People have always needed protection from the weather. For most of the last 100 thousand years, the Earth's climate was much colder than it is today. In the summer, people lived in huts in the open, but when cold weather set in, families moved into caves. They blocked the entrance with stone walls and built huts inside the caves for greater protection from the cold and wind. In the summer, following herds of game, hunters built shelters from branches and leaves.
Dwelling made from mammoth bones. This is what the ancient dwelling may have looked like. It is based on a frame made of tree branches and poles, which were lined with the bones of large animals. The gaps between the bones were filled with moss and bush branches. Then the entire structure was covered with turf and skins. Such a dwelling could be disassembled and moved to another place.
Families lived in camps in huts made from branches and animal skins. Further north, where there were no caves and few trees, people built huts from the bones and tusks of mammoths. But wherever they camped, it was very important that there was a source of fresh water nearby.
This is the entrance to a rock shelter in southwest France. Neanderthal people were the first to occupy this site around 100 thousand years BC. e. Usually people lived closer to the entrance of the cave, where there was better lighting and where the rays of the sun reached.
A home you can carry with you
When going on a hike, many tourists take with them a portable house - a tent. It is quite light, you can carry it on yourself, but in case of bad weather or for spending the night, the tent quickly turns into a reliable house. Portable houses were also used by those ancient people who wandered after the herds of wild animals that provided them with food.
Perhaps the prehistoric dwellings of such people were similar to the wigwams of the North American Indians and the plagues of the inhabitants of the Asian north. They were huts made of poles covered with animal skins. Such a dwelling could be easily erected and quickly dismantled. A fire was lit inside the wigwam or tent. To let the smoke out, a hole was left in the top center.
This example of a portable teepee was made in 1904 by the Cheyenne Indians of the Great Plains in the United States. Prehistoric people may have lived in similar tents or huts made from branches covered with animal skins. They were quickly erected and disassembled and could be folded for carrying. Mobile housing was a necessity for people who followed migrating herds of animals.
Structures made from skeletons
The dwellings of ancient people were discovered repeatedly during excavations. They dated back hundreds of thousands and millions of years. Many interesting details were discovered in such buildings.
During the Upper Paleolithic era, there was a revolution in the process of building and ordering housing. Perhaps it is associated with a radical change in the climate of the East European Plain.
23-18 thousand years ago there was a severe cold snap. The northwestern territories of Russia are covered with severe ice. The permafrost area extended to the Black Sea coast. Ancient people were faced with a serious choice - to leave these territories or change their way of life. The population chose the second path, although it was not easy.
The choice was determined by the favorable conditions of the forest-tundra or forest-steppe. Many bushes and grasses grew here, and therefore mammoths and other game were found. Conditions for hunting are quite suitable. But the severe cold, down to minus 50 degrees, required warm clothing and the construction of comfortable housing.
Before the climate change, light huts were built on the ground. In the center of such a building there was a hearth, around which there was a spot with the remains of bones and other traces of the life activity of the ancients. The houses were probably covered with animal skins. This type of construction was common throughout the world during the Upper Paleolithic and in later centuries.
Neolithic sites
The last part of the Stone Age is called the Neolithic - or New Stone Age. At this time, people learned to make permanent houses from stone, lined them with turf, and reinforced them with wood. Several dwellings were connected by covered passages. Housing became permanent as the tribes moved from hunting to farming and cattle breeding. This means that people no longer wandered after herds of animals, but began to domesticate them and graze them near their homes.
Inside an ancient dwelling
A more complex organization of human life appeared: in one room they slept, in another they lit a fire and prepared food, there were also premises for production: ceramic workshops for pottery, workshops for stone carvers who made stone arrowheads, knives, scrapers, needles.
Often settlements arose in lowlands and river valleys - where there was a source of clean water and enough of it to irrigate fields. The soil in such places was rich, rivers often carried fertile silt, and crops covered the food needs of people. The first agricultural settlements appeared in the Middle East.
This is a reconstruction of a typical longhouse in an early agricultural village in Europe. The village dates back to approximately 4500 BC. e.
The interior of the longhouse was both a place of work and provided shelter for the family and its animals. Around the hearth of this reconstructed dwelling are baskets woven from reeds and skins spread on the floor. Tools are stored along the walls.
Man's first home. How it all began
Category: Uncategorized Tags : First Dwellings
Australian Aboriginal dwelling, reconstruction (flickriver.com).
Australian Aboriginal dwelling, reconstruction (flickriver.com).
Home of the Bushmen - the indigenous population of South Africa (saluteafrica.co.za).
According to the hypothesis put forward by the American archaeologist John Clark, the appearance of long-term sites and dwellings is associated with an increase in the duration of childhood. While the younger generation is being trained, the mobility of the hominid group is limited. “The young chimpanzee achieves independence between seven and eight years, and the transfer of the more complex skills possessed by early hominids must have taken an even longer time,” Clark wrote. Housing provides greater security for offspring. This is very important for apes, who rarely give birth to more than one offspring. And the problem of predators becomes especially critical when they live not on a tree, but on the ground. It is better to take care of the child in a relatively safe place, where one of the parents looks after the offspring while the other gets food. True, does some kind of “wind barrier” provide protection? Doubtful... A predator can easily find people hiding behind a flimsy fence by smell. Another hypothesis, developed by the Soviet archaeologist V.Ya. Sergin, suggested that long-term dwellings arose in places where large game prey was butchered and eaten. Of course, small prey is literally eaten on the move. But when you manage to get an elephant, you can’t eat it and drag it away in one sitting. The entire community is invited to the place of prey (whether it is killed by a skilled hunter or an animal that has died a natural death) - this is what, for example, modern pygmies do in Central Africa. The meat should not go to waste, it should be consumed whole, simultaneously driving away the scavengers approaching from all sides. A family of ancient hominids would camp around their prey and throw a feast for several days; tools and raw materials for their preparation were brought here; a hearth was being built... However, no, there were no hearths at that time. And around, perhaps, there was some kind of barrier made of branches pressed down by stones - protection either from the wind or from curious people. It is clear that the above presents a very speculative picture. What gave people the first semblance of a home? Wind protection? From the sun? From predators? From prying eyes? From otherworldly forces? From the rain? From the cold?... An aesthetic feeling of “comfort”? Together? Be that as it may, modern hunter-gatherers, when stopping for a rest - even for one night - often build themselves simple shelters. To begin with, it would be nice to find out when they appear - the first dwellings. But it's easy to say! As American anthropologist Jerry Moore writes, “Ideally, every site should be something like the ash-covered ruins of ancient Pompeii: a moment frozen in time.” But, alas, Paleolithic Pompeii is unknown to us. And the most ancient dwellings were obviously short-lived. A settled life was not for ancient hunters. If the analogy with modern hunting groups is correct, their shelters were nothing more than fences of branches and, possibly, skins, at best, weighed down with stones. After a few days, people moved from the place and abandoned the remains of their homes, which fell apart, rotted and, most likely, disappeared without a trace. All that was left was the rubbish people had thrown around - scraps, bones, broken tools; perhaps depressions in places where supports were dug into the ground. If, as a result of a happy accident, all this was quickly buried under a layer of sediment, a certain “imprint” of the dwelling was obtained, the contours of which, in principle, can be identified by the distribution of cultural remains. However, such a print still needs to be read. Research in this direction became possible only after the advent of a fairly advanced excavation technique - one in which a significant part of the area of the ancient site was revealed, the ancient “floor” on which people lived was cleared. Any significant finds - bones, tools, etc. - fixed in place and plotted on the plan; then the entire ancient “residential complex” is analyzed. Now, by the way the clusters of artifacts are located, you can try to understand where the booty was cut up, where the tools were made, where the bones were thrown, and where the dwellings were located - if only they were here, in fact. It was as a result of the use of such technology that it was possible to discover residential structures of the Stone Age. Of course, the oldest of them are the most controversial.
Skara Brae Settlement
In 1850, thanks to a strong storm that washed away part of the earth from the rocky shore on the coast of one of the Orkney Islands (Scotland), traces of buildings reminiscent of ancient settlements appeared to the eyes of archaeologists. Excavations led to the discovery of an entire Neolithic village, well preserved under a layer of earth.
The houses, obviously, were previously covered with wooden roofs, which did not survive many thousands of years, but the stonework, the inside of the houses, the layout, the hearth, even pieces of stone “furniture” were preserved. Further study of the Neolithic village greatly surprised scientists: the settlement had a sewerage system, the houses had primitive toilets, and one of the buildings turned out to be like a workshop with numerous pieces of horn and bones.
Neolithic dwelling of Skara Brae, found in Orkney
The village of Skara Brae in Orkney was built from stone because there were no native trees to build on. Even the furniture inside was made of stone. Around 2000 BC. e. the entire village was buried by a sandstorm, which preserved the site until a strong hurricane exposed it in 1850.
Ancient city of Catalhöyük
In the southern part of Turkey there is a large Neolithic settlement - the ancient city of Çatalhöyük. The walls of the houses were made of bricks, and the roof was made of poles covered with straw mixed with silt. The houses were so closely adjacent to each other that there were no streets; apparently, the inhabitants walked around the settlement, moving along the roofs, and descended into the house along the stairs.
This drawing shows what a house at Çatalhöyük in Turkey may have looked like. The walls were made of mud bricks, and the roof poles were covered with reeds and mud. All the houses were adjacent to each other, and there were no streets between them. Residents walked around the area, climbing over roofs, and got home via stairs through the roof. In the main room of each house there were raised platforms on which people sat and slept. In Çatalhöyük there were more than a thousand residential buildings in this way.
The area in which Çatalhöyük is located is the vicinity of an ancient destroyed volcano, a plateau on the site of a dry lake. Pieces of obsidian, polished like a mirror, were often found in houses. A large number of plant remains, grains, wild nuts, and bones of domestic animals were also found. People left this settlement back in the Neolithic for an unknown reason.
Catalhöyük
Human habitation: from dugout to skyscraper
Building a house is not putting a hat on your head.
Proverb
From time immemorial, the Slavic peoples attached special importance to the construction of a house. Following traditions and covenants, the ancient Slavs sought not only to provide a roof over their heads, but also to fill the space of their home with warmth, peace and love.
The main type of dwelling in ancient Rus' was a semi-dugout - a large square pit about 1 meter deep, along the walls of which there were thick blocks or a log house. Benches and plank beds were built along the walls. The log house rose above the ground by about 1 meter, and the total height of the semi-dugout reached 2–2.5 meters. On the south side of the dwelling there was an entrance with earthen steps. They built a gable roof, covered it with boards, and put straw and a layer of earth on top. The outside of the above-ground walls were covered with soil, which helped keep the house warm and keep water out. The floor was made of clay (Fig. 1).
Rice. 1. Half-dugout of the ancient Slavs
To heat the home, a clay or stone stove was installed in the far corner from the entrance. The stove was made rectangular or round with one hole for storing firewood, and the smoke came out directly into the room. A clay brazier was built on top of the stove or a hole was made for the pots in which the stew was cooked. Around the 10th century. semi-dugouts became more spacious and higher; wicker or plank vestibules began to be installed in front of the entrance. The stove was moved to the entrance. Clay chimneys appeared [1].
In the X-XI centuries. log huts are quickly replacing semi-dugouts (Fig. 2).
Rice. 2. Izba in Rus'
The hut was a square building (log house), usually with a side of 4–5 meters. The floor was made of earthen or wood with a hole into a shallow cellar. Wealthy people built huts with a superstructure on top. A canopy about 2 meters wide was attached to the hut. Sometimes they housed a cattle shed or a workshop. The pitched roof of the hut was made of wood, planks or shingles. Although window glass appeared in Rus' in the 10th-11th centuries, it was very expensive and was used in palaces and churches. In simple huts, portico windows were installed to allow smoke to pass through. In wealthy houses, windows were made large and small (oblong and narrow).
The stove, as a rule, was located at the entrance and occupied the main space of the hut. It was shaped like a cube with a large firebox and a flat top for lying on. Ancient stoves were built without a chimney; during the combustion process, smoke hung from the ceiling. To allow the smoke to escape, a small hole in the ceiling and a door were opened. Later, chimneys began to be installed in homes. A table was placed in the opposite corner from the stove, above which icons were placed. Benches were placed along the walls, and shelves above them.
Throughout all stages of the existence of the ancient Russian home, the stove occupied the main place in the space of the home. There are many beliefs associated with the stove, including that a brownie lives behind it. If the hut did not have a stove, it was considered uninhabited. Ancient huts remained in use for many centuries and life did not give people a reason to move away from their familiar and comfortable home [2,3].
Next, let's turn the page of history and find ourselves in the 20th century.
After the formation of the USSR, in the 20–30s. There is an active reconstruction of cities, the development of architectural heritage, image and style [4]. Since the late 30s. In addition to barracks, individual one-story and multi-apartment wooden two-story houses, houses in the style of “neoclassicism”, known among common people as “Stalin” buildings, are being erected. A distinctive feature of such apartment buildings was their strength and attractive appearance. The apartments had high ceilings, spacious rooms, separate bathrooms, a large kitchen and wide balconies. The area of apartments in “Stalinist” houses could reach 110 square meters. m.
However, after the Great Patriotic War in the USSR, a need arose for mass industrial construction based on standard projects. In urban and rural areas, entire blocks of low-rise buildings of lightweight construction were built according to standard designs (for example, two-story apartment buildings with 8–18 apartments). By the beginning of the 50s. The country already had a number of large factories for reinforced concrete products, and standard designs and new building materials were being developed. The need to solve the housing problem, speed up and reduce the cost of construction has led to a change in approaches to housing construction and the formation of a new housing stock. So, in the late 50s. “Khrushchev buildings” appeared - standard series of brick and panel apartment buildings related to the architecture of “functionalism”. The architecture of the “Khrushchev” was functional and devoid of frills - the buildings lost their aesthetics and individuality, and the apartments became smaller in size [5]. In the 70s “Zhrushchevka” apartments were replaced by “Brezhnevka” apartments (apartments with an improved layout), equipped with an elevator and a garbage chute. The total area of the apartment reached 80 square meters. m.
Apartment buildings from the times of the USSR are shown in Fig. 3.
Rice. 3. Apartment buildings in the USSR
At the turn of the XX–XXI centuries. In Russia, the construction of urban and suburban “elite” houses began. In the construction of country cottages, a complete mixture of styles reigned, and architectural excesses began to appear. It became good practice to have a video room, a billiard room, a fireplace, and a swimming pool. In addition to the “elite” buildings, there were “economy class” buildings. As for urban apartment buildings, two-level apartments have appeared here, with wide corridors and kitchen-dining rooms. The area of apartments began to reach 150 square meters. m.
Today, high-rise residential buildings have become an integral part of urban planning in Russia. For example, in Moscow, one of the skyscrapers of the Vorobyovy Gory housing complex has a height of 48 floors. Particular attention is paid to the life support systems of a high-rise building - heating, ventilation, water supply and sanitation, electricity supply, waste disposal, etc. Safety control of the systems is computerized, which is why such buildings are often called “intelligent” [6].
In addition to the construction of high-rise residential complexes, low-rise housing construction is actively developing in Russia today. Depending on the area, both individual single-apartment buildings and low-rise apartment buildings are being built. The construction of low-rise residential buildings is carried out using various materials and structures. Logs and timber, brick and concrete blocks are widely used as wall materials. Options for residential buildings in modern Russia are presented in Fig. 4.
Rice. 4. Residential buildings in modern Russia
According to architects, low-rise buildings provide their residents not only with comfortable living, but also with accessible parking spaces, good ecology, the opportunity to purchase additional land, and most importantly, they allow them to realize their dreams in an individual project.
What kind of house would you like to live in?! The choice is yours!
Literature:
1. Artemov V.V. Slavic Encyclopedia. M.: OLMA Media Group, 2011. 292 p.
2. Alexandrova L. Wooden architecture of Rus'. M.: White City, 2004.
3. Zaruchevskaya E. B. About peasant mansions. Book for children. M., 2014.
4. Gorlov V. N. Housing construction in the USSR - an achievement of the Soviet people of historical proportions [electronic resource]: Access mode: https://www.prometej.info/blog/istoriya/zhilishnoe-stroitelstvo-v-sssr (access date 25.02 .2018).
5. History of Russian and Soviet art. Ed. D. V. Sarabyanova. Higher School, 1979. P. 375.
6. Abramson L. A. Development of construction of high-rise buildings // Housing construction. 2005. No. 10. P. 43–45.
Jericho
Almost 8 thousand years BC, a settlement arose on the site of the modern city of Jericho in the Middle East. Its inhabitants were farmers. This settlement is considered the most ancient city on our planet, which arose on the site of a village. It was surrounded by walls and a moat. The inhabitants of the first Jericho traded with nomadic pastoral tribes. From that time, massive ruins of walls remained, which were closed by a round tower. It is believed that the population of Jericho reached 2,700 people. Among the inhabitants there were not only farmers, but also artisans, priests, and traders.
Ruins of Jericho
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