Chereluş, Arad county, sec. the eighteenth
Found on the border between Banat and Crișana, the village of Chereluș is representative for the folk architecture in the Zarand Land. From here, it was transferred in the Village Museum, in 1965, the villager Herlo Petru's household, dated in the 18th century. Placed in a plain region, the village benefited of a favourable position for agricultural development and for animal husbandry.
These inhabitants' occupations are illustrated also in the annexes of the museum household: the barn with stable and the pantry (“găbănaș”).
The house form Chereluș is built on a stone foundation, over which are placed the massive sill and the walls made of oak beams, daubed and whitewashed.
The ridged roof is thatched with reed. The house plan is made of the median foyer, with two hearths for the openings of the in-wall stoves in the adjacent rooms: “the parade room” or “the front stove” on the left, and the room on the right, or “the back stove”, used as permanent living room. The two in-wall stoves are actually two ovens: a tapered one, made of wattle and daub, fixed in a soil hearth, and another one, in shape of a truncated pyramid, made of adobe.
Inside the home, one can note the furniture items specific for the region: the dowry chests, “sarcophagus” type, the long settles, the cabinets on the walls, the canopy bed (“cu cobălă”). One can not ignore either the wood utensils, the polychrome pottery made in the centres such as Leheceni, Hămăgel and Ineu or the richness of the lively coloured fabrics in which the cherry-red is predominant, placed on the walls or the furniture (carpets, tablecloths, pillows, coverlets, towels, etc).
