This kind of ancient puzzle located in Tacoronte, Tenerife, recalls the traditional rural home of an era. The “three pebbles” are the “three teniques”, which is how each of the large stones that make up the hearth or fireplace is called. On which the pot, the toaster or any other container for cooking food is supported. “Tenique” seems to be an indigenous voice that traces its origin to the languages spoken by the ancient Canaries and in turn probably taken from Berber. The term “fogal” (‘home’) is probably a Portugueseism (similar to ‘fogalera’) that designates the central place in the old houses, the meeting and gathering point around the fire; what has not in vain given the name to the entire house: the home. The term home thus transcends the physical idea of the architectural structure itself that serves as a habitat to embrace a feeling of belonging, welcoming and identity. The welcome of each member of the family who at twilight in the afternoon or “there in the sun” gather around the fire to share experiences. The same feeling gives us the use of the diminutive “three pebbles”, which conveys the feeling of affection that is manifested by certain things and material objects, and which reminds us of that other ancient expression that exclaims: “Oh, my house and my tres teniques! ”, which was once spoken with nostalgia when one returned home after a day’s work or a period of absence. These expressions that today are part of a geronto-language on the way to disappearing, plunge us into a rural world that is almost part of the past. The image evokes those who, in ecstasy, resting in front of the fire, lose their gaze in the dance of flames and silence, only interrupted by the crackling of the fire while it sparkles. And in which one is absorbed in his thoughts and in the fascination caused by the vision of the flames. The enigma contained in the riddle is not without its substance. On the one hand, the images oppose and complement a vision of the microcosm, the fireplace and the three teniques that, as an immediate and tangible reality, close, circumscribed to the domestic sphere, is perfectly identifiable, and even quantifiable (three pebbles). This microcosm is reflected in “the stars in the sky” which, as part of the cosmos or macrocosm, a superior and immeasurable reality, is infinite and is lost to our sight and imagination (and “they cannot count”). [En realidad, no tenemos la certeza que esta visión micro/macrocósmica exista como constructo o figura teórica así descrita entre los primitivos canarios. Estamos hablando, pues, de un conocimiento arcano de transmisión intergeneracional en la sociedad maga colonial, en este sentido no parecen nada despreciables los conocimientos astronómicos y una cosmovisión de los antiguos canarios, o quizá solo sea fruto de la pura intuición sapiencial del vulgo]. In this rural imaginary, the idea of the fireplace’s microcosm also reminds us that the «fire stones», the teniques, and the fireplace have a reflection on high, in the cosmos. As if the sparks of the fire in the fireplace ascended into outer space, returning to their ancestral origin, as if to merge with the stars of the sky in an infinite space.
