Porstube

The Porstube is a room in an outbuilding of the farm in East Thuringia or West Saxony , which takes up the entire width of the building and often takes up half its length. The name Porstube comes from the fact that the designated room is upstairs , i.e. on the first floor.

For most of the farming year, the Porstube was used to store small appliances or supplies. However, for the parish fair and for certain large family celebrations, the Porstube was cleared, cleaned and decorated so that one could celebrate with the neighboring farmers or relatives and dance to popular band music. As a seat there was a wooden bench built into the room around the walls. In order to give the room a solemn appearance, the whitewashed half-timbered fields of the inner side walls were decorated with paintings , ornaments and sayings. For its intended purpose, the Porstube was mainly used from the 17th century to the second third of the 19th century and occasionally up to the first quarter of the 20th century .