How Did People Survive Winter Before Heating?

For 99% of human history, there was no button on the wall to make your house warm. So how did people survive brutal winters, from the Great Frost of 1709 to Arctic nights that last for weeks? The answer involves sleeping next to cows, houses made of snow, a stove people slept on top of, and one simple trick you can use tonight. SOURCES & FURTHER READING The Great Frost of 1709: Stephanie Pain, "1709: The year that Europe froze", New Scientist (2009) Longhouses with people and cattle under one roof: Dartmoor longhouse studies; Viking-age longhouses in Scandinavia and Iceland Box beds (Scotland, Brittany, Netherlands) and curtained four-poster beds as heat traps Igloo construction, the cold-trap entrance tunnel, and the qulliq (seal-oil lamp): Inuit traditional knowledge Two-layer caribou-skin clothing and hollow caribou hair insulation Ondol, Korean underfloor heating, designated a National Intangible Cultural Heritage of Korea (2018) The Japanese kotatsu The Russian stove (pech) and sleeping ledge Roman hypocausts in baths and villas, including Roman Britain Bede, "The Reckoning of Time" (725 AD): Blotmonath, the Anglo-Saxon "blood month" Personal comfort systems research: UC Berkeley Center for the Built Environment New video every week. Stay curious. #history #winter #thinkbro