Structure with roof for drying hay and other crops
This article is about a drying rack. For the animal feeding device, see
Hay rack. For a hayrack ride, usually called a hayride, see
Hayride.
A hayrack (
Slovene: kozolec) is a freestanding vertical drying rack found chiefly in
Slovenia. Hayracks are permanent structures, primarily made of wood, upon which
fodder for animals is dried, although their use is not limited to drying hay.[1] Other foodstuffs such as field maize are dried on them as well. Although it is a practical structure, a hayrack is often artistically designed and handcrafted and is regarded by
Slovenes as a distinctive form of
vernacular architecture that marks Slovene identity.[1]
Slovenian names for the hayrack include kozolec and kazuc (colloquial, usually referring to a single straight-line hayrack), stog (commonly found in
Upper Carniola and especially in the area around
Studor in the
Bohinj region), and toplar.[1] Both kozolec and kozuc are probably diminutive forms of kozel (meaning "goat"), referring to a branching structure used for holding and drying hay or grain (cf. the similarly motivated German Sägebock and U.S. English sawbuck).[4] The word stog also refers to a haystack and is derived from Common Slavic stogъ, meaning "stack" or "heap".[4] The word toplar (or doplar) is borrowed from Austrian German Doppler, referring to a double structure in general.[4]
Specific varieties of hayrack include:
Single straight-line hayrack (enojni stegnjeni kozolec)[5]
Single straight-line hayrack with
catslide roof (stegnjeni kozolec s plaščem)[5]
From 2010 until 2013, the Municipality of
Šentrupert in southeastern Slovenia built the first ever
open-air museum "
Land of Hayracks" (slovene: Dežela kozolcev) in the southern part of
Šentrupert, its administrative center. The collection includes 19 hay drying devices, which includes 17 hayracks, with the oldest from 1795, and presents all types of hayracks. The museum also serves as a venue for events.[7] The main organizer of the project was Rupert Gole, the mayor of Šentrupert. Over 650 hayracks have been counted in the
Mirna Valley, where the settlement lies. The largest of them and in the entire country is the
Simončič Hayrack.[8]
Gallery
A
Valvasor copperplate engraving depicts filling a hayrack with hay
An abandoned single straight-line hayrack just outside
Olševek in winter