Ancient and Medieval Technology - Question Thread

[Yora]

I often wonder "Did they have that back then?" and "What did they do instead?". There's a thread for such things when it commes to millitary technology, which arguably is the greatest category in which such questions arise, but I think I'd also like a civilian version, so to speak.

Mostly, because I have a quite spefic question:

How did people make windows before they had window glass? In winter, you can't afford to have big holes in your walls, and even in desert environments it gets really cold at night.
What did people do to have light inside during the day, but also keep warm during the night? And what when it was winter and it was cold outside during the day as well.

Let's say we have a viking farmhouse. What solution did they have for this?

[Emmerask]

A Viking house often consisted of just one room. (Although in a well off family mum and dad might have a separate bedroom). The house was usually made with a wooden frame, which was filled in with timber planks or wattle and daub (wickerwork and plaster). However in areas where wood was scarce (like Greenland) stone was used for building and roofs might be made of turf.

In a Viking house there were no panes of glass so windows had to be small. At night wooden shutters covered them. Viking houses were dark because the windows were small and the only light came from oil lamps carved from soapstone.

In the center of the hut was a hearth where the cooking was done. However there was no chimney and the smoke just escaped through a hole in the roof.

[Spiryt]

Finely treated leather, especially stuff like some animals bladder or whatever, could give some rather thin membrane.

I think I've seen such reconstructions here.

Other than that simply wooden shutters that could be always tightened with some stuff from cloth to straw.

Then fire, a lot of food and less flimsy, non Floridian metabolism.
Plus solid clothing obviously.

You can always google "Viking" (or Norse for more sense) houses in Google to see some stuff from Scandinavia of that period.

[Conners]

In what cases did they use greased paper for windows? Greased paper was used at some points, since it could let light in--I'm fairly sure.

[Frozen_Feet]

Windows: they had wooden shutters that were closed during harsh weather. Heavy curtains, either from cloth or leather, were also used.

Lighting: candles, oil lamps, and burning splinters above a bucket of water, so falling embers are extinquished instead of burning the house down.

Heating: a stone stove, heated by burning wood inside - the hot stones store energy, keeping the house warm even after the fire is extinquished. This is not unlike a sauna. Fireplaces and ovens with chimneys you are likely familiar with.

Tents, lean-tos and other temporary shelters often had simple open fire either inside, at the middle, or just ourside. (More modern tents can have a metal oven with a chimney.) It's notable, though, that a shelter made of thick and heavy material can stay warm with just the bodyheat of those inside it.

In some places, people kept warm by sleeping naked with each other under furs, or sleeping among livestock, notably, dogs. I hear Australian aborginals used to rate coldness of nights based on how many dogs you needed to stay warm.

[Emmerask]

In what cases did they use greased paper for windows? Greased paper was used at some points, since it could let light in--I'm fairly sure.

Hm I´ve heard it being used in the american pioneer era but not from norse history, as far as I know paper was not that readily available to them that they could use it for windows.

[Spiryt]

Paper is rather out of question in pre Renaissance Europe - that was expensive stuff that even monk rarely used for books.

Anyway some Picture from Trzcinica -



Here method is obviously tiny weee window. It's representation of ~ 2000 B.C. settlement AFAIR.

[jpreem]

Paper was used for windows in ancient China (the place it was invented). Paper did not reach Europe until quite late in the middle-ages. So I doubt it was much used for windows in the western world. Those who could affor this exotic thing called paper probably could afford glass anyway.
As for the peasants - usually they just kept the few small windows they had shut most of the cold time. I have heard that some ( probably richer ones) stretched pig-bladders over the window opening. It lets in a little bit of light.
Most of the history a peasants home would be a rather dark place.
Where I come from historically one of the oldest types of house was so called long-house. A big long house that contained and extended family(or even a smaller clan), luxurious ones contained two rooms ( one was for the farm animals), less luxurious ones contained one room ( people lived in the same room with animals or didn't actually have many big animals).
There was no chimney. The light in the room comes from the fireplace and from long thin pieces of wood that are burnt. (Good work for children, give them a log and a knife, and put them cutting lightsources)

[Aux-Ash]

I was at Birka last month, the viking city in the Stockholm archipelago (or more correctly: the site where a viking city used to be). They had a number of reconstructed houses there. Not long houses, but city houses. Where a long house would be a mansion, these were the equalients of apartments.

And not a single one had windows. They only had three openings. One door and two holes at the top of the roof to let out smoke. The houses as a rule weren't very big, one antechamber with small storages and a tiny workshop and one sleepign chamber with storages, hearth and bed. Nothing more. The floor was stamped mud.
It was really quite dark inside, but despite that it rained like cats and dogs... warm and cozy. Which I believe was the point.

The smithy was a separate building. With loose airy walls you could see through (making it damp and cold since no fire was running, but it was not dark.

Also, to compare. When I was in Vietnam last year, I visited the National Ethnographic Museum. There they had a gallery of the homes of the various ethnicities that lived in Vietnam. The lowlanders frequently had windows high up, but the highlander homes (where snow could be expected in winter) completely lacked them.
In both cases the various workshops were located either on the porch or separate from the main building.

While two types of houses on opposite ends of the world are hardly compelling evidence, it does suggest that in areas were snow is to be expected windows are something you can do without.
This also ties in with things I've read over the years that suggested that the primary limitation of mediveal society was the sun. When the sun set, work ceased. Because no matter where you lived, it'd be too dark to keep working.

[Yora]

My mother was in Tanzania last month and told the same. Once sun sets, the day is over. When people were watching TV in the evening, it would usually just stop once the solar panels stopped working. Those people who had electricity after sunset told that it was a huge improvement in life quality.
I've also recently read about a man in the Philipines who constructs metal sheets with a round hole through which a water filled plastic bootle is stuck. When built into the roof, the water and plastic spreads the daylight from outside much better through the room than just a small hole in the roof. And people report that it's really a huge improvement to have more lights in the homes and workshops. And the idea is originally from a man in Brazil, who also had a huge success with them.

As it's still such a big thing today, it certainly wasn't any better 1000 years ago.

[Conners]

Any idea how dirty conditions could get for farmers in Europe and such, in the medieval period? In some movies, everything has a thick layer of grime to let you know the movie is trying to be realistic (but is actually just gritty, most times). Surely this is generally exaggerated?

I'm wondering about disease, you see. If the people rolled around in the mud every day, yet the fatality rates from disease weren't high by comparison--that'd be a sign of some strong anti-bodies, I'd guess.

[Chilingsworth]

Any idea how dirty conditions could get for farmers in Europe and such, in the medieval period? In some movies, everything has a thick layer of grime to let you know the movie is trying to be realistic (but is actually just gritty, most times). Surely this is generally exaggerated?

I'm wondering about disease, you see. If the people rolled around in the mud every day, yet the fatality rates from disease weren't high by comparison--that'd be a sign of some strong anti-bodies, I'd guess.

I've heard theories that many of our modern health problems (specifically, allergies and auto-immune diseases,) are caused or at least made worse by over-sanitation. I.e. we're so obsessed with keeping things clean, so our immune systems have nothing to do and get hyperactive.

[Spiryt]

I've heard theories that many of our modern health problems (specifically, allergies and auto-immune diseases,) are caused or at least made worse by over-sanitation. I.e. we're so obsessed with keeping things clean, so our immune systems have nothing to do and get hyperactive.

Pretty much this, mud and dirt are cheap... like dirt, so any animal that is particularly bothered by it doesn't have bright future. And humans are quite adaptive beasts.

Any idea how dirty conditions could get for farmers in Europe and such, in the medieval period?

Farmers didn't really have 'dirty conditions' most of the time - it was the case in growing cities.

Crowded communities, with obviously no good way to deal with waste, often no good sources of clean water. Poor diet was often problem too, with no ready source fresh forest and agrarian fruits and other goods. Rat and parasites were also breeding freely.

The problem was generally getting worse with development of cities up to the XIX century, when knowledge and means of dealing with those things appeared.

At the same time, country was usually the place when people spent most time at air, going just to the groove or whatever if "called".

So generally, any thing like famine or pestilence that could occur was hitting common townfolk much worse than countryfolk.

This is obvious simplification for post needs, but that's how it mostly looked in high medieval.

[Knaight]

Regarding the original questions on windows, viking stuff is done quite well by this group. Its not perfect, but it should give you a good idea of the housing, and the site in general has far more than just that.

[Jeraa]

I've heard theories that many of our modern health problems (specifically, allergies and auto-immune diseases,) are caused or at least made worse by over-sanitation. I.e. we're so obsessed with keeping things clean, so our immune systems have nothing to do and get hyperactive.

Not just things like that. With stuff like hand sanitizers, it only kills 99% of germs at best. That final 1%, the strongest among the germs, live to reproduce making diseases and things more harmful. And some of the most virulent strains of viruses are found in... hospitals. All of the sanitation and chemicals kill the weaker viruses, leaving the strong to reproduce.

Not to mention medication. The other members of my family take medicine everytime they are sick, for any symptom. And still get sick often - their bodies rely on the medicine to cure them, so don't develop an effective defense on their own.

So the stuff we do to try to keep ourselves healthier, could very well actually be making things worse for us. There is such as thing as "too clean".

[Aux-Ash]

Any idea how dirty conditions could get for farmers in Europe and such, in the medieval period? In some movies, everything has a thick layer of grime to let you know the movie is trying to be realistic (but is actually just gritty, most times). Surely this is generally exaggerated?

I'm wondering about disease, you see. If the people rolled around in the mud every day, yet the fatality rates from disease weren't high by comparison--that'd be a sign of some strong anti-bodies, I'd guess.

It's a myth.

Keeping clean was a virtue during the middle ages. In the "roman"-world (where the roman empire had extended) this was done by a combination of public baths (for -both- genders) if you lived in cities or bathing at home. Outside of it, it was saunas (in the finno-ugric/slavic tradition) or bathing days. There's even tooth brushes from the era, as well as many other grooming tools.
And if nothing else... they probably did the same thing we do on sweaty summer days: Went for a swim (yes, plenty of people could swim).

Even in the cities, despite throwing waste out on the street/into the cesspool... things were pretty clean in prosperous times (now during a famine/siege... that's another matter. But they had more pressing matters on their minds then). Mind... cities were as a rule rather small... probably factored in.

Vikings for instance, were particularly keen on keeping clean. In sweden, the name for Saturday is "Lördag" which is short for "Lögar dagen" or "The washing day". It predates the viking era and it is believed that people took proper baths that day (still cleaned themselves on other days as well mind)

So, yes. It is not only exaggerated, but blatantly untrue. People did keep clean and garden work wasn't much more "splattery" than it is today (so they wouldn't be covered in mud).

That said... washing was rather labour intensive if you did not have access to a public bath. So you didn't perhaps clean up everyday (other than washing off mud from your hand and face) but took one of the days in the week to do so (before church, perhaps?).

Also... fleas and rats were prominent, which today is often seen as "not being clean enough" but back then was unavoidable. So just because there's fleas doesn't mean it's not clean.

And 1 in 2 children did die before their 15th year, 1 in 3 before their first. Again, not a sign of not being clean but rather of lacking antibiotics/neonatal healthcare.

And like it has been mentioned, outside of the modern western world autoimmunities and allergies are pretty rare. The theory that allergies have been developed due to being too clean is plausible and if true then such diseases would have been very rare indeed.

[Eldan]

On the cleanliness thing: soap has been around for thousands of ages. I faintly remember a Roman description describing the queer, hairy Gauls who smeared themselves with a strange, smelly substances of bones, ash and lye to keep clean.

[Conners]

Thought it was rubbish, the stuff about farmers being so dirty all the time. Might be a bit different if you lived in a sandy place with stonrg wind--you'd probably get dusty fairly quickly.


Here's an odd question: How did coin forging work back in the old times? You often see people bite gold coins to see if they're genuine. Is this method accurately portrayed? also, how does it work, and why?

My guess is that they cover a cheaper metal in gold/silver, so you need to check the weight or that it's soft (like gold is meant to be).

[Yora]

One traditional form of coin making I have seen is to put a piece of metal roughly the size of the finished coin and exactly the weight it is supposed to have, and put it between two strong steel blocks engraved with the faces of the coin, just like a mold. Then you give it a really strong beating with a hammer (I've seen a heavy weight being pulled up on a rope and then just letting it drop), and the metal will be pressed into the shape of a coin with both sides having the appropriate faces.
On really old coins, you can often see the engraving in ver good condition, but the rim of the coin is highly irregular. Since the weight of the matal is important, you can't simply shave off what's protruding over the ideal rim.

(Here's one device demonstrated: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ee169...eature=related)

Taking a cheap metal piece and covering it with a thin layer of cold would be quite easy to do. However, cold is relatively soft. Hard enough to not bend, but still soft enough that you can dent it with your teeth. That's pretty much a quick test to see if it's solid gold, and not just iron covered in gold.

[flumphy]

Thought it was rubbish, the stuff about farmers being so dirty all the time. Might be a bit different if you lived in a sandy place with stonrg wind--you'd probably get dusty fairly quickly.


Here's an odd question: How did coin forging work back in the old times? You often see people bite gold coins to see if they're genuine. Is this method accurately portrayed? also, how does it work, and why?

My guess is that they cover a cheaper metal in gold/silver, so you need to check the weight or that it's soft (like gold is meant to be).

As I understand it, using gold-plated lead, or whatever, didn't happen all that much. Plating things is actually kind of complex. They would, however, mix cheaper, harder metals in as an alloy. Assuming the coin was supposed to have a high percentage of gold, biting a coin would be a somewhat effective way to judge the purity of the metal, although just weighing it could accomplish the same thing more reliably without resorting to toothmarks.

Really, because precious metals are so soft and so rare, most governments intentionally mixed in harder metals to allow for a greater quantity to be minted and also to prevent wear. Even the ancient greeks threw some base metals into the electrum they had lying around. Besides, in many cases the everyday guy wouldn't be throwing around gold coins even if the society used them.

Another reason to just weigh the coins was the practice of "clipping", shaving off bits of metal, which you would save up in order to counterfeit more coins. You know how some modern coins have all those indents around the edges? That was originally an old anti-counterfeiting measure meant to make it more noticeable if anything had been shaved off. Now it serves more to help distinguish between different denominations of currency.

[Pippa the Pixie]

Here's an odd question: How did coin forging work back in the old times? You often see people bite gold coins to see if they're genuine. Is this method accurately portrayed? also, how does it work, and why?

My guess is that they cover a cheaper metal in gold/silver, so you need to check the weight or that it's soft (like gold is meant to be).

If you wanted to make yourself a coin, but had none, you'd follow some simple steps. Find yourself some metal, either from a made tool or such or just some raw ore. It does not really matter too much what kind of metal it is. Then melt that metal down and make some coins that look just like the real thing. Then simply paint your coins gold.

For the bit more advanced trick, you'd coat your iron coin in gold. After all you can make many more 'gold coated coins' then you can 'all gold coins' from any amount of gold.

The biting of the coins comes from this idea. It was common enough for someone to have a lot of metal and a bit of gold and they would make fake gold coins. It was quite common out west around the time of the gold rush.

A real 100% gold coin would be just soft enough that you could bite into it, just a bit. A fake coin, even more so ones many by amateurs with common scrap metals like iron, would be very hard and you could not bite into them.

[Chilingsworth]

Also on the subject of coinage, the concept became possible with the discovery of minerals that functioned as touchstones

[Yora]

At what point did the value of a coin become different than the value of its material? Did the issuer of the coin have any other impact than the good name of the sovereign who guaranteed that his coinmakers would put exactly the amount of material into the coins as there is supposed to be?

[Eldan]

That really depends on where you'd be looking. Letters of credit were around very early, and the Chinese had paper money for ages.

INteresting factoid: if you look at modern coins, there's normally engravings on the rim as well, often stars, or just dents. These were originally introduced (in France, I think) to prevent clipping: if a part was cut off, the engraving would be gone.

Shaving was another practice: coins from softer metals often lost their engraving as they got older. So people would sometimes shave off parts of the engraving, then soften it again with a whetstone or sand, and pretend the coin was old.

[Knaight]

Vikings for instance, were particularly keen on keeping clean. In sweden, the name for Saturday is "Lördag" which is short for "Lögar dagen" or "The washing day". It predates the viking era and it is believed that people took proper baths that day (still cleaned themselves on other days as well mind).

The Vikings were so particularly keen on keeping clean that it is easy to find derisive names for them related to how often they washed themselves. They aren't even remotely usable as as an average. However, they appear to have cleaned daily, and "The washing day" had a lot more to do with cleaning things other than them. Clothing, houses, so on and so forth, all of which was hard work. The only people who considered them dirty anywhere near Europe were in the Middle East, where washing at least certain body parts five times a day was effectively mandatory.

[Aux-Ash]

Oh, granted. I was just trying to illustrate cleanliness was not foreign to the vikings either, despite never being part of the roman world.

[Yora]

Depends on how "roman". Byzantine claimed to be roman, and there was quite some viking activity in the black sea region.

[Spiryt]

Anyway, Norse (and not only) men who ventured on journeys on the East Baltic and down the rivers to the land of the Gardar, Rus or whatever, were called Varangians, Varegs or whatever we spell this - basically "Eastern Viking".

[Frozen_Feet]

There are even tales of Varangians being in the bodyguard of the Byzantian emperor.

[Spiryt]

There are even tales of Varangians being in the bodyguard of the Byzantian emperor.

Those are not really tales, but hard facts - Battle of Dyrrhachium is AFAIR battle where last Varangian Guards were mostly destroyed in defense of emperor - together with Hastings it can be seen as the date of twilight of the 'viking' era.