Civil Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Broadly speaking the same range of pliable materials which can be used to
provide the structure of a building can also be used for cladding that structure in
a homogeneous way. Such cladding may be more or less natural in the form of
leafy branches, or it can be fabricated—e.g. withies or osiers woven together (=
wattling). In either case it is ot en plastered over with mud or the like, perhaps
constituting a mixed material (e.g. wattle and daub). A specialised material of this
nature for rooi ng pitched roofs is thatch.
In conclusion it is to be noted that whatever precise mode is employed in con-
struction out of pliant materials, almost inevitably much rope, cordage or other
binding material is required. Construction in such pliant materials remained
common into contemporary times and there are ancient representations of such
huts and cabins.
One or two glances in historical context at construction out of pliable wooden
material are given to support the great antiquity with which this mode has always
been invested. h e “workability” of such material is eminent and demands little or
no technical equipment—i.e. it approximates the circumstances of animal build-
ing. However it is evident that virtually no direct evidence (i.e. material remains
of such construction) survives over the ages.
A beginning may be made by reference to the Early Neolithic Round House,
widespread in the Ancient Middle East. Over the last half century or so excavation
of these sites has been prolii c. On numbers of occasions a succession of round
houses has been observed built over one another on the same emplacement. h is
succession of the same building form has sometimes revealed a succession of
dif erent building materials. Whereas the Neolithic Round House of the Middle
East is characteristically built in mud (mud brick or rubble in mud mortar), the
earliest structure on the hollowed out emplacement is sometimes shown by the
discolouration of the soil proper to organic decay to have been of light vegetal
material (branches etc.). h e succession has been observed on key sites in Jordan
and in Cyprus. (For Jordan, e.g. Jericho, v Ancient Building in South Syria and
Palestine, pp. 25, 456-57. For Cyprus, e.g. Khirokitia, Sotira, Erimi, Lemba, v
Ancient Building in Cyprus, pp. 42-43; 44-45; 49; 57; 310; 493).
h e following observations might be drawn from this material.
Shelters fashioned out of light woody material were known early in building
history. However the beginning of the Neolithic Era is no longer considered to
be anything like the dawn of building construction. Hence the Neolithic Round
Houses can not be regarded as establishing some linear dei nition in the overall
building history of humanity. Within its particular ambit it is an ancient example
of the continuing tendency for light woody material to be used if practical at the
outset of building in a certain locality, to be later replaced by some more solid
material (here load bearing mud and rubble). Also within the terms of the Levant
Pliant
material
used for
initial
& tem-
porary
construc-
tion
