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Plank road

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A plank road is a road composed of wooden planks or puncheon logs , as an efficient technology for traversing soft, marshy, or otherwise difficult ground. Plank roads have been built since antiquity, and were commonly found in the Canadian province of Ontario as well as the Northeast and Midwest of the United States in the first half of the 19th century. They were often built by turnpike companies.

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72-458: The Wittmoor bog trackway is the name given to each of two historic plank roads or boardwalks , trackway No. I being discovered in 1898 and trackway No. II in 1904 in the Wittmoor bog in northern Hamburg , Germany. The trackways date to the 4th and 7th century AD, both linked the eastern and western shores of the formerly inaccessible, swampy bog. A part of the older trackway No. II dating to

144-415: A jarrah tramway lay upon 2.3-metre-long (7.5 ft) sleepers , bounded by two 70-centimetre-wide (28 in) strips of jarrah planks for cart and carriage wheels. The 90-centimetre (35 in) gap was filled with limestone rubble to be used by horses. This reduced the cost of road building by up to 85% after its widespread introduction in 1908. However, increased traffic and suburban development rendered

216-548: A company previously formed by Claridge. Claridge's Patent Asphalte Company  – formed in 1838 for the purpose of introducing to Britain "Asphalte in its natural state from the mine at Pyrimont Seysell in France",  – "laid one of the first asphalt pavements in Whitehall". Trials were made of the pavement in 1838 on the footway in Whitehall, the stable at Knightsbridge Barracks, "and subsequently on

288-400: A felling date of the trees around the 330 AD The discovery of the two bog trackways disproved the old doctrine that such bog trackways only occurred south of the river Elbe . They show that in earlier times, a lively exchange between the western and eastern shores of the marshland occurred, and that the routes were considered so important that a significant logistical and substantive effort

360-603: A local school teacher and historian followed a hint from Hinrich Mohr, a carpenter from Poppenbüttel , showing him the location of what he called a Russian causeway which is actually trackway No. I. In 1900 Frahm excavated a few planks of the trackway, publishing his findings in 1901 and 1913. The two bog trackways found in Wittmoor were excellently preserved due to the moist, peaty soil. Bog trackway I (location: 53°42′10″N 10°04′18″E  /  53.702829°N 10.0717169°E  / 53.702829; 10.0717169 )

432-518: A mixture of pitch and bitumen, was used in the Republic of Ragusa (now Dubrovnik , Croatia ) for tarring of ships. An 1838 edition of Mechanics Magazine cites an early use of asphalt in France. A pamphlet dated 1621, by "a certain Monsieur d'Eyrinys, states that he had discovered the existence (of asphaltum) in large quantities in the vicinity of Neufchatel", and that he proposed to use it in

504-664: A moldable putty that hardened into handles. Earlier, less-careful excavations at Le Moustier prevent conclusive identification of the archaeological culture and age, but the European Mousterian style of these tools suggests they are associated with Neanderthals during the late Middle Paleolithic into the early Upper Paleolithic between 60,000 and 35,000 years before present. It is the earliest evidence of multicomponent adhesive in Europe. The use of natural bitumen for waterproofing and as an adhesive dates at least to

576-423: A southeasterly direction through the Wittmoor, and had a length of about 600 metres (2,000 ft) and was located parallel to and c. 500 metres (1,600 ft) south-southwest of trackway No. I. This path was gradually destroyed through regular peat cutting. In 1947 approximately 2 metres (6.6 ft) of the central part was excavated by Kellermann in 1947 which is now on displayed in the permanent collection of

648-573: A sticky, black liquid or an apparently solid mass that behaves as a liquid over very large time scales. In American English , the material is commonly referred to as asphalt . Whether found in natural deposits or refined from petroleum, the substance is classed as a pitch . Prior to the 20th century, the term asphaltum was in general use. The word derives from the Ancient Greek word ἄσφαλτος ( ásphaltos ), which referred to natural bitumen or pitch. The largest natural deposit of bitumen in

720-537: A temperature of 50 to 150 °C (120 to 300 °F). Due to pressure from the rising of the Rocky Mountains in southwestern Alberta, 80 to 55 million years ago, the oil was driven northeast hundreds of kilometres and trapped into underground sand deposits left behind by ancient river beds and ocean beaches, thus forming the oil sands. Bitumen use goes back to the Middle Paleolithic , where it

792-424: A variety of ways – "principally in the construction of air-proof granaries, and in protecting, by means of the arches, the water-courses in the city of Paris from the intrusion of dirt and filth", which at that time made the water unusable. "He expatiates also on the excellence of this material for forming level and durable terraces" in palaces, "the notion of forming such terraces in the streets not one likely to cross

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864-424: Is a form of sandstone impregnated with bitumen. The oil sands of Alberta, Canada are a similar material. Neither of the terms "asphalt" or "bitumen" should be confused with tar or coal tars . Tar is the thick liquid product of the dry distillation and pyrolysis of organic hydrocarbons primarily sourced from vegetation masses, whether fossilized as with coal, or freshly harvested. The majority of bitumen, on

936-432: Is a visually similar black, thermoplastic material produced by the destructive distillation of coal . During the early and mid-20th century, when town gas was produced, coal tar was a readily available byproduct and extensively used as the binder for road aggregates. The addition of coal tar to macadam roads led to the word " tarmac ", which is now used in common parlance to refer to road-making materials. However, since

1008-792: Is related to the English word mummy . The Egyptians' primary source of bitumen was the Dead Sea , which the Romans knew as Palus Asphaltites (Asphalt Lake). In approximately 40 AD, Dioscorides described the Dead Sea material as Judaicum bitumen , and noted other places in the region where it could be found. The Sidon bitumen is thought to refer to material found at Hasbeya in Lebanon. Pliny also refers to bitumen being found in Epirus . Bitumen

1080-461: Is sometimes sold combined with other materials, often without being labeled as anything other than simply "bitumen". Of particular note is the use of re-refined engine oil bottoms – "REOB" or "REOBs"  – the residue of recycled automotive engine oil collected from the bottoms of re-refining vacuum distillation towers, in the manufacture of asphalt. REOB contains various elements and compounds found in recycled engine oil: additives to

1152-563: Is sometimes specified by the term crude bitumen . Its viscosity is similar to that of cold molasses while the material obtained from the fractional distillation of crude oil boiling at 525 °C (977 °F) is sometimes referred to as "refined bitumen". The Canadian province of Alberta has most of the world's reserves of natural bitumen in the Athabasca oil sands , which cover 142,000 square kilometres (55,000 sq mi), an area larger than England . The Latin word traces to

1224-543: Is the prevalent term in much of the world; however, in American English , asphalt is more commonly used. To help avoid confusion, the terms "liquid asphalt", "asphalt binder", or "asphalt cement" are used in the U.S. to distinguish it from asphalt concrete. Colloquially, various forms of bitumen are sometimes referred to as " tar ", as in the name of the La Brea Tar Pits . Naturally occurring bitumen

1296-429: Is typical of some petroleum. The substance is soluble in carbon disulfide . It is commonly modelled as a colloid , with asphaltenes as the dispersed phase and maltenes as the continuous phase. "It is almost impossible to separate and identify all the different molecules of bitumen, because the number of molecules with different chemical structure is extremely large". Asphalt may be confused with coal tar , which

1368-501: Is used for the oil refinery product. Diluted bitumen (diluted with naphtha to make it flow in pipelines) is known as " dilbit " in the Canadian petroleum industry, while bitumen " upgraded " to synthetic crude oil is known as "syncrude", and syncrude blended with bitumen is called "synbit". "Bitumen" is still the preferred geological term for naturally occurring deposits of the solid or semi-solid form of petroleum. "Bituminous rock"

1440-541: The Proto-Indo-European root *gʷet- "pitch". The expression "bitumen" originated in the Sanskrit , where we find the words "jatu", meaning "pitch", and "jatu-krit", meaning "pitch creating", "pitch producing" (referring to coniferous or resinous trees). The Latin equivalent is claimed by some to be originally "gwitu-men" (pertaining to pitch), and by others, "pixtumens" (exuding or bubbling pitch), which

1512-592: The Uinta Basin in Utah, US. The Tar Sand Triangle deposit, for example, is roughly 6% bitumen. Bitumen may occur in hydrothermal veins . An example of this is within the Uinta Basin of Utah , in the US, where there is a swarm of laterally and vertically extensive veins composed of a solid hydrocarbon termed Gilsonite . These veins formed by the polymerization and solidification of hydrocarbons that were mobilized from

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1584-425: The alpha privative , and σφάλλειν ( sphallein ), "to cause to fall, baffle, (in passive) err, (in passive) be balked of". The first use of asphalt by the ancients was as a cement to secure or join various objects, and it thus seems likely that the name itself was expressive of this application. Specifically, Herodotus mentioned that bitumen was brought to Babylon to build its gigantic fortification wall. From

1656-477: The 1970s, when natural gas succeeded town gas, bitumen has completely overtaken the use of coal tar in these applications. Other examples of this confusion include La Brea Tar Pits and the Canadian tar sands , both of which actually contain natural bitumen rather than tar. "Pitch" is another term sometimes informally used at times to refer to asphalt, as in Pitch Lake . For economic and other reasons, bitumen

1728-586: The 19th century. One of the earliest surviving examples of its use can be seen at Highgate Cemetery where it was used in 1839 to seal the roof of the terrace catacombs. On the London stockmarket, there were various claims as to the exclusivity of bitumen quality from France, Germany and England. And numerous patents were granted in France, with similar numbers of patent applications being denied in England due to their similarity to each other. In England, "Claridge's

1800-641: The Archaeological Museum in Hamburg. The substructure of the road consisted of two split oak planks that were placed parallel to each other on a sand or gravel foundation on the formerly swampy terrain. The thresholds were piles of split oak boards ranging from about 130 centimetres (51 in) to 160 centimetres (63 in) in length, widths between 25 centimetres (9.8 in) and 45 centimetres (18 in) and thickness of 2 centimetres (0.79 in) to 6 centimetres (2.4 in) laid transverse to

1872-882: The Bastenne company, were in production", with asphalt being laid as paving at Brighton, Herne Bay, Canterbury, Kensington, the Strand, and a large floor area in Bunhill-row, while meantime Claridge's Whitehall paving "continue(d) in good order". The Bonnington Chemical Works manufactured asphalt using coal tar and by 1839 had installed it in Bonnington . In 1838, there was a flurry of entrepreneurial activity involving bitumen, which had uses beyond paving. For example, bitumen could also be used for flooring, damp proofing in buildings, and for waterproofing of various types of pools and baths, both of which were also proliferating in

1944-698: The Boydton Plank Road from Petersburg southwards to just north of the North Carolina line. On the U.S. West Coast the Canyon Road of Portland, Oregon was another important but short artery and was built between 1851 and 1856. Kingston Road (Toronto) (Governor's Road) and Danforth Avenue , in Toronto , were plank roads built by the Don and Danforth Plank Road Company in the late 18th and

2016-468: The Greek, the word passed into late Latin, and thence into French ( asphalte ) and English ("asphaltum" and "asphalt"). In French, the term asphalte is used for naturally occurring asphalt-soaked limestone deposits, and for specialised manufactured products with fewer voids or greater bitumen content than the "asphaltic concrete" used to pave roads. Bitumen mixed with clay was usually called "asphaltum", but

2088-730: The Parc ( Ain ) and the Puy-de-la-Poix ( Puy-de-Dôme )", although it could also be made artificially. One of the earliest uses in France was the laying of about 24,000 square yards of Seyssel asphalt at the Place de la Concorde in 1835. Among the earlier uses of bitumen in the United Kingdom was for etching. William Salmon's Polygraphice (1673) provides a recipe for varnish used in etching, consisting of three ounces of virgin wax, two ounces of mastic , and one ounce of asphaltum. By

2160-755: The United States experienced the Plank Road Boom and a subsequent bust. The first plank road in the US was built in North Syracuse, New York , to transport salt and other goods; it appears to have copied earlier roads in Canada, which had copied Russian ones. The plank road boom, like many other early technologies, promised to transform the way people lived and worked and led to permissive changes in legislation seeking to spur development, speculative investment by private individuals, etc. Ultimately,

2232-451: The brain of a Parisian of that generation". But the substance was generally neglected in France until the revolution of 1830 . In the 1830s there was a surge of interest, and asphalt became widely used "for pavements, flat roofs, and the lining of cisterns, and in England, some use of it had been made of it for similar purposes". Its rise in Europe was "a sudden phenomenon", after natural deposits were found "in France at Osbann ( Bas-Rhin ),

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2304-609: The deeper oil shales of the Green River Formation during burial and diagenesis . Bitumen is similar to the organic matter in carbonaceous meteorites . However, detailed studies have shown these materials to be distinct. The vast Alberta bitumen resources are considered to have started out as living material from marine plants and animals, mainly algae , that died millions of years ago when an ancient ocean covered Alberta. They were covered by mud, buried deeply over time, and gently cooked into oil by geothermal heat at

2376-462: The direction of the path. The thresholds were notched so as to prevent slipping on the boards. Every second threshold was cut diagonally at the ends. Through the gaps birch poles were driven into the ground to prevent slipping of the thresholds. A large part of the excavated path resembled a building site, the woods were torn out of the path way and thrown together in one place. Beside it newly trimmed timbers were found which were designed to be built in

2448-472: The early 19th centuries. Highway 2 from Toronto eastwards was a plank road in the 19th century that was later paved. In 1833 Scarborough-Markham Plank Road was authorized to build a road from Danforth Road to Highway 7 to Ringwood and east on Stouffville Road to Main Street Stouffville. Plank roads are used exclusively in the Canadian fishing outport of Harrington Harbour , Quebec because

2520-857: The eastern and western shores of the formerly inaccessible, swampy bog. A part of the older trackway No. II dating to the period of the Roman Empire is on display at the permanent exhibition of the Archaeological Museum Hamburg in Harburg, Hamburg . Both bog trackways are located in the Wittmoor bog in the Hamburg districts of Duvenstedt , Lemsahl-Mellingstedt and the Norderstedt district of Glashütte in Schleswig-Holstein . Both trackways have been disturbed by historical peat cutters. In 1898 Ludwig Frahm,

2592-822: The fifth millennium BC, with a crop storage basket discovered in Mehrgarh , of the Indus Valley civilization , lined with it. By the 3rd millennium BC refined rock asphalt was in use in the region, and was used to waterproof the Great Bath in Mohenjo-daro. In the ancient Near East , the Sumerians used natural bitumen deposits for mortar between bricks and stones, to cement parts of carvings, such as eyes, into place, for ship caulking , and for waterproofing. The Greek historian Herodotus said hot bitumen

2664-495: The fifth edition in 1685, he had included more asphaltum recipes from other sources. The first British patent for the use of asphalt was "Cassell's patent asphalte or bitumen" in 1834. Then on 25 November 1837, Richard Tappin Claridge patented the use of Seyssel asphalt (patent #7849), for use in asphalte pavement, having seen it employed in France and Belgium when visiting with Frederick Walter Simms , who worked with him on

2736-542: The form of the adjective ἄσφαλἤς, ἐς signifying "firm", "stable", "secure", and the corresponding verb ἄσφαλίξω, ίσω meaning "to make firm or stable", "to secure". The word "asphalt" is derived from the late Middle English , in turn from French asphalte , based on Late Latin asphalton , asphaltum , which is the latinisation of the Greek ἄσφαλτος ( ásphaltos , ásphalton ), a word meaning "asphalt/bitumen/ pitch ", which perhaps derives from ἀ- , "not, without", i.e.

2808-523: The horse-drawn era, US streets were mostly unpaved and covered with dirt or gravel. Especially where mud or trenching often made streets difficult to pass, pavements were sometimes made of diverse materials including wooden planks, cobble stones or other stone blocks, or bricks. Unpaved roads produced uneven wear and hazards for pedestrians. In the late 19th century with the rise of the popular bicycle , bicycle clubs were important in pushing for more general pavement of streets. Advocacy for pavement increased in

2880-520: The introduction of asphalt to Britain. Dr T. Lamb Phipson writes that his father, Samuel Ryland Phipson, a friend of Claridge, was also "instrumental in introducing the asphalte pavement (in 1836)". Claridge obtained a patent in Scotland on 27 March 1838, and obtained a patent in Ireland on 23 April 1838. In 1851, extensions for the 1837 patent and for both 1838 patents were sought by the trustees of

2952-465: The new way, as well as items interpreted as tools, like a crowbar and mallet . Charred small pieces of wood indicating a fireplace. In 1938 the bog trackway was initially dated by pollen analysis to the 6th century BC; however, a radiocarbon dating performed in 1957 yielded an age nearer the beginning of the Christian era. The most recent dendrochronological dating performed in 1996 yielded

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3024-763: The oil deposits to be about 110 million years old. Two smaller but still very large formations occur in the Peace River oil sands and the Cold Lake oil sands , to the west and southeast of the Athabasca oil sands, respectively. Of the Alberta deposits, only parts of the Athabasca oil sands are shallow enough to be suitable for surface mining. The other 80% has to be produced by oil wells using enhanced oil recovery techniques like steam-assisted gravity drainage . Much smaller heavy oil or bitumen deposits also occur in

3096-424: The original oil and materials accumulating from its circulation in the engine (typically iron and copper). Some research has indicated a correlation between this adulteration of bitumen and poorer-performing pavement. The majority of bitumen used commercially is obtained from petroleum. Nonetheless, large amounts of bitumen occur in concentrated form in nature. Naturally occurring deposits of bitumen are formed from

3168-556: The other hand, was formed naturally when vast quantities of organic animal materials were deposited by water and buried hundreds of metres deep at the diagenetic point, where the disorganized fatty hydrocarbon molecules joined in long chains in the absence of oxygen. Bitumen occurs as a solid or highly viscous liquid. It may even be mixed in with coal deposits. Bitumen, and coal using the Bergius process , can be refined into petrols such as gasoline, and bitumen may be distilled into tar, not

3240-411: The other way around. The components of bitumen include four main classes of compounds: Bitumen typically contains, elementally 80% by weight of carbon; 10% hydrogen; up to 6% sulfur; and molecularly, between 5 and 25% by weight of asphaltenes dispersed in 90% to 65% maltenes. Most natural bitumens also contain organosulfur compounds , Nickel and vanadium are found at <10 parts per million, as

3312-568: The period of the Roman Empire is on display at the permanent exhibition of the Archaeological Museum Hamburg in Harburg, Hamburg . This type of plank road is known to have been used as early as 4,000 BC with, for example, the Post Track found in the Somerset levels near Glastonbury , England. This type of road was also constructed in Roman times. From the mid-1840s and to mid 1850s,

3384-516: The remains of ancient, microscopic algae ( diatoms ) and other once-living things. These natural deposits of bitumen have been formed during the Carboniferous period, when giant swamp forests dominated many parts of the Earth. They were deposited in the mud on the bottom of the ocean or lake where the organisms lived. Under the heat (above 50 °C) and pressure of burial deep in the earth,

3456-730: The remains were transformed into materials such as bitumen, kerogen , or petroleum. Natural deposits of bitumen include lakes such as the Pitch Lake in Trinidad and Tobago and Lake Bermudez in Venezuela . Natural seeps occur in the La Brea Tar Pits and the McKittrick Tar Pits in California , as well as in the Dead Sea . Bitumen also occurs in unconsolidated sandstones known as "oil sands" in Alberta , Canada, and

3528-436: The routes unsatisfactory over time, and by the 1950s, they had been replaced with bitumen surfaced roads. Types of roads Wittmoor bog trackway The Wittmoor bog trackway is the name given to each of two historic corduroy roads , trackway No. I being discovered in 1898 and trackway No. II in 1904 in the Wittmoor bog in northern Hamburg , Germany. The trackways date to the 4th and 7th century AD, both linked

3600-463: The similar "tar sands" in Utah , US. The Canadian province of Alberta has most of the world's reserves, in three huge deposits covering 142,000 square kilometres (55,000 sq mi), an area larger than England or New York state . These bituminous sands contain 166 billion barrels (26.4 × 10 ^  m ) of commercially established oil reserves, giving Canada the third largest oil reserves in

3672-428: The space at the bottom of the steps leading from Waterloo Place to St. James Park". "The formation in 1838 of Claridge's Patent Asphalte Company (with a distinguished list of aristocratic patrons, and Marc and Isambard Brunel as, respectively, a trustee and consulting engineer), gave an enormous impetus to the development of a British asphalt industry". "By the end of 1838, at least two other companies, Robinson's and

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3744-736: The stone artefacts, suggesting that bitumen was an important and frequently-used component of tool making for people in that region at that time. Geochemical analyses of the asphaltic residues places its source to localized natural bitumen outcroppings in the Bichri Massif, about 40 km northeast of the Umm el Tlel archeological site. A re-examination of artifacts uncovered in 1908 at Le Moustier rock shelters in France has identified Mousterian stone tools that were attached to grips made of ochre and bitumen. The grips were formulated with 55% ground goethite ochre and 45% cooked liquid bitumen to create

3816-486: The surface above underlying petroleum deposits. All three groups used the substance as an adhesive. It is found on many different artifacts of tools and ceremonial items. For example, it was used on rattles to adhere gourds or turtle shells to rattle handles. It was also used in decorations. Small round shell beads were often set in asphaltum to provide decorations. It was used as a sealant on baskets to make them watertight for carrying water, possibly poisoning those who drank

3888-457: The surface. Also in this part of the bog peat was regularly taken for fuel production, which gradually destroyed the trackway. The well-preserved wooden planks of the way were taken by the peat cutters and used as firewood . Bog trackway No. II (location: 53°42′00″N 10°04′10″E  /  53.699984°N 10.069399°E  / 53.699984; 10.069399 ) was discovered in 1904 by Hamburg state geologist Dr. Wolff. It too runs in

3960-764: The technology failed to live up to its promise, and millions of dollars in investments evaporated almost overnight. Three plank roads, the Hackensack , the Paterson , and the Newark , were major arteries in northern New Jersey . The roads travelled over the New Jersey Meadowlands , connecting the cities for which they were named to the Hudson River waterfront. U.S. Route 1 in Virginia follows

4032-454: The term is less commonly used today. In American English , "asphalt" is equivalent to the British "bitumen". However, "asphalt" is also commonly used as a shortened form of " asphalt concrete " (therefore equivalent to the British "asphalt" or "tarmac"). In Canadian English , the word "bitumen" is used to refer to the vast Canadian deposits of extremely heavy crude oil , while "asphalt"

4104-417: The terms asphalt and bitumen are often used interchangeably and refer both to natural and manufactured forms of the substance, although there is regional variation as to which term is most common. Worldwide, geologists tend to favor the term bitumen for the naturally occurring material. For the manufactured material, which is a refined residue from the distillation process of selected crude oils, bitumen

4176-559: The town is built directly over a hilly, rocky shore. ATVs are the only mode of transportation there. In Perth , Western Australia , plank roads were important in the early growth of the agricultural and outer urban areas because of the distances imposed by swamps and the relatively-infertile soil. As it cost £2,000/km to construct roads by conventional means, the local councils, known as road boards, were experimenting with cheaper approaches to road building. A method called Jandakot Corduroy had been developed at Jandakot south-east of Perth:

4248-433: The trackway. This bog trackway was built up in a much easier technique than the older bog trackway II The path consisted of clean-hewn oak planks ranging from 180 centimetres (71 in) to 200 centimetres (79 in) in length and 20 centimetres (7.9 in) to 30 centimetres (12 in) width laid directly on the surface of the bog. The trackway was embedded in the peat in a depth of only 1 metre (3.3 ft) from below

4320-609: The water. Asphalt was used also to seal the planks on ocean-going canoes. Asphalt was first used to pave streets in the 1870s. At first naturally occurring "bituminous rock" was used, such as at Ritchie Mines in Macfarlan in Ritchie County, West Virginia from 1852 to 1873. In 1876, asphalt-based paving was used to pave Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC, in time for the celebration of the national centennial. In

4392-525: The world is the Pitch Lake of southwest Trinidad , which is estimated to contain 10 million tons. About 70% of annual bitumen production is destined for road construction , its primary use. In this application, bitumen is used to bind aggregate particles like gravel and forms a substance referred to as asphalt concrete , which is colloquially termed asphalt . Its other main uses lie in bituminous waterproofing products, such as roofing felt and roof sealant. In material sciences and engineering ,

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4464-547: The world. Although historically it was used without refining to pave roads, nearly all of the output is now used as raw material for oil refineries in Canada and the United States. The world's largest deposit of natural bitumen, known as the Athabasca oil sands , is located in the McMurray Formation of Northern Alberta. This formation is from the early Cretaceous , and is composed of numerous lenses of oil-bearing sand with up to 20% oil. Isotopic studies show

4536-882: Was a valuable strategic resource. It was the object of the first known battle for a hydrocarbon deposit – between the Seleucids and the Nabateans in 312 BC. In the ancient Far East, natural bitumen was slowly boiled to get rid of the higher fractions , leaving a thermoplastic material of higher molecular weight that, when layered on objects, became hard upon cooling. This was used to cover objects that needed waterproofing, such as scabbards and other items. Statuettes of household deities were also cast with this type of material in Japan, and probably also in China. In North America , archaeological recovery has indicated that bitumen

4608-439: Was discovered in 1898, in 1900 and 1901 Frahm excavated a part of the trackway together with Prof. Wilms and it was re-examined by the archaeologists Prejawa and Kolumbe in the 1930s. The trackway ran in southeasterly direction through the Wittmoor and had a length of about 500 metres (1,600 ft). Even during World War II most of the western part of the pead bog were cut for fuel production which destroyed large sections of

4680-479: Was expended to build paths through the marsh rather than circumvent the area. No archaeological evidence for settlements have been detected belonging to the bog trackways. Download coordinates as: Bitumen Bitumen ( UK : / ˈ b ɪ tʃ ʊ m ɪ n / BIH -chuum-in , US : / b ɪ ˈ tj uː m ɪ n , b aɪ -/ bih- TEW -min, by- ) is an immensely viscous constituent of petroleum . Depending on its exact composition it can be

4752-557: Was more widely used. However, the First World War ruined the Clarmac Company, which entered into liquidation in 1915. The failure of Clarmac Roads Ltd had a flow-on effect to Claridge's Company, which was itself compulsorily wound up, ceasing operations in 1917, having invested a substantial amount of funds into the new venture, both at the outset and in a subsequent attempt to save the Clarmac Company. Bitumen

4824-440: Was shaped into tool handles or used as an adhesive for attaching stone tools to hafts . The earliest evidence of bitumen use was discovered when archeologists identified bitumen material on Levallois flint artefacts that date to about 71,000 years BP at the Umm el Tlel open-air site, located on the northern slope of the Qdeir Plateau in el Kowm Basin in Central Syria. Microscopic analyses found bituminous residue on two-thirds of

4896-487: Was sometimes used to adhere stone projectile points to wooden shafts. In Canada, aboriginal people used bitumen seeping out of the banks of the Athabasca and other rivers to waterproof birch bark canoes , and also heated it in smudge pots to ward off mosquitoes in the summer. Bitumen was also used to waterproof plank canoes used by indigenous peoples in pre-colonial southern California. In 1553, Pierre Belon described in his work Observations that pissasphalto ,

4968-401: Was subsequently shortened to "bitumen", thence passing via French into English. From the same root is derived the Anglo Saxon word "cwidu" (Mastix), the German word "Kitt" (cement or mastic) and the old Norse word "kvada". The word "ašphalt" is claimed to have been derived from the Accadian term "asphaltu" or "sphallo", meaning "to split". It was later adopted by the Homeric Greeks in

5040-401: Was the type most used in the 1840s and 50s". In 1914, Claridge's Company entered into a joint venture to produce tar-bound macadam , with materials manufactured through a subsidiary company called Clarmac Roads Ltd. Two products resulted, namely Clarmac , and Clarphalte , with the former being manufactured by Clarmac Roads and the latter by Claridge's Patent Asphalte Co., although Clarmac

5112-443: Was thought in 19th century Britain to contain chemicals with medicinal properties. Extracts from bitumen were used to treat catarrh and some forms of asthma and as a remedy against worms, especially the tapeworm . The first use of bitumen in the New World was by aboriginal peoples. On the west coast, as early as the 13th century, the Tongva , Luiseño and Chumash peoples collected the naturally occurring bitumen that seeped to

5184-407: Was used as mortar in the walls of Babylon . The 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) long Euphrates Tunnel beneath the river Euphrates at Babylon in the time of Queen Semiramis ( c.  800 BC ) was reportedly constructed of burnt bricks covered with bitumen as a waterproofing agent. Bitumen was used by ancient Egyptians to embalm mummies. The Persian word for asphalt is moom , which

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