The primitive clay oven, earthen oven, or cob oven has been used since ancient times by diverse cultures and societies, primarily for, but not exclusive to, baking before the invention of cast-iron stoves, and gas and electric ovens. The general build and shape of clay ovens were, mostly, common to all peoples, with only slight variations in sizeMaimonides (1967), p. 46 (Seder Taharot), s.v. Keilim 5:1. and in materials used to construct the oven. In primitive courtyards and farmhouses, earthen ovens were built on the ground.
In Arabian, Middle Eastern and North African societies, bread was often baked within a clay oven called in some Arabic dialects a tabun (also transliterated taboon, from the ),The word exists in Arabic, from the root "طبن", Edward William Lane, An Arabic-English Lexicon, s.v. طبن, which according to its source means "He covered the fire [in a hollow] in the earth, in order that it might not become extinguished." or else in a clay oven called a tannour, and in other dialects mas'ad. The clay oven, synonymous with the Hebrew word tannour, lit. 'oven', was shaped like a truncated cone, with an opening either at the top or bottom from which to stoke the fire. Others were cylindrical with an opening at the top. Built and used in ancient times as family, neighbourhood, or village ovens, clay ovens continue to be made in parts of the Middle East.Negev and Gibson (2001), pp. 91-92.
History and usage The earthen oven has historically been used for baking flatbreads such as taftoon (Persian: تافتون), taboon bread and laffa, and has been in widespread use in the greater Middle East for centuries. Aside from baking, some were used for cooking: pots were laid within the cavity of the oven and set upon hot coals, covered in ashes. If the pots were intended to be left in the oven for an extended period of time (such as the night of the Sabbath day in Jewish culture where the food is left to cook until the next day), the opening at the top of the oven would be covered with a large, earthenware vessel. Saleh (1979), s.v. responsum # 256 They would then add old rags around this vessel used to seal up the oven, in order to make the oven impervious to air around all the cooking pots. Where the opening was on the side, the door which covered the opening had to be left partially open to allow for combustion of the fire and coals during its initial lighting. The earthen oven differed slightly from earthen stoves and ranges where, in the case of the latter, the pots were laid directly over the stove and a fire stoked below.Maimonides (1967), p. 46 (Seder Taharot), s.v. Keilim 5:2.
Middle Eastern types Tabun
Gustaf Dalman (1855–1941), describing the material culture of the Holy Land in the early 20th century, photographed several types of clay ovens which he saw in use there.Dalman (1964) Of those ovens used for baking bread, there was the tabun shaped like a large, bottomless earthenware pot turned upside down and fastened permanently to the ground. It has a pebbled floor made of either smooth beach pebbles or limestone pebbles. The pot-shaped contour was wider at the base and narrower at the top, where the opening was, used both for kindling the fire, and for inserting dough for baking. A second, similar type of oven had, in addition to the hole at the top, a second side opening called the "eye of the oven", used for stoking the fire and clearing away the ashes,Maimonides (1967), p. 160 (Ohalot 5:1)Mulder-Heymans (2002), p. 199, s.v. Tabun and closed by a detachable door. This type had a ceramic floor. Both versions were equipped with a ceramic lid with a handle, used for covering and sealing the top opening (see illustration). These ovens were, typically, small in size and were placed within a baking hut to protect them from the elements.Dalman (1964 ), Diagram 14 Some tabun ovens were "dug-ins", half built into the ground and half above-ground. Baking was made on the pebbled floor of the oven, after the bowl-like exterior wall of the clay oven that sat over the floor like an inverted cup had been covered, itself, with hot coals and embers scattered with ash, usually placed atop dried cattle dung.cf. Dalman (2020 ), p. 164.
Tannur / tannour; tandoor Tinuru was the ancient Sumerian word for a basic clay oven, and this important technology of daily life and its descriptive name were carried through the ages to many other peoples and culture, manifesting in the Arab () tannur, Indian tandoor, Iranian () tanur and Turkish tannura.ʻArrāf (1993), pp. 53–54, s.v. (first published in 1290) The term tannur also appears in Hebrew () in the bible and Mishnah 15 times, as a place where bread is baked by fire., s.v. , Keilim 5:1, s.v.
In Yemen, the most common of clay ovens served both for baking and cooking. Its shape was cylindrical and reached half the height of man, and was made with a wide-open top, called the "mouth of the oven" (Arabic: bâb al-manaq),Qafih (1982), p. 204. its top being uniform in diameter with that of the oven's base. Kindling was admitted through the opening in the top. A small air-hole was also made therein at the base of the oven, called the "eye of the oven," which was made to ensure sufficient air circulation, as well as used to clear out the oven from its accumulated wood-ash. This oven had a flat, detachable ceramic lid made for it, with its own distinct rim, and which lid covering could be placed on its top and could hold additional pots and pans when needed. In such ovens, flat dough was pressed against the interior wall of the oven, whereunto it adhered until it was baked. Unleavened bread at Passover was made in the same way.Suleiman ben Yosef Ṣaleh, "Sefer Zevaḥ Pesaḥ," in: Tiklāl Shīvat Ṣiyyon (ed. Yosef Qafih), Jerusalem 1952 (); also in: The sealed pot containing the Yemenite-Jewish kubaneh was also placed in such ovens, laid upon the oven floor, upon its dying embers.Qafih (1982), p. 210. Pots containing viands and kettles of coffee were first brought to a boil and then kept hot by brushing aside the coals and embers to one side of the oven, covering the coals over with ashes, and placing the pots and kettles beside the ash-covered coals. Such ovens were almost always built within baking rooms (Arabic: al-daymeh = الديمة) or rustic kitchens adjoining a courtyard.
The tannour described by Gustaf Dalman in use among the Palestinian peasants (fellahin) of Palestine stood approximately to high, was cylindrical and made of clay. It measured to wide on the bottom and narrowed upwards. From the varied ovens described by him, an earthen oven may or may not be buried in the ground; it can be cylindrical, egg-shaped, pointed or curved. If necessary, it was also possible to convert a large water jug into a tannour.
In cylindrical clay ovens used in Syria Palaestina in the 1st and 2nd centuries CE, and where the opening was on top,Obadiah di Bertinoro (1978), Commentary on Parah 10:5, s.v. (p. 187) they were often equipped with a flat, detachable lid (tablet) made of clayMulder-Heymans (2002), p. 199, s.v. TannurCf. paragraph, "Excavated ovens uncovered," in The Ancient Near East Today (July 2016, vol. iv, no. 7) and which was usually perforated to allow for the retention of heat when needed, and the smoke to be emitted.Maimonides (1967), Keilim 9:7 (p. 62)Danby (1933), Keilim 8:3 (note 2)Nathan ben Abraham (1955), Mishnah Keilim, s.v. . While explaining the Hebrew name used for the type of covering laid over the clay oven, Nathan ben Abraham makes note of the fact that its name is derived from the Aramaic Targum on Exodus 27:4, where the Hebrew word = "grate" is translated by Onkelos as , being a type of network. Maimonides (1967), Keilim 9:7, clarifies there that this covering was not a literal "network," but merely a flat clay tablet with perforated holes made therein.
In some societies, such as in the villages around Aleppo, in Syria, the earthen oven (tannour) was vaulted and egg-shaped, the opening of which was made in the front, and the entire structure built above-ground by having it propped-up upon an earth and stone base. Its outer shell was thick, and could be anywhere between a handbreadth () to in thickness. Such shapes were typically found in Europe and in the British isles. In Europe and Britain, however, bread was baked on the floor of the oven, usually made of brick or tile. The dome-shaped oven in western societies was often built upon a stone and earth plinth to make it higher and easier to use, without having to bend over. Some ovens were made with flues; others without.
Furn / Purnei / Purnah The furn is a furnace-like oven, the name being a loanword borrowed from the Greek (φούρνος, fūrnos)Jastrow, ed. (2006), s.v. פורני. and earlier Latin, and which, according to Maimonides, was also made of clay.Maimonides (1967), p. 58, s.v. Keilim 8:9.
The eleventh-century talmudic exegete, Rashi, who was of the Jewish Diaspora in France, explained its meaning as being "our large ovens whose mouths are at their side" (i.e., masonry oven).Babylonian Talmud (Beitza 34a, Rashi s.v. פורני)Babylonian Talmud (Pesahim 31b, Rashi s.v. פת פורני), where Rashi writes: "The bread of a purnei. A large loaf [of bread] that has been baked in a large oven, such as our own ovens, seeing that their ovens were small and portable, and whose mouths were situated above, and they'd stick the bread unto the walls [of the oven], insofar that they did not bake therein except for small [flat] loaves."Babylonian Talmud (Avodah Zarah 35b, Rashi s.v. פורני), where Rashi writes: "Purnei. It is an oven which is large and its mouth on the side, but every oven (tannour) that is [mentioned] in the Mishnah is small and has a place for placing two pots, and its mouth is on the top."
The 10th-century Arab geographer al-Muqaddasī describes the furn that he had seen widely used in his day, writing: "The peasantry all of them possess ovens called furn, and those of them who can get burnt bricks make small bread-ovens (tannûr) in the ground. They line these with pebbles, and kindling the fire of dried-dung within and above, they afterwards remove the hot ashes and place the loaves of bread to bake upon these pebbles when they have become thus red-hot."Mukaddasi (1886), p. 79.
Gustaf Dalman (1855–1941) describes the furn which he had seen in Palestine, most of which were made of clay, as being mostly small and built with two compartments – the lower, a "boiler room" used to stoke the fire and which rests upon the ground;Dalman (1964 ), Diagram 27a; cf. Tosefta (Keilim Baba Kama 6:17), where it says: "Purna [...] it is not made except to serve with the ground." the upper, a "baking room" where the round leavened dough was laid down upon a flat surface and heated from below. In Palestine, these ovens also bore the additional name of ʻarṣa (qarṣa).Dalman (1964 ), Diagrams 26–27 In new furns that had yet to be fired, there was a danger of its dividing compartment collapsing or crumbling apart at its first firing.Babylonian Talmud (Beitza 34a) Based on samples of bread collected in Palestine, the leavened flatbread baked in a furn could be as large as, or smaller than, the flatbread baked in a tannour.Dalman (1964 ), based on Diagram 30 showing thirteen types of bread, and nos. 9–12 which were baked in a furn.
The furn in modern parlance is also associated with being a "public bakery," where flat-loaves of bread are baked wholesale to be sold in market, or where, in some countries, local villagers bring there certain produce, such as heaps of green chickpeas (Cicer arietinum) with their husks for roasting (when placed either in a clay oven or upon a convex griddle, known as ṣāj),Dalman (2020), pp. 319-320 or the flat round bread made with an impression containing omelettes.
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