French, Frisian, Italian, Romanized Japanese, Norwegian, Romanized Persian, Portuguese, Romanian, Serbian, Slovak, Turkish, Vietnamese, Welsh and other languages...
on the second 'o' indicates that a letter is left out. In Danish, 'bo' means
houseA house is generally a shelter, building or structure that is a dwelling or place for habitation by human beings. The term includes many kinds of dwellings ranging from rudimentary huts of nomadic tribes to high-rise apartment buildings...
. The word boô is
Low GermanLow German or Low Saxon is any of the regional language varieties of the West Germanic languages spoken mainly in northern Germany and the eastern part of the Netherlands.-Geographical extent:-Low German in Europe:Dialects...
.
History
A (usually unmarried)
cattleCattle are the most common type of large domesticated ungulates. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae, are the most widespread species of the genus Bos, and are most commonly classified collectively as Bos primigenius...
farmerA farmer is a person who raises living organisms for food or raw materials.- Definition :The term farmer usually applies to a person who grows field crops, and/or manages orchards or vineyards, or raises livestock or poultry such as chicken and cows...
who spent time in a boô was called a boô-heer and was employed by a so-called "broodheer" (literally: bread lord). Once every fourteen days, the boô-heer would return to the farm for food supplies and clean clothes. He could keep the earnings of his only
milk cowDairy cattle are cattle cows bred for the ability to produce large quantities of milk, from which dairy products are made. Dairy cows generally are of the species Bos taurus....
and the eggs his chickens laid.
The villages of
SchoonebeekSchoonebeek is a village in the Dutch province of Drenthe. It is located in the municipality of Emmen, about 12 km south of that city.Schoonebeek was a separate municipality from 1884 to 1998, when it merged with Emmen....
and
Nieuw-SchoonebeekNieuw-Schoonebeek is a village in the Netherlands and it is part of the Emmen municipality in Drenthe. Nieuw-Schoonebeek has an altitude of 14 meters and a population of about 1,320.-External links:*...
in the border area with
GermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium,...
in the Dutch province of
DrentheDrenthe is a province of the Netherlands, located in the north-east of the country. The capital city is Assen. It is bordered by Overijssel to the south, Friesland to the west, Groningen to the north, and Germany to the east.-History:Drenthe, unlike many other parts of the Netherlands, has been a...
are the only places where these buildings can be found. Because of this, Nieuw-Schoonebeek was known as Boôëndorf on the German side of the border. The boôs that can be found there today are
replicaA replica is a copy that is relatively indistinguishable from the original. Replicas are often used for historical purposes, such as being placed in a museum. Sometimes the original never existed. For example, Difference Engine No...
s, which were not built in the original boôs' locations.
The last genuine boô, the Wilmsboô (owned by the Drents Historical Society De Spiker) in Nieuw Schoonebeek (1640) burnt down in October 2004. The historical society suspected
arsonArson is the crime of deliberately and maliciously setting fire to structures or wildland areas. It may be distinguished from other causes such as spontaneous combustion and natural wildfires caused by lightning for example. The study of the causes is the subject of fire investigation...
as the building had no gas or electricity. In March 2005, a restoration programme was begun. Before it burned down, plans were afoot to have the original building listed on the European list of monuments.
Another replica, the Hekmansboô, is on the terrain of the dairy farm "De Katshaar" (not its original location) along the Europaweg (N863) in Schoonebeek.