Builder's blocks

Usage examples of bricks.

The earliest burnt bricks known are those found on the sites of the ancient cities of Babylonia, and it seems probable that the method of making strong and durable bricks, by burning blocks of dried clay, was discovered in this corner of Asia.

The site of the ancient city of Babylon is still marked by huge mounds of bricks, the ruins of its great walls, towers and palaces, although it has been the custom for centuries to carry away from these heaps the bricks required for the building of the modern towns in the surrounding country.

The Babylonians and Assyrians attained to a high degree of proficiency in brickmaking, notably in the manufacture of bricks having a coating of coloured glaze or enamel, which they largely used for wall decoration.

It is believed that the art of making glazed bricks, so highly developed afterwards by the Chinese, found its way across Asia from the west, through Persia and northern India, to China.

Chinese had any knowledge of burnt bricks when the art flourished in Babylonia.

Israelites during their bondage in Egypt, but in this case the bricks were probably sun-dried only, and not burnt.

These bricks were made of a mixture of clay and chopped straw or reeds, worked into a stiff paste with water.

This mixture is removed in lumps and shaped into bricks, in moulds or by hand, the bricks being simply sun-dried.

They carried their knowledge and their methods throughout western Europe, and there is abundant evidence that they made bricks extensively in Germany and in Britain.

Britain nearly 2000 years ago, the art seems to have been lost when the Romans withdrew from the country, and it is doubtful whether any burnt bricks were made in England from that time until the 13th century.

In the 16th century bricks were increasingly used, but down to the Great Fire of London, in 1666, the smaller buildings, shops and dwelling-houses, were constructed of timber framework filled in with lath and plaster.

In the rebuilding of London after the fire, bricks were largely used, and from the end of the 17th century to the present day they have been almost exclusively used in all ordinary buildings throughout the country, except in those districts where building stone is plentiful and good brick-clay is not readily procurable.

In 1784 a tax was levied on bricks, which was not repealed until 1850.

The commonest soluble impurity is calcium sulphate, which produces a whitish scum on the face of the brick in drying, and as the scum becomes permanently fixed in burning, such bricks are of little use except for common work.

The presence of magnesium salts is also very objectionable, as these generally remain in the burnt brick as magnesium sulphate, which gives rise to an efflorescence of fine white crystals after the bricks are built into position.