ABSTRACT
The closer a society is to it's own the more difficult it is to begin an anthropological account of it. Tinchi is a small service village which has grown up in the last fifty years at the crossing of the road from Montalbano to Bernalda with the road from the coast to Pisticci. It serves the rural area which surrounds it, and has three grocers, a bar, two carpenters, an agricultural machinery mechanic and a barber. Houses are for the most part windowless; light and air come in through the door and through an unglazed grille near the roof. Traditionally, there is one room, with a rccess at the back which is used for storage, keeping animals, or as a kitchen. The main day-to-day contact between the state and the individual Pisticcese is concentrated, in one way or another, in the town: not only tax offices and legal departments, but welfare services, agricultural services, education and local administration.
