I’m a sucker for the technical vocabulary of traditional fields, the more obsolescent the better (cf. retting flax), so of course I enjoyed Rukmini Callimachi’s NY Times piece (archived) on the beleaguered master thatchers of olde England and the roofs they thatch:
For the most ardent traditionalists, the only true thatch is “long straw” — typically cereal straw, like wheat, which is threshed to remove the grain — believed by historians to be England’s original roof. Then there’s water reed, the more durable alternative that is increasingly imported from abroad.
For master thatcher Stephen Letch, the difference is unmistakable. The problem is that for almost everyone else it’s undetectable — which is one reason long-straw roofs are going extinct. “There’s 20 or 30 long-straw thatchers left in all of England,” said Mr. Letch, 66, who has spent much of his life trying to preserve this dying art. “We’re the last and we know we’re the last — and we know that once we’re gone, those skills will be lost.” […]
Long before Britain was stitched together by a railway, roofs were made from whatever grew nearby, like heather in the northern highlands and reed near bogs and waterways. Overwhelmingly, though, most areas of the country used straw, a byproduct of the wheat grown to make bread, according to historians. It’s a lightweight material that keeps homes well insulated in the summer heat and the winter cold, but it is also flammable, attracts insects and the spiders that feed on them, and requires costly maintenance.
According to one assessment, 90 percent of thatched roofs in England and Wales were made of straw before 1800, with the remaining share split between water reed and grasses, like heather. Now that percentage has been inverted, as more and more houses are re-thatched with the more durable reed. But it’s not sourced from the local river — much of it is shipped from Eastern Europe and China.
“We do get asked the question: Well, what is the value of it?” Mr. Letch said of the long straw. “Tradition,” he answered, before dropping his voice: “But you can’t see the tradition because it all looks the same.” […]
It’s not hard to see why water reed has won out. It lasts longer — up to 70 years, versus 40 years for long straw, according to Julia Shelley, editor of The Thatcher’s Standard, the publication of the National Society of Master Thatchers. And it’s much easier to source and to install.
“You can pick up the phone and say, ‘I need 2,000 bunches of reeds,’ and they’ll turn up next week,” said the master thatcher Bodkin Willows, 38, while it can take up to a year to source the wheat for a long-straw roof.
The reed arrives from overseas in bundles that can go straight onto a roof. Long straw, by contrast, requires a preparation so elaborate that it has its own archaic vocabulary: Straw must be “gabled,” soaked in water and sorted, before being arranged in “yealms,” and pinned into place with “broaches” or “spars” made from hazel sticks that have been sharpened into staples.
Yealm is normatively spelled yelm; the OED (entry from 1921) defines it as “In Old English, a handful, bundle, sheaf, as of reaped corn; in modern dialect use, a bundle of straw laid straight for thatching (see yelm v.): = helm n.³ 1.” and says it is “Of uncertain origin.” As for broach, the OED (entry from 1888) has a great many senses (“A pointed rod of wood or iron; a lance, spear, bodkin, pricker, skewer, awl, stout pin”; “A spit for spitting herring; a similar instrument used in Candle-making for suspending the wicks for dipping”; “A shuttle used in weaving tapestry,” etc.), but the one we want is I.5. “A piece of tough pliant wood, pointed at each end, used by thatchers for fixing their work”; the word is from French broche (“The same word as brooch n., the senses having been differentiated in spelling”).
I feel for the beleaguered thatchers, of course, but I’m afraid they’re not going to have much success trying to persuade people to undergo more trouble and expense for something that no one but an expert can tell from I Can’t Believe It’s Not Thatch. At any rate, the photos in the article are splendid — do take a look.
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