Podklet

the bottom, nonresidential floor of a stone or wooden house in Russian folk architecture. The podklet is used as a storage place and more rarely for the wintering of livestock. In Russia, wooden izbas have been built on stone podklety since the end of the 17th century. Podklety were also built in some Russian churches dating from the end of the 14th century; here they were used for the storage of the property of the church and its parishioners, as burial vaults, and as a means of retaining heat.