You are on page 1of 5

Earth, Stick & Stone

Creating Mankinds Earliest Houses


Charmaine Taylor 2000
We think of caves as the first shelter for primitive man, and they were. But the
descendants of those cave dwellers created astounding and very sophisticated
houses from the clay beneath their feet, and the stones around them. In each area of
the world native people ingeniously used what they had, and made the most of
these natural materials.
Building in the Midden
Around 2000 BC, in the cold, far northern Orkney and Shetland Islands above
Scotland, a thriving population of thousands peacefully lived and traded. These
early inhabitants may have been the first true recyclers because they carefully built
subterranean structures through their trash heaps, called midden. All the villagers
dumped refuse into one area, then over time as it composted and melded together it
formed a loam like material. They simply carved out passageways, large rooms and
lined the walls with a drystacking of the islands abundant flagstones. This was an
extremely clever way to build without having to dig out the hard earth, and it is
presumed the midden acted as weatherproofing and wind shelter for their stone
lined shelters. Wood from trees was non-existant, although driftwood was
available for supporting turf roofs over the stone walls.
Stone Wheelhouses, Black Houses and Beehives
About 150 AD the Shetland Islanders built giant wheelhouses with tall earth and
stone walls arched over to support an earthen roof. Many people lived in these
wheelhouses, each had their own private areas; with goods hung from embedded
driftwood rafters.
The Outer Hebrides islanders to the West developed a different kind of house made
of earth and stone. The harsh winds howled across the treeless land so the builders
there rammed earth two to five feet thick between inner and outer stone walls.
These were called Black Houses, and had a heavy thatched roof sloped to the
ground for extra wind protection, and no openings for windows, or firepit. Smoke
escaped through the thatch but soot collected inside, blackening walls and roof,
hence their name. Animals and humans lived together inside; it was dark, and
fragrant, but warm! As a note, some Black Houses built in the 1800s exist today
and serve as hostels for visitors.
Near Penzance in the UK, a small stone and earth domed structure still exists with
its roof intact, built over 1,000 years ago. In Cornwall, in the mid 1900s, the
remains of similar caved-in domes were still seen in fields of heather. Blocks of

sod, or peat, known by names such as fale and turf have been used for centuries.
Sod blocks can be cut on an angle to key in together and form a supporting
structure. This is an early form of earth sheltered construction. Layers of stones and
turf were formed into domes and beehives, like the sketch shown here. Beehive
houses are also found in Scotland; the lumps of fale placed between layers of
stone, the whole mass weighting itself together to make a snug shelter. A stone or
wood lintel was built in over the entry, and shrubbery pulled into the doorway to
keep animals, and drafts, out.
Clay and Bool walling. This is a very old Scottish method of building using
rounded river stones the bool mortared in a bed of clay. A formwork of boards
was later used help shape straighter walls.
Early Wattle and Daub, and Cob
Dwellers in the Eastern areas of Britain learned to lash small tree poles together to
make a conical hut, and surrounded the feet of the poles with stones to brace them.
The stone footings would evolve to a low, double walled ring of stones, with earth,
and straw-laced dung, packed into the middle, creating the first crude cob
material. Eventually, stone facings were eliminated when it was seen the cob wall
stood well on its own.
The Celts transferred their skill in cloth and basket weaving to wattle and daub
construction for shelters. Plastering the wattlework with local river clay helped to
weatherproof these shelters.
When the Romans abandoned the British Isles around 400 AD, the Angles,
Saxons, Norse, Jutes and other tribes invaded, bringing many new forms of earth
and wood construction. One method for upper wall formation was nogging a
placement of small stones, between vertically spaced sticks, then plastered over
with clay. This was the forerunner of lath and plaster, a system of horizontal
wooden slats that serve to key, or hold, the wall plaster.
Excavations at Koln-Lindenthal, in Germany, indicate an almost playful sculpting
of earth to form single, and family sized, shelters from 4,000 BC to 1,500 BC. The
floors of these footprint shaped dwellings were dug about 30 deep to create
seating nooks, couches, and shallow beds. Wattle panels were attached to posts,
and covered over with thatch or shrubbery to create a roof. Filling a sleeping pit
with fresh straw, laid over with animal skins, probably made for warm and
comfortable rest. The earth helped maintain the temperature and the wattlework
shielded them from cold winds and rain.
European peoples in the 4th century AD assembled rough wood planks and piled a
core of earth between the boards, letting it dry, and removing the boards to build
higher walls an early form of rammed earth. This was considered poor mans

stonework, and was widely used for hundreds of years. The earthen walls could
withstand the driving rains and rising damp only if it sat on a rubble stone
foundation and had a wide overhang roof. This is the boots and cap method of
protecting earthen walls which is still practiced by builders today.
The sophisticated earth building techniques found in the Middle East did not
develop in the British Isles. However, during the religious wars of 1100s Crusaders
were exposed to intricate adobe and rammed earth building designs in Eastern
lands, and later translated those ideas into towers and keeps made of stone, not
earth. The castle building that resulted may be a direct transfer of ideas from East to
West.
The earliest dwellings are located on the upper Euphrates river, in a place called
Tell Mureybit, occupied about 10,000 years ago. The local peoples built round
houses, hand sculpted, using red clay. Seven thousand years later these tribes
would form the Sumerian civilization, the first great culture on earth, and build the
pyramids.
In Middle Eastern lands, where wood and stone are scarce, or non-existent, the
inhabitants developed the clay material they had to an artform in building. An
ancient method of clay use was to coat a woven basket, and roast it over a fire to
harden the clay. When the basket reed burned up the clay pot remained. The use of
clay evolved from pots for food and oil, to a large earthen jars to bury the dead,
then to huge, house-sized granaries.
Small shrines in Afghanistan, called Ziarats, are sculpted of earth. The walls host
phallic shaped pillars, and the domed center room is sculpted like a breast with a
nipple of earth on top. There are thousands of these small health hostels
providing a cool resting place for travelers today.
Early Chinese builders prepared a foundation of rubble stones on which to build
earthen walls. They used a formwork of bamboo, or rough timbers, and dirt was
poured into the forms, and pounded with mallets, creating constant din for weeks
as walls grew higher. Around 400 BC most dwellings were roofed with thatch,
which the great Confucius considered the only proper material a virtuous builder
would use! And, by 1100 AD, the ruling Song government provided an exhaustive
set of building codes which prescribed usage for all materials from rammed earth to
ridgepoles. The standardized code allowed builders all over China to follow a
modular construction plan for any type of structure, public or private, and even
promoted use of prefabricated parts.
On the continent of Australia cob, mud, and rammed earth houses were built by the
thousands, mostly in the 1800s. A famous two story cob structure is Bears
Castle in Victoria, with four sturdy towers and a thatched roof.

Earth Building in the Americas


The eight mile square city of Chan Chan in Peru was built around 1000 BC with
millions of sun-dried adobe bricks. Small houses made of the same brick material
sat within the city walls. Brickmaking in South America today is very similar to
ancient methods. River clay, sand and water are mixed, and plopped into wooden
forms, then turned onto the ground to sun dry. The adobe walls of Chan Chan were
not plain, reliefs depicting fanciful creatures were carved at various points, high
and low.
Ancient people were artful with clay too. The Olmec culture in Mexico built La
Venta, a 100 foot high cone shaped earth mound using vivid colored clays from
red and yellow to white, purple, olive and blue. Floors, walls and courtyards were
sculpted, and designed using the colorful clay. A modern researcher, Richard A.
Diehl, writes A visit to LaVenta in its heyday must have been a truly psychedelic
experience.
Teotihuacan, the current site of Mexico City, held over 100,000 people in 20 BC.
Their houses utilized volcanic materials for walls, ceilings and floors, all
completely plastered over with mud, or lime plaster. Even stone facades were
stuccoed. Teotihuacan did not have the harsh climate of northern countries, so the
plaster coating was purely decorative, and apparently culturally preferred.
In the United States, around 900 BC, native peoples built massive earth mound
cities along the Mississippi river. Researchers postulate that circular huts, in
dome or tipi shape with thatched roofs, served as housing. None of these exist
now, but some of the mounds are protected in state parks today.
Earth-sheltered dugouts, and adobe style dwellings developed in the western US.
Early pit-houses were excavated, piling up the earth to form a wall around the pit,
then laying poles and brush over top. Southwestern pueblo and mud walled
structures had flat roofs and used poles laid across to support earthen, or sod, roofs.
The walls were built up by pouring earth in layers and sun baking them, a form of
monolithic adobe.
Earth, sticks and stones are still used today for simple dwellings the world over.
Its estimated that one third , to one half, of our planets population live in houses
made of earth. Adobe, cob, and rammed earth are gaining popularity in many
parts of North America , and hybrid alternative designs are being developed.
Exploration of natural and indigenous materials used in ancient dwellings can
help us plan sustainable dwellings for our future.
**********

Charmaine Taylor lives in a small, but sturdy cottage of Redwood, built in 1949, in
Humboldt County CA where she writes about, and experiments with natural
building materials. The text for this article was excerpted from her booklet entitled
Ancient Earth Dwellings
See books online at www.dirtcheapbuilder.com or email
books@dirtcheapbuilder.com
Taylor Publishing PO Box 375 Cutten CA 95534 tel: 707-441-1632
www.dirtcheapbuilder.com

You might also like