Along the way, people figured out how to keep their homes at least somewhat warm, employing simple methods that we too can use in a stubbornly drafty room or to lower the heating bill.
The Romans are often given the credit for discovering how to heat floors and since heat rises the entire room. Called a hypocaust heating system from the Greek words meaning to “heat underneath ” in upper-class Roman homes and public baths the stone floors were raised several feet off the ground and perched on tile pillars
T here’s one in every house the room that stubbornly refuses to get warm. Maybe it’s because it’s under the roof or has a northern exposure or has a window that doesn’t quite fit its frame. Whatever the reason to enter the room is to be greeted with a blast of cold air — a shivery reminder of the way people once lived.
Truth to tell even our draftiest room would probably seem like heaven to our ancestors who braved the winds and snows of a typical Eastern European winter. Yet despite their lack of modern technology they managed to survive as did people who lived in chilly China and nippy New England. That’s because along the way people figured out how to keep their homes at least somewhat warm employing simple methods that we too can use in a stubbornly drafty room or to lower the heating bill.
The Romans are often given the credit for discovering how to heat floors and since heat rises the entire room. Called a hypocaust heating system from the Greek words meaning to “heat underneath ” in upper-class Roman homes and public baths the stone floors were raised several feet off the ground and perched on tile pillars. Heat from a fire placed at one end of the room passed through the hollow space underneath the floor and heated the stones. Later the fire was moved to a separate furnace chamber — where it was kept going by slaves — and the heat was directed to the various rooms via a system of flues vents and ducts much like our modern central heating systems.
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