Mesopotamia’s Mud-Brick Building Material

Archaeological evidence indicates that some of the very earliest large-scale buildings were in ancient Mesopotamia; however, in many cases, the only thing that has survived is traces of their foundations.  We have better examples of the impressive buildings constructed by the later civilizations of Mesopotamia, Persia and the rest of the ancient Near East of which some of them remains partially intact. 

Since wood was scarce in the area and the climate is extremely dry and hot, the most common building material was brick formed from mud.  The bricks were easy to make as well as to use and varied from small hand-sized bricks to large slabs used for paving.  They were made from mud or clay from the river, and then mixed with sand or chopped straw to provide additional strength.  Once formed the bricks were laid in a wide variety of elaborate and sophisticated patterns. 

Although the earliest bricks were shaped by hand, Wikipedia states by 3500 BC, “fired bricks came into use and surviving records show a very complex division of labor into separate tasks and trades.”  The fired bricks were used to build walls and also used with stone to make pavement.  Sometime around 2700 BC, rectangular wooden molds were introduced that produced bricks twice as long as they were wide.  In addition during that same period the Mesopotamians started producing plano-convex bricks, which have flat bottoms and sides but tops that curve out to form a convex surface.  The plano-convex bricks were used to construct walls of buildings, which had the convex side on the exterior wall of the structure.  This type of brick lost its popularity sometime around 2400 BC and bricks makers started to make every surface a flat plane.   

The Conco Companies are one of the foremost suppliers of concrete services for the Western U.S. We got our start in 1959 in the Bay Area by offering clients the best value on a broad range of concrete services and products.  Since that time, we have taken a leading role as top concrete contractors in the region. We have four regional offices serving California, Oregon, Nevada, Colorado and Washington.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_construction, fofweb.com/