BRICK (probably allied to break, originally meaning a fragment; cf. Fr. brique, a piece, fragment ). The earliest examples of this branch of the ceramic art were doubtless the sun-dried bricks of Egypt. Assyria. and Babylonia. Re markable to say, many of these, which, in a northern climate, the frosts of a single winter would destroy. have been preserved for 3000 years or more by the dry, warm atmosphere of those countries. Sun-baked bricks of ancient date arc also found in the mud walls of old towns in India. Kiln-baked bricks must have been the products of a later time; but they are found in all the chief ruins of ancient Babylonia, where they were often used to face or bind to gether walls of sun-dried bricks, and occasionally they were even ornamented with enameled colors. These ancient. bricks, whether baked by the sun or by fire, were all made of clay mixed with grass or straw. The ancient Greeks. probably owing to their possessing plenty of stone, cared little for building with burned clay; but most of the great ruins in Rome were originally built of brick, and the Romans appear to have introduced the art into England. Interesting historical information
has been obtained from the impressions on Ito man and especially on Babylonian bricks. In many instances the Roman bricks found in Eng land have been removed from their original posi tion, and employed in the construction of build ings of later date. The earliest instance in which bricks of the modern or Flemish make occur in England is Little Ball, in Suffolk (1260), In America bricks were made in Virginia as early as 1(112; in New England. in 1647, and in Philadelphia. in 1685. The hand-power brick machine was invented in 1835 by Nathaniel Adams, of Cornwall. N. Y. A little later he de signed a briek-machine operated by horse-power, and he also invented a tempering wheel for work ing clay.