It has been thought that brick were made in England, under the direction of Alfred the Great, as early as A. D. 886, and it is possible that, in rebuilding London and other cities which had been destroyed by the Danes, brick were used ; but this is not probable, as there are but few buildings in any part of West ern Europe now in existence that are earlier than the eleventh century, and if brick were made in the time of Alfred, in Eng land, there are none at present in existence, and no authentic history of any building erected in his reign in which they are said to have been used, and it is most probable that the earliest true modern or Flemish brick building existing in England is Little Wenham Hall, in Suffolk, which was erected in A. D. 1260.
In the reign of Henry VI. brick construction was not general, Hurstmonceaux Castle, Sussex, built early in his reign, being one of the principal brick buildings of that period ; but under Henry VIII. and Elizabeth the manufacture of brick flourished, and they were used mostly for large buildings, the smaller ones being of timber construction, in which small panels of orna mental brickwork were sometimes formed and exposed between the upright studs.
Only a few instances of early fourteenth century brick-work occur, and they are towards the close of the style ; but in the fifteenth century brickwork became common, and we have in the Lollards' Tower, of Lambeth Palace, built in A. D. 1454, and the Manor House, or older portion of Hampton Court Palace, Middlesex, built in A. D. 1514, good examples of the English brick architecture in times. The ecclesias tical and palatial architecture of Italy of this period is rich in many beautiful specimens of brick-work, and in addition to the employment of colored decorative brick-work, the most elabor ate mouldings and ornamentation in terra-cotta and brick are exhibited.
Until the first quarter of the seventeenth century, the brick made in England were of many different sizes, but by Charles I., in A. D. 1625, their size was regulated and made nearly uniform.
After the great fire of London in September, A. D. 1666, brick was the material universally used in the reconstruction, and ornaments carved with the chisel were introduced into some of the brick-work erected towards the last of that century in that city.
In A. D. 1784, brick were subjected to taxation by George III., which burden was not repealed until A. D. 1850; the tax for this time, two-thirds of a century, averaging about 4s. 7d. per thousand for common brick, and about ios. per thousand for the finer grades.
The material of which a town is built depends generally upon the geology of the surrounding district; as in a mountainous country, like Scotland, cities of stone, such as Edinburgh, Glas gow, and Aberdeen, naturally abound ; but London and most of the great cities of England, being situated in alluvial valleys and plains, are built of brick made from the alluvial clay be neath and around them. In Holland and the other provinces
of the Netherlands, where no stone except a very soft and in ferior sandstone is found, the use of brick as the chief building material became almost universal from earliest times, even the paving of the streets and other public works being done with brick. There are buildings in some cities of the Netherlands in which stone has been largely used, but they are the excep tion rather than the rule.
Peter Mortier, in a small book published in A. D. 1782, gives a description of the city hall of Amsterdam. He says that the old city hall was erected earlier than A. D. 1400, that the front and sides rested on divers stone columns, and that on one side there was a four-square stone steeple ; that the building was burned July 7, A. D. 1682, and the heat was so great that everything was consumed except a piece of brick-work in the steeple. The new building was constructed on the site of the old one, but was commenced in 1684, part of the old structure having been taken down to make room for the new. In order to obtain a foundation for the new building, 13,659 piles were driven, upon which were placed seven feet of brick-work to form the foundation.
It was under Wouter Van Twiller, of Amsterdam, a governor appointed by the Dutch West India Company, that the first brick buildings were erected in this country. In 1633, soon after his arrival on Manhattan Island, Governor Van Twiller erected for his own use a substantial brick house, which was the most elaborate private dwelling which had up to that time been attempted in America, and during the remainder of the Dutch dynasty this dwelling served for the residence of the successive chiefs of the colony. He also built several small brick dwell ings for the officers, which, with his own, were erected within the walls of the fort. The brick used in these buildings were brought from Amsterdam, and were of such a good quality that but few were broken in the long and rough voyage. The Dutch seem to have succeeded well in making a strong and very durable quality of brick, which brick have been famous from an early period for soundness, and specimens of them brought over by the early settlers from Holland are yet to be met with in some of the old Dutch houses of New York.