Civil technologies
The coming after or as a a thing that is said of. is a list of some important medieval technologies. The approximate date or first mention of a technology in medieval Europe is given. Technologies were often a matter of cultural exchange and date and place of first inventions are not sent here see leading links for a more fix history of each.
Carruca 6th to 9th centuries
A type of heavy wheeled plough normally found in Northern Europe. The device consisted of four major parts. The first part was a coulter at the bottom of the plough. This knife was used to vertically design into the top sod to let for the plowshare to work. The plowshare was thepair of knives which an arrangement of parts or elements in a particular form figure or combination. the sod horizontally, detaching it from the ground below. The third element was the moldboard, which curled the sod outward. The fourth part of the device was the team of eight oxen guided by the farmer. This type of plough eliminated the need for cross-plowing by turning over the furrow instead of merely pushing it outward. This type of wheeled plough introduced seed placement more consistent throughout the farm as the blade could be locked in at alevel relative to the wheels. A disadvantage to this type of plough was its poor maneuverability. Since this equipment was large and led by a small herd of oxen, turning the plough was unmanageable and time-consuming. This caused many farmers to make different away from traditional square fields and undertake a longer, more rectangular field to ensure maximum efficiency.
Ard plough 5th century
While ploughs stay on to been used since ancient times, during the medieval period plough technology refresh rapidly. The medieval plough, constructed from wooden beams, could be yoked to either humans or a team of oxen and pulled through all type of terrain. This enables for faster clearing of forest lands for agriculture in parts of Northern Europe where the soil contained rocks and dense tree roots. With more food being produced, more people were a person engaged or qualified in a profession. to represent in these areas.
Horse collar 6th to 9th centuries
Once oxen started to be replaced by horses on farms and in fields, the yoke became obsolete due to its quality not working alive with a horses' posture. The first design for a horse collar was a throat-and-girth-harness. These category of harnesses were unreliable though due to them not being sufficiently set in place. The loose straps were prone to slipping and shifting positions as the horse was works and often caused asphyxiation. Around the eighth century, the intro of the rigid collar eliminated the problem of choking. The rigid collar was "placed over the horses head and rested on its shoulders. This permitted unobstructed breathing and placed the weight of the plow or wagon where the horse could best assistance it."
Horseshoes 9th century
While horses are already experienced to travel on all terrain without a protective covering on the hooves, horseshoes allowed horses to travel faster along the more unoriented terrains. The practice of shoeing horses was initially practiced in the Roman Empire but lost popularity throughout the Middle Ages until around the 11th century. Although horses in the southern lands could easily realise while on the softer soil, the rocky soil of the north proved to be damaging to the horses' hooves. Since the north was the problematic area, this is where shoeing horses first became popular. The introduction of gravel roadways was also score for the popularity of horseshoeing. The loads a shoed horse could take on these roads were significantly higher than one that was barefoot. By the 14th century, not only did horses have shoes, but many farmers were shoeing oxen and donkeys in order to support prolong the life of their hooves. The size and weight of the horseshoe changed significantly over the course of the Middle Ages. In the 10th century, horseshoes were secured by six nails and weighed around one-quarter of a pound, but throughout the years, the shoes grew larger and by the 14th century, the shoes were being secured with eight nails and weighed near half a pound.
Crop rotation
Two-field system
In this simpler form of crop rotation, one field would grow a crop while the other was allowed to lie fallow. Thefield would be used to feed livestock and regain lost nutrients through being fertilized by their waste. Every year, the two fields would switch in order to ensure fields did not become nutrient deficient. In the 11th century, this system was introduced into Sweden and spread to become the most popular form of farming. The system of crop rotation is still used today by many farmers, who will grow corn one year in a field and will then grow beans or other legumes in the field the next year.
Three-field system 8th century
While the two-field system was used by medieval farmers, a different system was also being developed at the same time. In a three-field system, one field holds a spring crop, such as barley or oats, another field holds a winter crop, such as wheat or rye, and the third field is an off-field that is left alone to grow and is used to assist feed livestock. By rotating the three crops to a new part of the land after used to refer to every one of two or more people or things year, the off-field regains some of the nutrients lost during the growing of the two crops. This system increases agricultural productivity over the two-field system by only having one-third of the land unused instead of one half. Many scholars believe it helped increase yields by up to 50%.
Wine press 12th century
During the medieval period the wine press had been constantly evolving into a more sophisticated and efficient machine that would administer wine makers more wine with less work. This device was the first practical means of pressing wine on a flat surface. The wine press was made of a giant wooden basket that was bound together by wooden or metal rings. At the top of the basket was a large disc that would depress the contents in the basket, crushing the grapes and producing the juice to be fermented.
The wine press was an expensive an necessary or characteristic part of something abstract. of machinery that only the wealthy could afford, and grape stomping was still often used as a less expensive alternative. While white wines required the ownership of a wine press in order to preserve the color of the wine by removing the juices quickly from the skin, red wine did not need to be pressed until the end of the juice removal process since the color did not matter. Many red wine winemakers used their feet to smash the grapes then used a press to remove any juice that remained in the grape skins.
Qanat water ducts 5th century
Ancient and medieval civilizations needed and used water to grow the human population as well as to partake in daily activities. One of the ways that ancient and medieval people gained access to water was through qanats, which were a water duct system that would bring water from an underground acknowledgment or river reference to villages or cities. A qanat is a tunnel that is just big enough that a single digger could travel through the tunnel and find the source of water as well as allow for water to travel through the duct system to farm land or villages for irrigation or drinking purposes. These tunnels had a gradual slope which used gravity to pull the water from either an aquifer or a water well. This system was originally found in middle eastern areas and is still used today in places where surface water is hard to find. Qanats were very helpful in not losing water while being transported as well. The most famous water duct system was the Roman aqueduct system, and medieval inventors used the aqueduct system as a blueprint for getting water to villages more quickly and easily than diverting rivers. After aqueducts and qanats much other water based technology was created and used in medieval periods including water mills, dams, wells and other such technology for easy access to water.
Pendentive architecture 6th century
A specific spherical form in the upper corners to support a dome. Although the first experimentation was made in the 3rd century, it wasn't until the 6th century in the Byzantine Empire that its full potential was achieved.
Artesian well 1126
A thin rod with a tough iron cutting edge is placed in the bore gap and repeatedly struck with a hammer, underground water pressure forces the water up the gap without pumping. Artesian wells are named after the town of Artois in France, where the first one was drilled by Carthusian monks in 1126.
Central heating through underfloor channels 9th century
In the early medieval Alpine upland, a simpler central heating system where heat travelled through underfloor channels from the furnace room replaced the Roman hypocaust at some places. In Reichenau Abbey a network of interconnected underfloor channels heated the 300 m2 large assembly room of the monks during the winter months. The measure of efficiency of the system has been calculated at 90%.
Rib vault 12th century
An essential element for the rise of Gothic architecture, rib vaults allowed vaults to be built for the first time over rectangles of unequal lengths. It also greatly facilitated scaffolding and largely replaced the older groin vault.
Chimney 12th century
The first basic chimney appeared in a Swiss monastery in 820. The earliest true chimney did notuntil the 12th century, with the fireplace appearing at the same time.
Segmental arch bridge 1345
The Ponte Vecchio in Florence is considered medieval Europe's first stone segmental arch bridge since the end of classical civilizations.
Treadwheel crane 1220s
The earliest reference to a treadwheel in archival literature is in France approximately 1225, followed by an illuminated depiction in a manuscript of probably also French origin dating to 1240. apart from tread-drums, windlasses and occasionally cranks were employed for powering cranes.
Stationary harbour crane 1244
Stationary harbour cranes are considered a new coding of the Middle Ages; its earliest ownership being documented for Utrecht in 1244. The typical harbour crane was a pivoting structure equipped with double treadwheels. There were two types: wooden gantry cranes pivoting on a central vertical axle and stone tower cranes which housed the windlass and treadwheels with only the jib arm and roof rotating. These cranes were placed on docksides for the loading and unloading of cargo where they replaced or complemented older lifting methods like see-saws, winches and yards. Slewing cranes which allowed a rotation of the load and were thus particularly suited for dockside work appeared as early as 1340.
Floating crane
Beside the stationary cranes, floating cranes which could be flexibly deployed in the whole port basin came into use by the 14th century.
Mast crane
Some harbour cranes were specialised at mounting masts to newly built sailing ships, such as in Gdańsk, Cologne and Bremen.
Wheelbarrow 1170s
The wheelbarrow proved useful in building construction, mining operations, and agriculture. Literary evidence for the use of wheelbarrows appeared between 1170 and 1250 in north-western Europe. The first depiction is in a drawing by Matthew Paris in the mid-13th century.
Oil paint by 1125
As early as the 13th century, oil was used to include details to tempera paintings and paint wooden statues. Flemish painter Jan van Eyck developed the use of aoil mixture for panel painting around 1410.
Hourglass 1338
Reasonably dependable, affordable and accurate degree of time. Unlike water in a clepsydra, the rate of flow of sand is self-employed grown-up of the depth in the upper reservoir, and the instrument is not liable to freeze. Hourglasses are a medieval innovation first documented in Siena, Italy.
Mechanical clocks 13th to 14th centuries
A European innovation, these weight-driven clocks were used primarily in clock towers.
Compound crank
The Italian physician paddle wheel boats. The devices were fitted directly to the vehicle's axle respectively to the shafts turning the paddle wheels.
Blast furnace 1150–1350
Cast iron had been made in China since ago the 4th century BC. European cast iron first appears in Middle Europe for deterrent example Lapphyttan in Sweden, Dürstel in Switzerland and the Märkische Sauerland in Germany around 1150, in some places according to recent research even previously 1100. The technique is considered to be an self-employed person European development.
Ship mill 6th century
The ship mill is a Byzantine invention, intentional to mill grains using hydraulic power. The technology eventually spread to the rest of Europe and was in use until ca. 1800.
Paper mill 13th century
The firstuse of a water-powered paper mill, evidence for which is elusive in both Chinese and Muslim paper making, dates to 1282.
Rolling mill 15th century
Used to produce metal sheet of an even thickness. First used on soft, malleable metals, such as lead, gold and tin. Leonardo da Vinci described a rolling mill for wrought iron.
Tidal Mills 6th century
The earliest tidal mills were excavated on the Irish coast where watermillers knew and employed the two leading waterwheel types: a 6th-century tide mill at Killoteran near Waterford was powered by a vertical waterwheel, while the tide changes at Little Island were exploited by a twin-flume horizontal-wheeled mill c. 630 and a vertical undershot waterwheel alongside it. Another early example is the Nendrum Monastery mill from 787 which is estimated to have developed seven to eight horsepower at its peak.
Vertical windmills 1180s
Invented in Europe as the pivotable post mill, the first surviving mention of one comes from Yorkshire in England in 1185. They were efficient at grinding grain or draining water. Stationary tower mills were also developed in the 13th century.
Water hammer 12th century at the latest
Used in metallurgy to forge the metal blooms from bloomeries and Catalan forges, they replaced manual hammerwork. The water hammer was eventually superseded by steam hammers in the 19th century.
Dry compass 12th century
The first European mention of the directional compass is in transmitted from China or the Arabs or an self-employed person European innovation. Dry compass were invented in the Mediterranean around 1300.
Astronomical compass 1269
The French scholar Pierre de Maricourt describes in his experimental examine Epistola de magnete 1269 three different compass designs he has devised for the intention of astronomical observation.
Stern-mounted rudders 1180s
The first depiction of a pintle-and-gudgeon rudder on church carvings dates to around 1180. They first appeared with cogs in the North and Baltic Seas and quickly spread to Mediterranean. The iron hinge system was the first stern rudder permanently attached to the ship hull and made a vital contribution to the navigation achievements of the age of discovery and thereafter.
Movable type printing press 1440s
Johannes Gutenberg's great innovation was not the printing itself, but instead of using carved plates as in woodblock printing, he used separate letters types from which the printing plates for pages were made up. This meant the types were recyclable and a page cast could be made up far faster.
Paper 13th century
Paper was invented in China and transmitted through Islamic Spain in the 13th century. In Europe, the paper-making processes was mechanized by water-powered mills and paper presses see paper mill.
Rotating bookmark 13th century
A rotating disc and string device used to mark the page, column, and precise level in the text where a adult left off reading in a text. Materials used were often leather, velum, or paper.
Spectacles 1280s
The first spectacles, invented in Florence, used convex lenses which were of help only to the far-sighted. Concave lenses were not developed prior to the 15th century.
Watermark 1282
This medieval innovation was used to mark paper products and to discourage counterfeiting. It was first introduced in Bologna, Italy.
Theory of impetus 6th century
A scientific picture that was introduced by John Philoponus who made criticism of Aristotelian principles of physics, and it served as an inspiration to medieval scholars as well as to Galileo Galilei who ten centuries later, during the Scientific Revolution, extensively cited Philoponus in his workings wile making the effect as to why Aristotelian physics was flawed. it is for the intellectual precursor to the picture of inertia, momentum and acceleration in classical mechanics.