Recreated Homes of the Builders of Stonehenge

Angela

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I thought some of our members might be interested in seeing recreations of the homes of the Stonehenge builders. They are described as surprisingly light and airy, and I would agree...quite comfortable looking.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-wiltshire-27656212

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I wonder when people invented windows? It doesn't look like they had hinged doors, so probably they used something instead to close the doorway for the night.
I'm enjoying recreations much better than left overs ruins from ancient times.

They say that builders used puddled chalk for floors and walls. Does someone know what exactly is this puddled chalk?
 
I wonder when people invented windows? It doesn't look like they had hinged doors, so probably they used something instead to close the doorway for the night.
I'm enjoying recreations much better than left overs ruins from ancient times.

They say that builders used puddled chalk for floors and walls. Does someone know what exactly is this puddled chalk?

I'm not sure when windows were first invented, but I'm fairly sure they became much more popular once glass became readily available.

From Wikipedia, a description of the manufacture of puddled chalk, in that case for making dew ponds. It sounds as if once chalk is sufficiently wet, it temporarily becomes a paste, which then hardens.

"A Sussex farmer born in 1850 tells how he and his forefathers made dew ponds:
The requisite hole having been excavated, the chalk was laid down layer by layer, while a team of oxen harnessed to a heavy broad-wheeled cart was drawn round and round the cup shaped hole to grind the chalk to powder. Water was then thrown over the latter as work progressed, and after nearly a day of this process, the resultant mass of puddled chalk, which had been reduced to the consistency of thick cream, was smoothed out with the back of a shovel from the centre, the surface being left at last as smooth and even as a sheet of glass. A few days later, in the absence of frost or heavy rain, the chalk had become as hard as cement, and would stand for years without letting water through. This old method of making dew ponds seems to have died out when the oxen disappeared from the Sussex hills, but it is evident that the older ponds, many of which have stood for scores of years practically without repair, are still more watertight than most modern ones in which Portland cement has been employed."

Cool houses. I wouldn't mind vacationing in one, but in the long run I'd miss hot showers and flush toilets.
 
I'm not sure when windows were first invented, but I'm fairly sure they became much more popular once glass became readily available.
I think the first material used as glass in widows was animal abdominal membrane, it is translucent.
 
The only thing I know about windows is what's in wiki:

The earliest windows were just holes in a wall. Later, windows were covered with animal hide, cloth, or wood. Shutters that could be opened and closed came next. Over time, windows were built that both protected the inhabitants from the elements and transmitted light: mullioned glass windows, which joined multiple small pieces of glass with leading, paper windows, flattened pieces of translucent animal horn, and plates of thinly sliced marble. In the Far East, paper was used to fill windows.[2] The Romans were the first known to use glass for windows, a technology likely first produced in Roman Egypt—In Alexandria ca. 100 AD, cast glass windows, albeit with poor optical properties, began to appear—but these were small thick productions, little more than blown glass jars (cylindrical shapes) flattened out into sheets with circular striation patterns throughout. It would be over a millennium before a window glass became transparent enough to see through clearly, as we think of it now.

Over the centuries techniques were developed to shear through one side of a blown glass cylinder and produce thinner rectangular window panes from the same amount of glass material. This gave rise to tall narrow windows, usually separated by a vertical support called a mullion. Mullioned glass windows were the windows of choice among European well-to-do, whereas paper windows were economical and widely used in ancient China, Korea and Japan. In England, glass became common in the windows of ordinary homes only in the early 17th century whereas windows made up of panes of flattened animal horn were used as early as the 14th century.[5] Noted science historian, author and television show host/producer James Burke attributes the rapid deforestation of Great Britain in the late 1500s to the uptick in production of glazed windows as well as iron cannon production (1st Cast in 1547). He writes further this gave rise to coal for fuel, which spurred iron production, requiring more coal, and more iron, then steam engine pumps, canals... and more iron; all because windows became a middle class commodity in the latter days of the little ice age, one large factor among several leading to the deforesting English woodlands, and the switch over to a coal economy.


As for the floor and walls, it reminds me of the way you plaster walls in Italy.
 
The only thing I know about windows is what's in wiki:

The earliest windows were just holes in a wall.
That's write, and especially in south Europe where is warmer not having stuffed opening wasn't a big inconvenience. Most of the years a cooling breeze is very welcome.
As they said probably first closure for window was just a curtain made of animal skin in case of a bad weather.

In England, glass became common in the windows of ordinary homes only in the early 17th century whereas windows made up of panes of flattened animal horn were used as early as the 14th century.[5]
It is hard to release for modern folk that not that far ago people didn't even have a basic thing like a proper windows.
 
By way of comparison, this is the housing in Catal Hoyok in Anatolia:
Shelter2.jpg

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Skara Brae always reminds me of the hobbit houses in Lord of the Rings:
skara_brae_-_geograph-org-uk_-_582968.jpg
 
By way of comparison, this is the housing in Catal Hoyok in Anatolia:
Shelter2.jpg
Interesting. For some reason they were afraid having doors on the outside, however there are doors to enclosed courtyards. Sort of first fortified settlement?
 

Cool houses. I wouldn't mind vacationing in one, but in the long run I'd miss hot showers and flush toilets.

I'm actually considering spending a week in one of these this summer!


If I don't chicken out (I'm a little claustrophobic), I'm going to be spending a week of my time in Italy this summer in one of these! They do have hot showers and flush toilets now though.
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trullo3.jpg


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These are the roofs...capped nowadays, of course.
Alberobello_%20Trulli%20interior.JPG
 

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