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Posted by on Mar 22, 2014 in Home interiors | 0 comments

How Fireplaces Have Changed

How Fireplaces Have Changed

Fireplaces have been a social epicentre among families for thousands of years. Long ago, people would have told stories around a fireplace and today we sit around and talk about world affairs and unwind. Throughout our history, fireplaces have changed to be more economical, social, and functional. From being the main source of heat in a house to being a leisure item; the fireplace has really had a vital role in every household for a long time. At one stage it was used as the main cooking area and in some parts of the world this is still the case.

Fireplaces in Castles

 fireplace 300x214 How Fireplaces Have Changed

Fireplaces in castles were designed very poorly. They were big open areas where lots of rain could find its way in and also they were quiet large so a lot of heat would have escaped. The fire places are magnificent to look at though and are a real eye-piece but they really were unnecessarily large. Some castles would have 10ft – 12ft wide fireplaces. There would have needed to be an enormous fire for it to have any effect in heating an area so large.

Open Fireplaces and Fires

Many of the local houses around castles would have had open fireplaces which would have been used to cook and also as a social epicentre much like they are today. Fires have been an intriguing part of society for thousands of years. The Native Americans of North America believed that fires held ancient spirits. They were also worshipped by numerous tribes around the world and still are today in a large part of society when it comes to tribes found in Asia, South America and Africa.

Fireplace cooking

 fire place cooking 300x200 How Fireplaces Have Changed

Fireplaces have evolved from just somewhere to cook. Take for example stone boiling, an ancient way people use to cook food by throwing hot stones from the fire into water until the water was at a boiling temperature. The Italians created an oven by heating mud clay boxes with fire, we still use this today and it is known as a stone oven. The Indian people use a similar method to cook tandoori meat. These methods would have been used for hundreds of years within homes but we now only need to uses fires as decorative pieces, to add an extra bit of heat to a room and sometimes to heat some water.

Modern Fireplaces

Fireplaces have come a long way; you can see just how much they have changed at Modern fireplaces run on a variety of different fuels; electricity, gas and fossil fuels which can make installation easier and also reduce running costs. The purpose of a fireplace isn’t as necessary as it used to be as now people have central heating systems in place, but they do make a room look amazing and do add extra warmth. The fireplace is now an important part of a house as it has the ability to complete a room, especially if it is made from marble or stone.

Image courtesy of adamr /

Image courtesy of amenic181, /

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