2l6 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 133 



On school days, in homes where there are children of school age, 

 the above routine cannot be followed, for "children must be at school 

 early." A partial meal, then, is usually eaten in the early morning 

 and a full meal after the children return from school. Schools furnish 

 a midday snack of toasted wheat in sugar-sweetened water. 



Meals are eaten around the fireplace seated either on the ground 

 on folded sheep pelts, or on low benches, stools, or tree-trimk sections. 

 "Formerly we had no benches ; we sat on pelts and rugs on the 

 ground." The food is served in bowls or on plates. No tables are used. 

 The woman serves her husband and visiting adults first, then the 

 children, and then herself ; but all eat together. According to Cooper's 

 sources, men used to eat together, and women apart from them (1946, 

 p. 706), a custom not known to my informants. 



THE RUKA: construction, LIGHTING, FURNISHINGS, STORAGE 



The ruka is the home of the Araucanian. Formerly, according to 

 Cooper's sources, ruka were commonly oval, polygonal, or rectangular 

 in ground plan, and generally the framework was of timber or cane 

 and the roof of thatch reaching nearly or quite to the ground level. 

 However, as early as 1551 there were well-built ruka of large planks 

 around Imperial (the Boroa area), many of them large ones with four 

 to eight entrances (1946, pp. 707-708). 



Today nearly all ruka are rectangular. The framework is of planks, 

 and roofs are gabled or lean-to in shape (pis. 52, 53). Walls and roof 

 combinations fall predominantly into three types: walls and roof both 

 of thatch — this is the oldest combination ; walls of planks and roof 

 of thatch; and walls of planks and roof of logs. One shingled and 

 several tin roofs were seen, but these were exceptional. 



In Alepue area men began building plank houses after they had 

 helped to build the Sisters' home and school, where they assisted non- 

 Araucanians in hewing lumber from logs. In Coharipe area building 

 with planks was the result of contact and observation at a recently 

 established Chilean-owned lumber camp in an Andean valley nearby. 

 ]\Ien not directly engaged at the lumber mill felled and hauled logs 

 to the mill. A non-Araucanian herbalist of the area commented on the 

 rapidity with which the traditional thatched ruka was replaced by the 

 one-room plank ruka, usually two such ruka to a family, after the 

 men began to work at or for the lumber mill. One of the two ruka 

 was used for sleeping and the other for cooking and indoor work in 

 the winter. In the summer most families cook and work outdoors, 

 either under sun shelters, behind windbreaks, or in the shade of trees 



