At the entrance to the home of the carpenter Ion Turbatu from Clinciu, we are greeted by the barking of a dog tied to a chain. At some distance, two means of transport are "parked", two old carts, which the craftsman uses both to bring the raw material from the forest and to transport the finished products for sale; near one of them a goat and a kid seem to be sentinels. A few other items, buckets, a basin, a wheelbarrow and a cauldron placed on pirostris complete the look. In front of the house, a small woodworking workshop is improvised and there are also some logs, some of them split, just right for processing. In front of the house, placed on a bench, some of the products made by the craftsman: about 20-30 larger and smaller spoons plus a spatula.
The craftsman Turbatu Ion and some of his products
He learned the craft of woodworking from his father and has been practicing it since he was 14 years old. There were 8 siblings to his parents (5 boys and 3 girls) and his father practiced the craft until the end, as Mr. Turbatu will also do, according to his own disclosure. His children do not deal with woodworking, they did not want to learn this craft.
The Romanian craftsman was kind enough to demonstrate his craft by making two of his most common products: a spoon and a three-legged stool. The tools used were: barda, curved tesla, knife, trowel, spredel (drill); in the old days these tools were made by local blacksmiths, but today they no longer exist. The scythe, says the craftsman Turbatu, he has had for about 60 years.
Mr. Turbatu Ion makes household and household objects from white poplar wood and willow wood; he prefers white poplar, because "it works better" as opposed to willow, which is "softer"; very rarely he also uses linden wood. The logs (30-40 cm long) to be processed are left for a while in the yard, to dry, then they are portioned (along the fiber) resulting in smaller pieces, just right for carving; in the case of chairs, the pieces are wider.
Work technique
In order to make a regular-sized spoon, the Turbatu craftsman uses several operations. At first he uses the bard, a tool with which he carves the piece of wood into a stylized spoon shape, after which, with the help of the curved tesla, he carves its groove, deepening it. Next comes the use of the knife, a tool with which he thins the tail of the spoon, finishing it by bringing it to the shape and normal thickness of a spoon tail; also finish the portion between the tail and the breech followed by the lip of the breech.
Usually, after this operation, the object is left to dry... "to draw the water out of it", according to the expression of the craftsman; this time processing continued.
Left: Turbatu craftsman working on a three-legged stool
Right: tools used by the quarryman
Also with the help of the knife he also finished the back side of the same hole; with the same tool, the rudar craftsman carves a small diagonal indentation on the face of the tail, about 3 cm from the tail, flanked at the ends by two other small hollows located right on the edges of the tail, a kind of ornamental motif. The last tool used by the rudar craftsman is the crescent-shaped scythe, with one of the edges very sharp; with her help, Mr. Turbatu makes the final finishing touches: the interior of the spoon's oval case. The spoon took 13 minutes to make.
After this skilled demonstration, Mr. Turbatu set about making a stool (stool) with three legs. He took a "slice" of log, rectangular and 3-4 cm thick (a top); the first tool used was the bard, then the ax and again the bard; with the help of these two tools he removed the excess wood from the face and back of the top and thinned (especially with the axe) the four sides of the object. The corners are rounded with the barda and the lower surface slightly rounded with the same tool. Barda is also used to finish the upper surface of the table top. After finishing the object, a relatively thick chisel, taken from a log of wood, comes into play; it is slightly sharpened, by the craftsman, with a file. The top is placed on the ground with the slightly rounded side on top, after which the miner makes three round holes in it with the respective drill, turning it and pressing at the same time. After completing the holes, with the help of the axe, split a log (longitudinally) into several pieces to be processed in order to obtain the three legs of the chair. With the bard he makes the three legs, then with a knife he finishes them. Take the top again with the holes for the legs already made, then with the curved tesla remove a little more material from the thickness of the top on the unrounded surface, next to the holes obtained. Before inserting the legs into the holes, they are subjected to final finishing. With the help of a few taps of the bar (with the blunt side), each of the three legs is inserted into the round hole in the table top. With the rounded tesla, level and finish the top surface of the worktop for the last time; the chair was ready in 35 minutes. It should be noted that the precision of his blows, with the bard or the axe, is remarkable, especially when the craftsman does not use glasses.
Other aspects of the life of the stonemason Turbatu Ion
Asked if today it is possible to make a living from such a craft, the craftsman says that it is possible but you have to travel long distances in order to sell the products. It used to go with
