8 simple inventions that changed the world beyond recognition

1. Wheel

When it comes to simple inventions, the first thing everyone thinks about is the wheel. It would seem an elementary thing, but for our distant ancestors it was a truly revolutionary discovery.

Still unknownwho first invented the wheel. But, most likely, this invention appeared immediately in many independent places around 3500 BC. e. Wheel prototypes have been found in the Middle East, Western and Eastern Europe, India and China. Even the Native Americans had toys with wheels. True, they did not derive practical benefit from this.

Most likely, the first wheel was a simple log. Put it under the load - ancient and effective way facilitate the dragging of objects. Egyptians rolling in this way, blocks for their pyramids will not let you lie.

If you saw off a couple of pieces of the same size from a log and drill holes in them, you get a pretty good wheel.

It's funny that the potter's wheel, which works on almost the same principle as the moving part of the cart, was invented about 4500 BC. e. That is, mankind invented the wheel, but it took a thousand years to move it from a horizontal position to a vertical one.

So why is it so useful? Oh, it has found a huge number of uses. After the goods began to be transported, and not dragged on drags, the face of civilization changed.

First, people were now able to build complex architectural structures, as the movement of building materials became easier. To fold pyramids, dragging stone blocks, many people could: and Egyptians, and the Nubians, and the inhabitants of pre-Columbian America. But to build the Notre Dame Cathedral, when there are no banal carts, let alone pulleys with blocks for lifts, it would hardly have been possible.

Secondly, thanks to the wheel of steel possible long-distance travel and increased volumes of transported goods, which led to the possibility of building new economic ties.

And finally, wheels are simply necessary to create any machines and mechanisms. Now they are everywhere, from your computer to nuclear power plant. This is really a universal thing.

2. Paper money

First paper money appeared in China in the 11th century. They originated from merchant receipts invented during the Tang Dynasty in the 7th century.

Merchants did not like to pay with heaps of small copper coins, which are difficult to carry and count, and preferred to issue invoices for similar amounts. Often, credit receipts had a limited validity period and promised a small discount, that is, it was not only more convenient to accept bills, but also a little more profitable.

In Europe, similar documents appeared around 1150 - it was the invention of the Templars. They were convenient for knights, merchants and pilgrims: when you go somewhere on a trade journey or Crusade, carrying a bag of coins for accommodation, food and uniforms is not very convenient.

And so - he issued a bill, arrived at the place, cashed it from the banker.

The idea to use banknotes instead of coins came to Europe in the 13th century from China, thanks to the stories of travelers like Marco Polo and Wilhelm Rubruck. But in full-fledged paper money in the modern sense of the bill turned in 1661. It was then that the Swedish Central Bank in Stockholm began printing the first banknotes.

Difficult to overestimate importance transition from metallic money to paper money. It is easier to transport large amounts of banknotes because they are light. Instead of hiring a cart and a guard to transport your little gold, you could put a stack of sheets in your pocket and go to make deals light.

Paper money was especially useful during the colonization of America. They allowed settlers to trade without having to transport tons of precious metals across the Atlantic each time, where the treasures could be appropriated by pirates or sent to the bottom. Hurricane.

It is quite possible that without banknotes, mankind would never have properly populated the New World, considering it "economically unprofitable." And now you would go to a nearby store, stuffing your pockets with coins that ring loudly and pull your pants down.

3. Glasses

The first optical devices appeared more than a thousand years ago - these were the so-called reading stones. Pieces of rock crystal, beryl or glass were led along the pages in order to enlarge the letters. This invention attributed Berber astronomer Abbas ibn Firnas, who lived in the 9th century.

Naturally, such stones were not very convenient to use. But the invention of ibn Firnas improved Italians around 1290. Later, the technology made its way to Venice, which became the European center for the production of lenses. The first guild of master optometrists was formed there in 1320.

The first glasses did not have temples and were attached to the nose like a clothespin.

The modern form they got only around 1727, thanks to the British optician Edward Scarlett.

Since then glasses didn't change much. But in 2008 Briton Joshua Silver created lenses in which you can change the magnifying power. The built-in syringe pumps or sucks the silicone solution into a flexible lens, and you can choose the right diopter yourself.

Why can glasses be considered an invention that changed the world? Yes because they are serious increase number of economically active population.

In some early Middle Ages, both a young man with poor eyesight and an old man with age-related farsightedness would be a burden. It is difficult to wait for the completion of even physical, even paper work from someone who does not see beyond his nose, because we receive most of the information about the world with the help of our eyes.

Glasses have given a huge number of people the opportunity to benefit society and live a full life.

4. Plow

Before the plow, people used hand hoes, and you don’t get much of them. The significance of this device is difficult to overestimate, because it was it that led to the agrarian revolution. People began to grow so much food that they could not only feed themselves, but also leave it in reserve and trade.

Thanks to the plow, the growth of the human population and the formation of the entire civilization as a whole became possible. It's hard to build pyramids, conquer new continents and launch rockets into spaceif your life depends on one tiny vegetable garden, you know.

The first prototypes of the plow, the so-called plowshare, or scraper plow, were invented in Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley in the 6th millennium BC. In Europe, the earliest evidence their use dates back to 3500-3800 BC. e.

The plowshare was a big step up from the hoe, but still they weren't particularly effective. Later Romans created a wheeled plow with an iron share, which became the key to the success of their agricultural industry empire. Then the Germans borrowed it, and from them it will spread throughout Europe.

5. Nails

The first prototype nails, made from blocks of wood, applied at least 7,000 years ago in ancient Germanic settlements. But their metal version was invented in ancient Rome.

Nails were a strategic resource for the Romans. Legionnaires, hastily retreating from the onslaught of the Scots in 86–87 AD, left Inkhtutil fortress in Perthshire and left behind as many as seven tons of these products. They buried them so that they would not get to the enemy, and so carefully that this treasure was found only in the 1960s.

Until the 16th century, nails were forged by hand and cost a lot - sometimes they even used like a currency. Later, the British invented the slitting machine and England became the largest nail manufacturer in the world. This seriously harmed America, because at that time the colony of Britain supplied such a valuable resource in a very dosed manner.

Sometimes Americans even deliberately set fire to abandoned houses in order to find precious nails in their ashes. In Virginia because of this had to issue a law prohibiting local residents from burning their homes when moving.

In the 1860s, a machine was created in France production metal wire nails. The technology was immediately applied in England, and the whole world finally saw a miracle - cheap and high-quality nails. From a great value, they turned into a mass product, the production of which could be established by anyone.

You may ask: what is so special about these nails? An elemental thing.

The fact is that before their invention, notches had to be cut out in the beams in order to connect them together according to the puzzle principle. It was a rather time-consuming process, and it was impossible to build something complex.

Wooden pegs did not make the task much easier. To drive this into the board, you had to first drill there is a hole in it, which also took a lot of time and made life difficult for carpenters.

But a metal nail could simply Score into the wall and then forget about it. The mass production of these products made a revolution in construction - without them, humanity would have lived in wooden log cabins and huts, considering the hut the pinnacle of architecture.

6. Compass

Compass invented in China around 1088 - it was originally used when traveling through the deserts. It was a vessel in which wooden fish swam with small magnets inside. Their muzzles pointed to the south.

In Europe, the compass came up with in the 12th century, and this happened independently of China. At first, it was very simple: a magnetized needle was fixed in a piece of cork and thrown into a glass of water. A more or less modern device appeared only at the beginning of the 14th century, when the Italian Flavio Gioia combined a magnetic needle with a circle-card, divided into 16 compartments-rooms.

It would seem that, compass is just a piece of iron that points in a certain direction due to a magnetic field. But without it, navigating the sea far from the coast would be almost impossible. The stars, of course, have not been canceled, but during the day and in cloudy weather they are not visible.

It is the compass did possible era Great geographical discoveries. Thanks to him, sea routes to America, Africa, Asia and Oceania appeared - and this helped human civilization to take a serious step forward.

7. Bulb

incandescent lamp invented in the 1870s the American Thomas Edison and the Englishman Joseph Swan, and independently of each other. However, the version of the first was more efficient due to the carbon-coated bamboo thread. Later it was replaced with a tungsten coil.

Now incandescent bulbs are considered an extremely inefficient and energy-consuming method of lighting, and therefore they are being replaced everywhere by LEDs. But immediately after their invention, they undoubtedly made a real revolution.

Incandescent light bulbs were cheaper and brighter than candles and 19th-century oil, kerosene, and gas lamps. And the sleep patterns of people changed forever: now in the evenings it was possible to work, play and have fun, instead of going to bed.

Before the invention of electricity and the Industrial Revolution, people slept in two sets.

In medieval England, for example, the first dream called "dead", and the second - "morning". People went to bed after dark slept about 4 hours, then woke up for an hour or two, and then went back to bed. This midnight wake was used for prayer, meditation, dream interpretation, sex, writing, visits to neighbors and petty crimes - any robber will tell you that you need to go about it well sleepy.

Thanks to the invention of Edison, people got the ability to go to bed later and not take breaks during sleep. So the light bulb changed not only the history of civilization, but also the very nature of man.

8. Barbed wire

A metal cord with spikes is an elementary thing. But it was invented only in the XIX century. Application for wire fencing for livestock in 1873 filed to the US Patent Office, a simple Illinois farmer named Joseph Glidden.

Strictly speaking, he was not the first to invented "thorn" - before him, his compatriot Henry Rose presented a single-core wire at a fair in Illinois. And before Rose, a certain Lucien Smith from Ohio developed a similar thing. But the Glidden version was the most successful - simple, cheap, but durable.

Before the invention of wire, Americans tried control areas for walking their cows, planting thorny bushes around pastures. But, as you understand, sticking a stick into the ground and winding a “thorn” around it is a little faster than waiting for a whole bush to grow. And no, you don't need to water it.

Now farmers have the opportunity to fence huge areas on Great Plains, and this led to an unprecedented development of animal husbandry.

How could this affect world history? Well, you eat meatballs thanks to this invention too.

Barbed wire, which spread throughout the world, began to be used to protect prisons, industrial zones and military facilities. But the main area where it is indispensable is cattle breeding.

In fact, to control a huge herd, it was now need to only a few hundred meters of wire and support for it. No other fence was so useful. As a result, by the beginning of the 20th century, the profession cowboy became unnecessary.

Thanks to the wire, man received opportunity develop agriculture and grow more meat, and therefore eat better and work more productively.

And finally, an interesting fact: the telephone network, invented by Alexander Graham Bell, is also in the Wild West worked through barbed wire - American ranchers literally called each other "over the fence." Yes, and breaks could be found that way. If you can't get through to your neighbor, get on your horse and look for where the cows have knocked down your fence.