Winter Blues: History Edition

We all know how nice it is to huddle round a fire on a cold night, but do you know how long fires have been used this way? There is archaeological evidence of fire being used in a controlled manner over one million years ago by Homo erectus, a genetic ancestor of Homo sapiens.

It is likely that early people used percussion, for example a flint and steel, or friction, for example a fire drill, to light fires. Fires would not only have provided heating for these people, but also light, protection, and somewhere to cook food.

Bringing your fire inside the home is a big step that allows you to warm up the whole space. Anglo Saxons and Vikings built their homes with simple chimneys. These were nothing more than a hole in the roof above where the fire was built, but it allowed the smoke to escape making a room with a fire in it inhabitable rather than smoke filled. There is even evidence of an indoor hearth providing a source of light and warmth inside homes in pre-Roman Celtic dwellings.

From the 1300’s wealthy nobles began to have a hearth built into the wall with a proper chimney. This proved to be safer, cleaner and more efficient. In the Georgian period there was a shift towards coal as a fuel source, which allowed fireplaces to be built smaller.

When we think of underfloor heating, we tend to think of something very modern, but in fact the idea of heating a room from below dates back to ancient times. Floors in Roman baths and villas were raised up by being built on a series of brick columns (pilae) to create an airspace. A fire or furnace was used to heat the air under the floors, as well as in air spaces in the walls, effectively heating the building.

Romans called this kind of heating was a Hypocaust. It is believed that this type of central heating originated in ancient Greece but many examples of it can be seen in Roman ruins, in both the UK and Europe.

It’s not surprising, considering the Russian climate, that keeping warm is a vital part of Russian life and history. Russians were building stoves out of stone as early as the 8^th century. These stoves contained a fire that would heat the surrounding stones, providing a large warm mass which helped to heat the room.

These not only heated the room effectively but also often had a flat surface or bench on top which provided a space for people to sleep on, allowing them to keep warm all night.  

Metal stoves such as range cookers seem to have been developed in northern Europe in the 15^th century. This innovation spread widely from here, however in Britain it wasn’t until the industrial revolution that these became affordable enough to be accessible to the general population.

In its most basic form, a radiator is a set of metal tubes or pipes that can be filled with hot water. It is unclear where the design originated. Multiple individuals are credited with the invention of the radiator around the world in the mid 1800’s. It seems to have been a natural progression!

By Victorian times radiator “systems” using water heated by a coal furnace were becoming common.