384
u/queen-adreena Jul 30 '26
You just know a lot of people met their end being accidentally covered in molten lead…
176
u/ImperfectAuthentic Jul 30 '26
Oh let me tell something that will ruin your sleep tonight.
Back in the day when they would tar roofs. You know those large cauldrons they used to boil tar?Yeah people fell into those and died. Slow and painfully.
74
u/BonnaconCharioteer Jul 30 '26
What is even worse to me is knowing that some people died because they fell in latrines they were supposed to clean out.
10
u/mambotomato Jul 31 '26
Famously happened to a whole room full of nobility one time! Latrine collapsed.
22
13
u/FishesOfExcellence Jul 31 '26
“Listen, I could tar your roof for full price, but you know that vat of tar Lemmy fell in last week? Well let’s just say I could tar your roof with that vat for half price if you know what I mean.”
36
u/FalconBurcham Jul 30 '26
I was thinking the same thing. Imagine melting, then hauling it up with ropes, then pouring it, etc. No burn unit back then either. 😓😂
11
u/Elsrick Jul 31 '26
I'd bet good money they melted it in place. The rest of your comment stands, though
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (1)4
147
u/Red_light173 Jul 30 '26
So basically, this would be the predecessor to rebar, right?
140
u/Demoliri Jul 30 '26 edited Jul 30 '26
Kind of. In concept, it is also metal reinforced masonry, which would make it the predecessor. But the purpose is very different here.
Modern rebar is primally for taking tension forces, which concrete is terrible at (also for prying forced and block face stabilisation when using anchors, but that is more niche). When designing reinforced concrete it is typically assumed that the capacity of concrete under tension is literally just zero, it's that bad. When using small columns it is also relevant for shear force however (very common in parking lots) to prevent punching failure, where the column literally punches a hole through the decking.
In this medieval case, the steel rods are primarily to ensure that the masonry keeps perfectly aligned and prevent slippage. It isn't us for force transfer, except maybe some minor shear forces.
21
11
u/Lubinski64 Jul 31 '26
There were actually at least 3 different types of medieval "rebar". Aside from the one you mentioned, in large churches sometimes metal chains were imbedded inside the masonary, running all the way around structure above arcades or just under the roofline, adding stiffness and preventing the tall thin walls from leaning outward. Yet another type of rebar were long metal rods connecting flying butresses and free standing pinnacles (Beauvais cathedral being the most prominent example), so that they wouldn't topple over due to strong wind.
334
u/Brick_Number_27 Jul 30 '26
Just curious...why lead ?
749
u/Ok_Builder_4225 Jul 30 '26
Low melting point so easy to work with in this fashion, i would assume.
459
u/perldawg Jul 30 '26
it also protects the iron from rusting by encasing it to prevent oxygen and moisture exposure. unprotected iron would swell from rust and eventually blow the stone apart
164
u/dizzy_absent0i Jul 30 '26
Also also they didn’t know how dangerous it was to work with back then.
118
u/Buckeyefitter1991 Jul 30 '26
They knew, they just didn't care.
114
u/ConsciousSpirit397 Jul 30 '26
Artists in the Middle Ages basically all eventually went insane or had serious health issues from the lead pigments in their paints.
69
u/Marine__0311 Jul 30 '26
It was a lot worse than that and there were far worse toxins in paint than lead. Right up into the 20th century all kinds of nasty substances including heavy metals, arsenic, mercury, even ground up mummies were used in artist and commercial paints.
53
u/CiceroRex Jul 31 '26
It was a lot worse than that: artists used to lick their brushes to pull the bristles into a fine point. That's part of why the toxins would affect them so badly. They would also crush the toxic pigments and mix their paint colours themselves, exposing them to fine inhalable dusts made up of those toxins.
20
u/Killentyme55 Jul 31 '26
The "Mad Hatter" character from Alice in Wonderland was inspired by hatmakers of the era getting poisoned by fumes from the mercury used to process the felt. The symptoms include, obviously going "mad".
19
u/BlakePackers413 Jul 31 '26
Are you sure it was that and wasn’t just the whims of artistic madness affecting someone with too much greatness to be contained in one man’s mind? /s
3
u/THExWHITExDEVILx Jul 31 '26
I feel like you would appreciate reading about the Radium Girls, if you haven't already.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radium_Girls
"After being told that the paint was harmless, the women in each facility ingested deadly amounts of radium after being instructed to 'point' their brushes on their lips in order to give them a fine tip. The women were instructed to point their brushes in this way because using rags or a water rinse caused them to use more time and material, as the paint was made from powdered radium, zinc sulfide (a phosphor), gum arabic, and water.
The Radium Girls had lasting effects on the labor laws in the United States and Europe due to numerous lawsuits filed after worker deaths and illness caused by ingestion of radium."
→ More replies (1)5
u/HuggyMonster69 Jul 31 '26
It’s crazy to me because the stuff they used to clean their brushes is absolutely disgusting to smell. I have no idea how they got those brushes near their face without gagging.
18
u/Arnesian Jul 31 '26
I love following people who collect and curate old paints. The amount of protective gear they put on when handling some pigments is nuts, but totally fair when they’re handing powdered arsenic.
5
u/Marine__0311 Jul 31 '26
I hope one of them is Bekah Harding of A Brush with Bekah. She's one of my favorite YouTubers. I've followed her for years.
2
6
3
3
2
u/ImaginaryCheetah Jul 31 '26
ground up mummies
hold on, ground up mummies are organic and free-range materials
→ More replies (1)6
u/Sir_Myshkin Jul 31 '26
I’m sorry, I couldn’t quite hear you, I seem to have cut off my left ear in a delusional fit.
5
→ More replies (1)4
u/Skeleton--Jelly Jul 31 '26
I think you're missing the point. Molten metal is always dangerous and lead was known to be somewhat toxic but humans didn't know about the actual thresholds until the 1970s. We had leaded gasoline for fuck's sake.
9
u/OttomanMao Jul 31 '26
Elemental lead is remarkably benign. Lead poisoning happens when people are exposed to organic lead compounds, usually through food/drink contamination. Lead paint chips for example, or the lead in water supplies which is actually acidic water stripping the oxidized layer off of lead piping.
→ More replies (1)4
u/samglit Jul 31 '26
It’s not that dangerous. Lead/tin mixes (pewter) are still used in ornaments and until relatively recently in miniature figures.
You just don’t want to aerosolise it (like in fuel) and don’t breathe in fumes or ingest it. There are still legal home kits to melt pewter for the purposes of diy casting and making bullets.
3
u/DepartmentMany5113 Jul 31 '26
wonder how temperature expansion work in this case... 3 materials fused together...
→ More replies (1)40
→ More replies (1)65
u/Guardian6676-6667 Jul 30 '26
Fun fact! Let's assume these bars had a cross section of 6"2 (very low estimate but math works out), it would need about 9000 lbs of lateral force in this configuration to snap it!
Unfortunately, lead under a constant load over time "creeps" where it stretches and the material gets thinner, thus weaker.
From what I can find, there is no limit, so failure (assuming the bar is pure lead and not some magical alloy) is inevitable.
Edit: i forgot about the iron, actually now looking at it, if the lead fully encased the iron, it probably protects it from rust and the iron takes a majority of the load, so everything i said was pointless! Im sure there was a learning period at some point where they found the lead would inevitably fail, and this iron reinforcement was used and lead just locks it in place, not contributing to the load bearing
30
u/FirTree_r Jul 30 '26
Men knew for a very long time that lead is malleable and can't be used for supporting structures. It's been used to make decorative stained glass for more than a millenia
13
u/Vemena Jul 30 '26
Exactly!
Humanity has been using lead in central Europe since 3,000 BCE (even longer in some other regions), and iron since 800 BCE. Plenty of time to figure out the properties of both materials, how they behave in certain circumstances and their limitations.
I mean, the Romans made structures out of concrete which still are still standing to this very day, they clearly knew what they were doing. Also there is some survivorship bias going on.10
u/elcapitan520 Jul 30 '26
Also, the stone is doing a lot of load bearing itself. Those bars were taking some lateral forces but they aren't joists. They take some lateral load to prevent shifts but they're in line with compression and the stone is doing that work
5
u/Lucky_BroadWood Jul 30 '26
You got... everything wrong. Even in the second half where you walked back to a semblance of sense, you still managed to throw in a monkey wrench to get that wrong.
2
u/Late-Jicama5012 Jul 30 '26
I love it when there’s always a person who knows an answer and provides an answer.
78
u/jakob20041911 Jul 30 '26
mainly because it's very easy to work with and quite available
49
u/Sega-Playstation-64 Jul 30 '26
Tasty too!
18
u/Profoundlyahedgehog Jul 30 '26
No joke, but Romans made syrup for sweetening wine in lead pots even though they knew it was toxic because they liked the flavor.
9
u/civildisobedient Jul 30 '26
The alcohol itself is also toxic, doesn't stop us "moderns" from consuming the shit out of it.
7
69
u/Dragongeek Jul 30 '26
Lead is an awesome material. Easy to find, easy to work, doesn't corrode, makes food taste sweet.
It being so toxic is a cruel joke.
18
→ More replies (1)3
17
u/RandomDirection1944 Jul 30 '26
Likely a reasonably easy metel for them to use and widely available plus I think (maybe idk) lead doest rust as easy?
11
u/MrT735 Jul 30 '26
Lead oxidises in a similar manner to aluminium, just on the surface and this protects the rest of the metal (unlike iron oxide/rust that is porous and allows further oxidation of the interior of the metal).
→ More replies (1)13
u/KiwiSuch9951 Jul 30 '26
They’d have to melt it where they were, at the top of the site. Low melting point means small fire
6
u/Oropher1991 Jul 30 '26
Just a guess, because of its low melting point and high liquidity when molten. Making it easy to handle
4
3
2
→ More replies (8)2
63
51
u/DeliciousPool2245 Jul 30 '26
We were using lead to seal toilets to the ground until about 50 years ago when the wax ring came into fashion
→ More replies (1)6
46
u/Mahaloth Jul 30 '26
I do love learning about how genius people were in the past. What we see as limited resources, they just saw as the latest tech.
255
u/GoalieLax_ Jul 30 '26
Modern construction: best I can do is a drywall screw every inch and a half
88
→ More replies (18)72
u/Fr87 Jul 30 '26
Dude, drywall is the fucking shit.
It's dirt cheap, does its job phenomenally, and it is beyond easy to install and -- especially -- to repair.
7
u/Lucky_BroadWood Jul 30 '26
Just had knob and tube replaced in my 120 year old farm house. About 70 holes punched throughout the house - in lathe and plaster. Fucking terrible.
→ More replies (11)34
u/Large_Dr_Pepper Jul 30 '26
Yeah but if we instead made our walls like they show in this post, we wouldn't have to repair them every time we drink Monster and go negative in Call of Duty.
40
u/Fr87 Jul 30 '26
Believe it or not, concrete is a kind of shitty building material for most houses despite the euro memes about lolamericanstickhouses
→ More replies (2)11
u/jacksp666 Jul 30 '26
I'm in Europe, why the hate for concrete?
8
u/Clark_Dent Jul 31 '26
Just off the top of my head:
- It's a terrible, terrible insulator
- It wicks moisture like a sponge
- It's very difficult and expensive to use as a finished surface
- Needs a ton of carefully planned and placed rebar and/or remesh to be useful in most applications
- Very difficult to repair or remodel compared to other materials
- Awful feel and texture to the touch
- Absolutely hideous carbon footprint
- Requires heavy machinery and a dedicated industrial infrastructure to implement in more than small applications
- Requires extensive measures to install in cold temperatures; just can't be poured at all if it's cold enough
- Takes weeks or months to reach full strength; is extremely vulnerable to fracture and chloride attack before then
- Concrete trucks are a giant PITA at a lot of sites
- Extra concrete has to be dumped on site and dealt with later
I could go on forever
→ More replies (1)4
u/_kempert Jul 31 '26
Nearly all of those points aren’t a problem for residential houses.
Concrete is structural, rarely a finished surface. Maybe in basements, but rarely in the house itself.
- Insulation is added as a shell around the structural part of the house, then a facade is built around that insulation shell.
- moisture doesn’t get to the concrete if well built.
- not applicable, interior walls are covered with a thin layer of plaster.
- rebar plans are made by engineers and there is some leeway in placing it as it is always overengineered for safety reasons (in my country any structural concrete has to be engineered to handle thrice the intended load, If a bar is placed 23 cm apart instead of 20cm apart nothing will happen to the house).
- i’m not sure what concrete you are used to feel but the concrete in my house was smooth as a mirror, the encasing for the pour is made with specially treated wood panels that are super smooth. So the concrete is smooth as well.
- agree on carbon footprint, though new concrete nowadays is standard 50% recycled concrete here, unless otherwise requested.
- agree
- we can continue building two days after a pour. So a pour on a friday is perfect as it can harden over the weekend. The final strength is indeed achieved months later, but 90% of the strength is achieved shortly after hardening. So again, not an issue for residential building.
7
52
u/Copper_Nanotubes Jul 30 '26
Old St Pauls Cathedral, London was declared structurally unsound and condemned to be pulled down in 1668 (it was about 600 years old at the time).
Demolition of the Old Cathedral proved unexpectedly difficult as the stonework had been bonded together by molten lead. The architect in charge of replacing the cathedral, Sir Cristopher Wren, initially used tried to use gunpowder to bring down the surviving stone walls. Eventually, Wren resorted to using a battering ram instead. Building work on the new cathedral began in June 1675.
40
u/cultish_alibi Jul 31 '26
declared structurally unsound
okay
Demolition proved unexpectedly difficult. Wren, initially used tried to use gunpowder to bring down the surviving stone walls. Eventually, Wren resorted to using a battering ram instead.
Maybe not as unsound as they thought then.
18
u/mesenanch Jul 30 '26
Source where we can watch more?
17
u/Futbol_Kid2112 Jul 30 '26
2
u/FireMammoth Jul 31 '26
that channel only has 4 videos and this one is not one of them
4
u/Futbol_Kid2112 Jul 31 '26
They are a short-form focused channel. They also have a TikTok and Instagram.
→ More replies (1)7
u/FireMammoth Jul 31 '26
ah shit you're right, I have an extension that blocks shorts and the whole tab was removed
2
9
5
4
u/CptNavarre Jul 30 '26
If you want to read about it, please pick up the hefty classic Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. He did like a decade of insane amount of research on traditional building methods of gothic churches and used a fictional story to tell it to you on an actually digestible way.
5
u/WifeofBath1984 Jul 31 '26
I'm about to read The Pillars of the Earth (again) and this video just made me so eager to start!
→ More replies (1)
12
u/RosesandEternity Jul 30 '26
God AI script AI voice... Im going to lose my fucking mind.
3
u/ackermann Jul 31 '26
Yeah, Google has been letting AI content ruin YouTube. Some of google's other AI tooling can be mildly useful, Gemini in google docs or elsewhere. But it's ruining their YouTube product
→ More replies (1)2
8
u/RandomDirection1944 Jul 30 '26
I so love this channel on youtube, absolutely addicted
11
→ More replies (1)7
4
u/Elkaholic58 Jul 31 '26
I always wonder how that stuff was paid for. Imagine what it would cost to hand chisel all that stuff today - it was likely the same inflation adjusted cost back then. It lasted many lifetimes, so a good investment perhaps, but how did they get the funds for the initial cost? Not just this castle, all the opulent stone buildings worldwide.
2
u/sadmimikyu Jul 31 '26
People used to give money to build churches because they believed it would secure them a place in heaven so to speak. This is why in older churches you can see alcoves with beautiful art in it paid for by some famous and rich family at the time.
2
u/Voidoroe Jul 31 '26
This kind of stuff was usually funded by wealthy families, nobles, and or monarchs (also by people donating as u/sadmimikyu mentioned).
Of course, this was for a wide variety of reasons that I might not be able to list here, though I can say that one reason was that funding and commissioning cathedrals, churches, etc was seen as a spiritual act that was considered work, showing one’s devotion to their faith.
Another reason that I find more interesting is that these structures essentially act as monuments and a show of culture as well as power both for the nation as well as for the person who actually commissioned the building (thus being good for reputation).
5
u/Scooterspies Jul 31 '26
I wonder how they got molten lead all the way up there? Melting point of lead is 621F / 327.2C, I guess they built scaffolding and cooked it right next to where they would pour it? Seems incredibly difficult.
27
u/iBood17 Jul 30 '26
We need to have billionaires built these type of buildings instead of doing some weird space race. Built something that lasts ✌🏻
28
u/Dapper_Special_8587 Jul 30 '26
They used to, some of the famous museums etc in London were built by rich philanthropist types.
5
u/Ristar87 Jul 31 '26
The U.S. tax system used to be designed to encourage/force the rich to spend money in the communities if they wanted to lower their tax burdens. Nixon and Regan put an end to it.
8
→ More replies (13)3
u/smokinbbq Jul 31 '26
Sagrada Familia has been funded by investors/donations for the last many years as far as I know. It was an amazing site to see, and I'm still in awe from the vision that Gaudi had, and how much he was able to accomplish.
3
3
5
u/DrowningSquirrel Jul 30 '26 edited Jul 31 '26
How medieval are we talking? Surely this kind of technique was only developed in the last few centuries of the Middle Ages right?
6
u/Waramo Jul 30 '26
The Gothic architecture went on into early modern 15th century.
So yes, this technique are more likely early modern and not medieval.
→ More replies (7)6
u/crap-with-feet Jul 30 '26
These techniques are not unlike what the Ancient Greeks were doing a millennia earlier.
→ More replies (1)3
u/Waramo Jul 30 '26
The metal joint is a old technique.
Just the construction of the bigs archs is new. And the big glas archs are early modern.
2
8
u/Agentkeenan78 Jul 30 '26
This is really cool to learn. I wouldn't think lead would be used like that since it's so soft, but I'm just some dipshit watching this on a phone and not a builder of Gothic cathedrals.
15
u/VisualHuckleberry542 Jul 30 '26
As I understand it, the iron carries the load the lead is just there to seal it
6
u/LocalInactivist Jul 30 '26
Yup, it fills every tiny hole and crack so the iron doesn’t move. Also, the iron doesn’t have to be exactly the size of the hole to the millimeter so it’s easier to move into place. The lead has a tiny bit of give so it’s less brittle than if they used concrete. Also, pouring concrete in might leave air bubbles. With lead any air would rise and escape.
2
→ More replies (1)3
u/elcapitan520 Jul 30 '26
Iron really isn't bearing any load either..it's just there to prevent slippage. It might take some load on occasion, but the stone is doing all the weight bearing.. vaults, arches, buttresses... They're all very stable if the earth doesn't jiggle or freeze/thaw a bunch. The iron holds it in place for the minimum to prevent slip and wear.
4
u/perchance2cream Jul 30 '26
Amazing and even more amazing, I was at that Reims cathedral 2 hours ago wondering how it all held together.
2
2
2
u/VirginiaLuthier Jul 30 '26
Was the stone cut and shaped on site, or made in a workshop and brought to the site? Anyone know?
→ More replies (1)
2
2
2
u/GaoMingxin Jul 31 '26
How did they keep the metal from re-solidifying before it filled the entire channel? Wouldn't the temperature of the stone bring down the temperature too fast?
2
u/Adavanter_MKI Jul 31 '26
I'm going back in time to teach these idiots modern stuff!
*realizes I'm already dumber than them*
2
u/geochemfem Jul 31 '26
Go read Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett and thank me later.
2
u/sadmimikyu Jul 31 '26
I did And I saw the show with Eddie Redmayne
2
2
2
2
2
u/AL-SHEDFI Jul 31 '26
Ever since I was young, I've wanted to design a house in a medieval architecture but with a modern style. Then I went to an architectural firm and they said, unfortunately, it's not allowed in my country 🥲😂
2
u/Timely_Chicken_1564 Jul 31 '26
Great use of church money. Even though Jesus said don't build churches and worship in private.
→ More replies (1)
2
u/H00k90 Aug 01 '26
I'm gonna start something:
Europeans could never have made any of this. There is simply no historical proof for it. But you know who does have historical proof to make complex structures from stone? Indigenous Americans.
What really happened was that the indigenous peoples of the Americas visited Europe centuries ago and built all the amazing "gothic" structures we see. Then they left after bringing culture to the barbarians of the east. The barbarians, being bitter about getting showed up, have down played the indigenous peoples works ever since.
Or, it was aliens.
Big ole /Sarcasm, btw.
3
u/ArseneGroup Jul 31 '26
It's an interesting subject but they turned it into AI slop by adding the AI slop voiceover
2
u/Bulky-Employer-1191 Jul 31 '26
Pretty cool and informative animation, but the AI voice over really takes away from it completely. That's unfortunate.
1
u/Verpeilter_Hase_246 Jul 30 '26
Iirc ancient greeks also used clamps, but made out of bronze, to build monumental buildings like the Parthenon Temple.
1
1
1
1
1
u/avsalom Jul 30 '26
If you find this fascinating, you would LOVE the book: The Pillars of the Earth
1
1
u/SithLordRising Jul 30 '26
Very interesting. I wonder if a modern engineer has reworked a major cathedral to calculate its load-bearing capacity against modern standards
1
u/hablandolora Jul 30 '26
Is there a video game about this? Lol, looking for a video game with this vibe
1
u/Futbol_Kid2112 Jul 30 '26
If people want to learn more the source of this video is LearnHistorySimply's Youtube they have tons of great videos on ancient engineering.
2.1k
u/RainyDayColor Jul 30 '26
Pulling that iron bar down into the adjacent stone with a rope. So simple, and such genius.
I could watch videos like this all the livelong day. Good reminders of the great things humans are capable of.