mulsA - museo di storia dell'agricoltura - ETS
Fondato a Milano nel 1971
THE RESTORATION OF AGRICULTURE AND OF RURAL VILLAGES, AND THE DIORAMA OF THE PLOWING MONK
In the Middle Ages, lands abandoned after the fall of the Roman Empire were brought back under cultivation, and new lands were cleared and reclaimed through deforestation, drainage, terracing, and the creation of irrigation networks. New villages were established on land thus won for agriculture. These activities are documented here through iconographies drawn from various sources.
At the centre of the exhibition space stands a diorama depicting a ploughing scene with a monk guiding a plough drawn by a taxidermied horse fitted with a padded collar. Introduced into Europe at the end of the 1st millennium AD, the padded collar made it possible to employ equine traction—faster than bovine—for heavy draught. Unlike earlier harnessing systems (the saddle yoke and breast strap), which tended to suffocate the animal under heavy strain, the padded collar, by reducing the angle of traction, enabled the horse to deploy the powerful muscles of its chest and shoulders without impairing breathing or damaging its hide.
In the foreground: diorama of the Ploughing Monk; in the background: a series of panels dedicated to woodland clearance, land reclamation, construction and life in rural villages, haymaking, livestock farming, hunting and fishing
CROPS IN THE MIDDLE AGES
This section illustrates the crops cultivated in the Middle Ages through a series of contemporary images, including reproductions of miniatures from the Tacuina sanitatis held in the Casanatense Library in Rome and frescoes from the Torre dell’Aquila in the Buonconsiglio Castle in Trento. The medieval farmer inherited a wide range of fruit plants already cultivated in Roman times. Among these were pome fruits (apple, pear, quince), stone fruits (peach, European plum, cherry and sour cherry), and other fruit-bearing Rosaceae trees such as the azarole and the medlar. Except for certain monastic contexts, specialised orchards did not exist; fruit trees were grown in mixed cultivation, in courtyards, gardens or in rows along arable fields. Viticulture and olive growing continued in the Middle Ages, perpetuating a tradition in Italy dating back to pre-Roman times. In particular, many of the grape vine varieties of the Roman period were lost, while others appeared that remain important today. Olive oil was used both as food and as fuel for lamps. Also significant was the chestnut, present in Italian woodlands since the Roman period; its carbohydrate-rich fruit was a vital source of calories for mountain populations. As for herbaceous crops, medieval farming relied largely on species already known in Roman times. Winter cereals (bread wheat, durum wheat, spelt, barley, rye and oats) were of great importance, as were summer cereals (millet and panic grass, later joined by sorghum in the 14th century and rice in the 15th). Grain legumes (lentil, broad bean, chickpea, vetch, pea and cowpea) were also widely cultivated. Among fibre crops, flax persisted, and hemp was introduced, used for example in the making of ships’ ropes. Tillage became more effective in the later Middle Ages thanks to the spread of the mouldboard plough. A wide range of garden species was also cultivated, including leafy vegetables (spinach, cabbage, chicory, celery, fennel, leek, beet, cardoon, artichoke, rhubarb, borage etc.), shoots (asparagus), root crops (parsnip, turnip, carrot, horseradish, celeriac etc.), bulbs (garlic, onion, shallot), fruiting vegetables (aubergine, melon etc.), and herbs (aniseed, parsley, mint, basil, rosemary, oregano etc.). A particular type of garden was the physic garden, typical of monasteries, where medicinal plants were cultivated to provide the active ingredients used in pharmacy.
Panoramic view of the exhibition space “Crops in the Middle Ages”
PROCESSING AND SALE OF AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS IN THE MIDDLE AGES
This space also makes use of medieval iconography through reproductions of miniatures from the Tacuina sanitatis of the Casanatense Library in Rome, frescoes from the Torre dell’Aquila in the Buonconsiglio Castle in Trento, and from Issogne Castle in the Aosta Valley. The display is further enriched by iconographic documentation of watermills from different parts of Europe. Animal products were transformed into cheeses and cured meats, which were traded and sold in urban markets. Their long shelf life made them suitable for transport over distance, but their production required not only animal raw materials but also additives such as salt and pepper—the former sourced from mines or marine salt-pans, the latter brought from exotic lands after long and perilous journeys. Other preservation techniques were also employed, such as smoking or storage in animal fat (northern Italy) or oil (southern Italy), to ensure the durability of animal products.
Cereals had to be ground before being made into bread or polenta; here, mills powered by water or wind proved crucial. In the Middle Ages, mills were also employed for fulling, a process that thickened woollen cloth by felting. The use of water to power millstones had already been known to the Romans, but they made limited use of it, perhaps owing to the abundance of slave labour. In the Middle Ages, however, watermill technology spread rapidly. From the Early Middle Ages, floating mills also appeared: Procopius of Caesarea recounts that the first example in Italy was built on the River Tiber in the year 537 AD by order of the Byzantine general Flavius Belisarius, who was defending Rome during the Gothic siege. A scale model of a floating mill on the River Adige at Verona is shown in this section. The technology of floating mills remained widespread until the first half of the 20th century, as shown in some of the photographs reproduced here. The Middle Ages also saw the spread of the windmill, probably invented in Persia in the 7th century AD. This innovation made it possible to grind grain even when water resources were lacking or diminished, as during the dry Mediterranean summer.
Panoramic view of the exhibition space “Processing and Sale of Agricultural Products in the Middle Ages”
RENAISSANCE AGRICULTURE
The earliest agronomic treatise is the so-called “Sumerian Farmer’s Almanac” (15th–16th century BC), which precedes by nearly a millennium the poem Works and Days by the Greek Hesiod (8th century BC), itself followed by that of Mago the Carthaginian (3rd century BC). Agronomic literature flourished in the Roman period, whose leading authors include Cato the Elder (234–149 BC), Marcus Terentius Varro (116–27 BC), Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella (AD 4–70), Pliny the Elder (AD 23–79), and Rutilius Taurus Aemilianus Palladius (5th century AD). From the Early Middle Ages comes the Geoponica, compiled in Byzantine circles in the 6th century; the Late Middle Ages saw both the Andalusian school, reaching its height around 1150 with the Treatise of Ibn al-‘Awwām, and the revival of agronomic writing in the Latin West with the Ruralium Commodorum, composed around 1305 by Pier de’ Crescenzi (1233–1320). The Renaissance marked a new flowering of agronomic literature, the result of advances in farming techniques and scientific knowledge, together with the advent of movable type printing (1455), which decisively fostered the spread of texts. Among the Renaissance authors, special mention should be made of the Spaniard Gabriel Alonso de Herrera (1470–1539), the German Konrad Heresbach (1496–1576), the Frenchman Olivier de Serres (1539–1619), and the Italians Agostino Gallo (1499–1570) and Camillo Tarello (1513–1573), both from Brescia province and citizens of the Venetian Republic. Agostino Gallo, in his treatise Le venti giornate dell’agricoltura et de’ piaceri della villa, definitively published in 1572, provides a vivid portrayal not only of farming and animal husbandry practices but also of cheese-making and winemaking. An appendix to the work contains 19 plates illustrating various craft and agricultural implements. Camillo Tarello of Lonato authored the Ricordo d’agricoltura, published in Venice in 1567. A champion of innovation in agriculture with a distinctly practical economic aim, in his treatise he described a new four-year crop rotation system consisting of two years of clover, one year of winter cereals, and one year of bare fallow. The Venetian Senate granted him the exclusive right to distribute his book and a royalty to be paid by anyone adopting his method. The book’s structure departs from the traditional Crescenzi-style comprehensive treatise, consisting instead of short entries arranged alphabetically—a genuine technical manual.
View of the exhibition space “Renaissance Agriculture”, focusing on the agronomic writings of Agostino Gallo and Camillo Tarello
LEONARDO DA VINCI AND THE SFORZA
The Renaissance marks the dawn of modern scientific thought. In this period, scientific speculation and technical achievement—paths which since the end of the “Hellenistic Revolution” had proceeded separately and seldom intersected—began to converge and to influence one another. Thus arose a technology in which scientific results were increasingly applied to the development of artefacts, which, while improving efficiency, in turn stimulated further scientific progress through their very construction. For example, the improvement of suction pumps prompted deeper studies on the vacuum, leading to refinements in machinery such as devices for extracting water from mines.
An emblematic Renaissance figure is Leonardo da Vinci, active in many fields including those related to agriculture. He studied and designed canals for irrigation as well as for powering mills: these, driven by water flowing in the canals through hydraulic wheels, operated, among other things, millstones for cereals or fulling mills for wool. To this end Leonardo drew topographical maps with surveys and measurements. Beyond studying canals, he also designed machines for their construction. Among his surviving drawings, gathered in various codices, are designs for a canal-digging machine and another for removing silt from canal beds.
The exhibition space also features a scale model of the front part of the Cascina Sforzesca with its two corner towers (colombaroni) and the double-wing layout of the adjacent irrigated meadows (prati marcitoi). This innovative agricultural building, commissioned by Ludovico il Moro near Vigevano and completed in 1486, was intended purely for farming purposes: there was no stately villa, but only stables, haylofts, granaries, workers’ dwellings, and the steward’s residence.
The Sforzesca, a closed-court building, constitutes a true prototype for later Lombard rural architecture, owing to its grand scale and rigorous functionality. Leonardo stayed there in 1494, conducting studies on water movement, on irrigation and drainage problems tackled at the farm, and on the six hydraulic mills operating there. The display also includes a model of a watermill similar to those studied by Leonardo.
Panoramic view of the exhibition space dedicated to Leonardo da Vinci
IRRIGATION
This section places particular emphasis on a series of images of different irrigation methods, demonstrating the vital importance of water in the development of agriculture, with special reference to the network of irrigation canals that today characterises Lombardy and, more generally, the whole of northern Italy. Since the earliest times, farmers had perceived the importance of water for productivity by observing the vigour of plants growing along rivers and streams during dry summers. Irrigation increases and stabilises the yields of summer crops such as meadow grass and maize, the foundations of dairy cattle farming in which Lombardy has traditionally excelled. This explains the flourishing of irrigation practice in the Lombard plain, served by a network of canals of impressive density and extent (totalling some 40,000 km). For centuries this network has provided water for irrigation and civil uses, mechanical energy for machines (mills, forges, rice-husking mills, etc.), and waterways for the transport of goods. Canals also served to reclaim land by draining excess water and making once marshy and malarial areas healthy and cultivable. The importance of land reclamation works is evoked here by a horizontal-axis screw from a pumping station. The display also includes a bust of Arrigo Serpieri, author of the 1928 law on “integral reclamation”, recalling the importance of legislation on irrigation and drainage, which in Lombardy has long been exemplary at a European level.
Also shown is a model of a prato marcitoio, with its characteristic double-wing layout. These irrigated meadows, watered continuously in autumn and winter and according to normal irrigation turns in summer, produced a winter flora essentially composed of Lolium multiflorum ssp. italicum (Italian ryegrass), while the summer flora was typical of permanent meadows (Dactylis glomerata – cock’s-foot, Festuca pratensis, Trifolium repens var. giganteum – ladino clover, etc.). From the marcita nine or ten cuts could be obtained each year; the grass, often cut daily—especially in winter—was used fresh, while in summer it could be used either green or dried as hay.
The marcite dominated the Lombard landscape below and around the line of springs (risorgive) from the Middle Ages until the 1960s–70s, when they rapidly disappeared, no longer suited to new cattle-feeding systems, the requirements of agricultural mechanisation, and the challenges of water pollution and rural urbanisation.
Panoramic view of the exhibition space “Irrigation”
CAMILLO BENSO, COUNT OF CAVOUR, AND AGRICULTURE
This exhibition space highlights the highly innovative aspects of the agricultural activity of this illustrious figure, who worked on his family’s estates in the Vercelli plain and the Cuneo hills, introducing significant innovations both at farm and territorial level. The space also features prints dedicated to the Cavour Canal, a work of fundamental importance for the agricultural development of the Po Valley. Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour (1810–1861), before becoming a statesman and father of a united Italy, was a successful agricultural entrepreneur. Having abandoned his military career in the corps of engineers in 1831, Cavour first undertook a series of journeys across Europe in order to observe at first hand the innovations taking place in agriculture—a very rare initiative for Italian landowners at the time. On his return, he began managing the three family estates in the Vercelli area (Leri, 480 ha; Montarucco, 471 ha; and Torrone, 296 ha), large rice-growing farms worked by wage labourers. In addition, he rented nine farms near Grinzane (Cuneo), the site of the family castle. Among the innovations introduced by Cavour on his estates in the plain were the mechanisation of rice threshing, the use of guano and mineral fertilisers (nitrogenous and phosphatic), the extension of irrigation, and the adoption of tile drainage to remove excess water from paddy fields. Of great significance was his constant attention to markets: he personally oversaw the purchase of inputs and the sale of produce. Cavour also founded a discount bank to finance agricultural innovation, promoted the establishment of a rice mill, and in 1847 created the first Italian chemical industry for the production of mineral fertilisers for agriculture. He conceived the idea of forming the Irrigation Association of the Western Sesia District, a consortium of landowners whose estates could be irrigated. The association was established in 1853 and immediately signed an agreement with the government for the lease of water rights. Another major work associated with Cavour is the Cavour Canal, one of the nineteenth-century irrigation works that profoundly changed the face of Italian agriculture. As Minister of Agriculture, Cavour also instructed the Royal Academy of Agriculture in Turin to study the grapevine disease oidium, introduced into Europe from America in 1847 and first reported in Italy in 1850, and to identify a remedy. At the end of the study, the results were presented at an extraordinary meeting on 10 September 1851, which recommended sulphur as a means of control.
Panoramic view of the exhibition space dedicated to Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour
THE GREEN REVOLUTION
The twentieth century witnessed two unprecedented events in human history: an enormous demographic growth, with the world population quadrupling from 1.5 billion in 1900 to 6 billion in 2000; and an extraordinary increase in agricultural production, which also quadrupled between 1900 and 2000, despite only a modest increase in cultivated land. This latter phenomenon, known as the Green Revolution, effectively averted a demographic crisis. The Green Revolution was the result of massive technological innovation, beginning in the 1920s–1950s, following the application of numerous scientific discoveries of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Among its effects were a decline in the absolute numbers and percentages of people living below the food security threshold, and an increase in life expectancy. Furthermore, the intensification of agricultural activities in the most fertile and suitable areas—such as plains and low hills—made it possible to increase yields per hectare, meeting the growing demand for agricultural products without expanding cultivated surfaces. This approach helped preserve natural ecosystems, such as grasslands and forests, which would otherwise have been sacrificed to make way for new fields. This exhibition space shows how the Green Revolution profoundly transformed plant and animal genetics, the cultivation techniques of crop species, and livestock-rearing methods. The display includes a gallery of symbolic figures (from de Saussure to Mendel, from Vavilov to McClintock) and objects related to the innovative technologies introduced in twentieth-century agriculture: scale models (tractors, combine harvesters, etc.), inputs (seeds, pesticides, fertilisers, etc.), and instruments supporting the management of cropping systems (e.g. meteorological sensors, soil analysis equipment). The Green Revolution also brought with it a series of environmental problems, including the overuse of synthetic fertilisers and pesticides, leading to soil and water pollution; the excessive use of brackish water for irrigation, causing soil salinisation; and inappropriate tillage on sloping land, which resulted in erosion. To address these challenges, more environmentally friendly technologies are now being promoted, such as precision agriculture, conservation agriculture, and integrated pest management. Outstanding issues also include the conservation of foodstuffs, with significant food losses, particularly in low-income countries where, owing to limited energy resources, proper storage strategies cannot be applied.
Panoramic view of the exhibition space dedicated to the “Green Revolution”
