Peasant families lived in houses dotted around the land. The farm consisted of its fields for crops and the farmhouse, which was divided into two parts, the house itself and the stable for animals. They were simple constructions built of irregularly shaped pieces of stone laid dry or with mud as mortar. In addition, there were the vici, hamlets where a small number of families lived together. Vici were sited in raised places that were easy to defend and laid out on the basis a few or perhaps just one street in the shelter of a tower or church. Farms and hamlets spread throughout Old Catalonia as the border advanced.