A while back, I was watching this cable show on King Arthur. Apparently, there really was such a man. But his times were nothing like those depicted in the movies. For one thing, castles and other structures were made of wood, not stone and mortar. But (the host assured us), wooden structures are just as sturdy and long-lasting as stone. To which, I say, BS. For one thing, there are no wood structures around today from hundreds of years ago.
Anyways, I am not going to make this a debate about the longevity of wood structures. That would belong in GD. My question is really quite simple: What is the oldest wooden structure (in the world) that is still around today?
And here I thought the stave churches of Norway were the oldest.
Obviously, only a percentage of these wooden buildings will still be the original wood. The wiki said the Japanese shrine was about 15% seventh century wood. Still very impressive.
The Engyo-ji group of temples in Japan (setting for the film The Last Samurai) are so old that several of the buildings were* rebuilt* more than 500 years ago.
The Dome of the Rock, on the Temple Mount, dates from the seventh century and is partly made of wood, though Ship of Theseus arguments certainly cast doubt on how many pieces of wood actually date from its initial construction.
Weeell, not entirely true. Wood, wattle and daub, and a thatched roof made up the finest homes and halls in post-Roman Britain, including “Arthur’s” at Cadbury Castle, in Somerset. A bit (whole lot? entirely?) more Beowulf than Excaliber. There was some use of mortared stone, like the Romans used, but mostly it was set dry. The walls of a fort were usually soil and/or rubble fill, tied together with an embedded wooden framework, with a wooden palisade on top and a dry stone facing if they got fancy, much like the Murus Gallicus that impressed Caesar with its strength. Some forts had more dressed and fitted stone, but were nothing that Bavaria’s Mad King Ludwig would recognize as a castle.
Wow, reading Alcock’s “Arthur’s Britain” at lunch (he ran the dig at Cadbury) has paid off with TWO posts! The first being a minor rant about how he spent the first 120 pages trying to assemble a chronology from two or three sources that he demonstrated were totally unreliable and contradictory. Still, it was more interesting than my job.
As for what is thought to be the earliest surviving balloon-frame (2x4 frame with siding; held up by the strength of the frame, not heavy cornerposts) house from about 1840 can be visited in the western suburbs of Chicago. A prototype for most homes built today in the US.
There’s a bunch of Elizabethan pensioners’ cottages in Stratford-on-Avon, so dating from the 1500’s IIRC.
As for wood pieces on mixed-construction buildings, a number of medieval churches still have the original roofs, as far as I can tell. yes, they are stone, but the roofing is original wood - all the classics like Notre Dame, York, Salisbury, Sienna, etc. I’m not clear how much of, say, the Tower of London’s central White Tower flooring and roofing is original wood dating back to the Norman conquest. The Doge’s palace in Venice has a large audience room with an incredibly wide flat roof, no doubt much of it original. (The islands of Venice are stabilized, since the 800’s, by tall trees pounded in as piles into the lagoon mud.)
The trouble with wood is that it is singularly more flammable than stone. In a world where candles provided light and open fires provided heat, the wood bits disappeared faster than the rock bits (see “London, Great Fire of”). Flaming arrows might eventually work to bring down a fortification, but only if the besieging forces could wait things out a while. Many medieval castles were built originally on small artificial hills originally topped with a wood palisade until the lord could afford rock construction, so even if you burned a hole in the palisade, it was still an uphill battle…
The wooden floors and roofs of the White Tower are all much later, although there are a few bits of wood elsewhere in the structure that do date from the late eleventh century.
The ceilings in most of the major rooms in the Doge’s Palace date from after the serious fires in 1574 and 1577. Which is why they are decorated with paintings by the likes of Tintoretto and Veronese.
Japan is really to place to look for very old wooden buildings. Under the right conditions, not only does wood last a long, long time, but its structural strength improves with age.
It’s not quite a Ship of Theseus problem, but all the oldest Japanese buildings have been completely taken apart and rebuilt. Is it still the same building if it’s (mostly) the same pieces of wood in the same configuration?
Extent buildings built before the 9th century are:
Horyu-ji Sanctuary Hall (Kondo) c. 670
Was damaged by fire in 1949 during restoration work. About 15-20% of the wood is original, so this might not fully qualify.
Horyu-ji Pagoda c. 670
This is the oldest wooden building in the world. It was fully deconstructed in the 1930s and rebuilt after WW2. Analysis of the wood showed it was felled in the late 6th century, though it might be a bit later, as outer rings were likely shaved off.
Hokki-ji Pagoda 638
Built around the same time as the Horyu-ji pagoda, this smaller tower was unfortunately rebuilt and modified in 1678. However, it was again deconstructed in 1970 and in 1975, using the 7th century wood was rebuilt to its original shape. Or something close to it. Does it count? Certainly a lot of the wood in it is very old.
Yakushi-ji Pagoda 730
A bit more recent than Horyu-ji’s pagoda, it was recently deconstructed and is undergoing restoration work.
There are many more “recent” buildings from the 9th century onward. I can’t think of anywhere else in the world where you can see so many millennial wooden buildings. Not only are these buildings extremely old, because they’ve been taken good care of, they look great.
There is also a building at the base of the Great Pyramid housing the Solar Boat. This boat was found in a pit beside the pyramid; it was disassembled, and has been reassembled and put on display. it’s 143 feet long, 20 feet wide. I suppose technically, since it has a little cabin on board, it might qualify for this thread. (Which occurred to me as my wallpaper cycles through pics of my Egypt trip). Of course, sitting in a ready-to-assemble state for 2600 years might not qualify.
The wood is about 4600 years old, dating back to the Pyramid of Khufu, 2500BC. Apparently there’s another one in a second pit which has been left 'as is" for now. The museum building also has on display neatly coiled and knotted ropes from the original boat.
If you want to know what it takes to preserve wood - a sealed, extremely dry pit above the water table is probably your best bet for preserving wood, or pickled and dried pharaohs. Oxygen with water are probably what does in most wood over time.
