# Uses of metal wire prior to the electric age? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 27, 2013, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886 "2013-11-27T03:24:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![SirRay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@SirRay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SirRay)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/1 "2013-11-27T03:24:38Z")
Reading a book concerning the adoption of electrical lighting systems around the turn of the previous century, as you may guess metal wires (and cable) play a important but unsung supporting role. OK, before such lights and their attendant newfangled generators (you need a lot of fine copper wire for good windings), there were telegraph systems which required large amounts of wire, and before that there many experimenters with their voltaic piles, ledyen jars, and twitchy frog muscles - these guys were using wire from the early 1700s (well, some like Ben Franklin, were using silk). Where’d they get it? Being a good doper, I checked the wiki on wire, and there is a short history section - as I expected, most applications pre-electrical age were for jewelry and decoration, with a mention of British wire mills being found in the 1560s, to make pins and wool cards (guess those were iron). So that’s two uses for wire, jewelry and pins. I also considered military uses, such as chain mail (are the loops cut from wire?) and perhaps crossbow wire-strings, and musical usage such as harps and lutes…and then I hit a wall. Did they use cable in any great quantity prior to the industrial age? What else would they have used metal wire for back then? ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/2 "2013-11-27T03:31:27Z")
Hay bales. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/3 "2013-11-27T03:36:54Z")
Barbed wire and other types of fencing. ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/4 "2013-11-27T03:39:25Z")
Fusee wire in clock mechanisms. ---
**Author:** ![JBDivmstr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b4bc9f/32.png) [@JBDivmstr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JBDivmstr)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/5 "2013-11-27T05:30:29Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > Hay bales. Are you sure about that? :dubious: The hay bales that I recall from my youth were always tied with a type of twine called, appropriately enough, ‘hay rope’. I think that the use of ‘baling wire’ came about afterwards. ---
**Author:** ![Telperion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telperion/32/509_2.png) [@Telperion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperion)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/6 "2013-11-27T05:36:24Z")
Wire was used to make pins, so that may have been one of the main uses before industrialization. From the mid-19th century, nails were also cut from wire. ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/7 "2013-11-27T05:39:00Z")
[Piano strings.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_wire#History) ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/8 "2013-11-27T05:44:31Z")
Gold or silver wire was sometimes used in embroidery. Chaucer has mention of wire being used in compasses (to fix the needle to the centre of the rose, I’d guess). And I suspect there were other manufacturing/craft applications. Oh, and for cutting cheese, soap, butter and the like. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/9 "2013-11-27T05:45:40Z")
> [@JBDivmstr](#): > > Are you sure about that? :dubious: > The hay bales that I recall from my youth were always tied with a type of twine called, appropriately enough, ‘hay rope’. I think that the use of ‘baling wire’ came about afterwards. No, before. I remember baler twine from when I was a kid, too, but the older guys had plenty to say about the wire bales they used to have to deal with. > **[Baling wire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baling_wire)** > > Baling wire, otherwise known as bale wire, farm wire, haywire, or soft wire, is a type of wire used in agriculture and industry for many uses such as mending fences or manually binding rectangular bales of hay, straw, or cut grass. It is also used in many non-agricultural applications, such as banding together corrugated cardboard, paper, textiles, aluminum and other materials that are processed in the recycling industry. > Baling wire is also known as bale wire, farm wire, haywire, or soft wire, ... > [@](#): > > Baling wire was a commonly used product for many years before it was replaced by baling twine in the late 1970s. A little before then, I think. None of the dairy farmers I lived around in the late 60s were still using wire bales. ETA: Don’t confuse this with modern day round bales. The smaller size bales that one picked up by hand used to be wire bound before twine balers came in. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 7:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/10 "2013-11-27T07:55:56Z")
I’m not sure when they first baled hay (as opposed to just loading it loose in the wagon), but I’d be surprised if it were earlier than the late 19th century and more likely some time in the 20th. So it’s not what the OP is looking for. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/11 "2013-11-27T10:15:43Z")
Mail (“chain mail” is a neologism) _was_ made from wire. But the advantage of mail is that it’s made from lots of short lengths. Wire was made by hand or by mill power, using a [draw plate](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draw_plate) or just smithing to shape (kind of like how noodles are formed by pulling, only with hot metal) ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 10:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/12 "2013-11-27T10:46:28Z")
Wire cable, as in rope was in use by the early Victorian period, I would imagine the techniques were highly relevant since this was the industrialisation of a very much older process of wire manufacture ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 11:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/13 "2013-11-27T11:05:13Z")
Stiff wire can be coiled, tempered and annealed into springs. I don’t know when the first helical springs were made, but it might well be before the age of electricity. ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/14 "2013-11-27T11:21:35Z")
According to this page coiled springs were in use in the 15th century; [http://www.madehow.com/Volume-6/Springs.html](http://www.madehow.com/Volume-6/Springs.html) I wouldn’t be surprised if they existed even earlier. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/15 "2013-11-27T12:42:06Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > Barbed wire and other types of fencing. Nope. Barbed wire is a much more recent invention than you’d think. It was invented in the second half of the 19th century. I doubt if anyone was using wire for fencing much before that. Lotsa sources, but Wikipedia is, as always, the most accessible: > **[Barbed wire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbed_wire)** > > Barbed wire, also known as barb wire or bob wire, is a type of steel fencing wire constructed with sharp edges or points arranged at intervals along the strands. Its primary use is the construction of inexpensive fences, and it is also used as a security measure atop walls surrounding property. As a wire obstacle, it is a major feature of the fortifications in trench warfare. > A person or animal trying to pass through or over barbed wire will suffer discomfort and possibly injury. Barbed wire f... As already stated, wire was used in decoration. There are plenty of illustrations and surviving examples of wire pulls, used mainly to make wire for metalwork and jewelry. Wire may also have been used for heavy-duty fastening, but I can’t honestly think of examples. regarding electricity – the early experimenters used a lot of non-metallic conductors in place of wire, much of the time – silken ribbon and pack threads. One of the difficulties I’ve always had with suggestions that the ancients might have done things like electroplating, using things like the “Baghdad battery” is precisely because it seems incredibly unlikely that the parallel development of metal wires for conduction (and the knowledge that they could have been used for this) existed. > **[Baghdad Battery](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baghdad_battery)** > > The Baghdad Battery is the name given to a set of three artifacts which were found together: a ceramic pot, a tube of copper, and a rod of iron. It was discovered in present-day Khujut Rabu, Iraq in 1936, close to the ancient city of Ctesiphon, the capital of the Parthian (150 BC – 223 AD) and Sasanian (224–650 AD) empires, and it is believed to date from either of these periods. > Its origin and purpose remain unclear. Wilhelm König, at the time director of the National Museum of Iraq, suggested ... ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/16 "2013-11-27T12:46:15Z")
One other use: Bell pulls and the like. When I was a kid, you could still purchase something called “bell wire” in the general goods stores, and it always bothered me that such wire was not insulated – who’d make wire for doorbells that could bleed off the voltage like that? I was too far removed from the age in which the force of a pulled handle at the door ran along the walls over pulleys to physically move a bell in the kitchen or servant’s quarters to know that this is what the wire was intended for – not for carrying electricity at all. To this day I wonder what most of the “bell wire” from my youth was actually used for. Probably not for bell pulls. Thomas Jefferson had pantographs, which could have used string or various kinds of cord, but would’ve worked better with wire. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/17 "2013-11-27T13:37:56Z")
One thing to remember is that before the mid-1800s or so, iron and steel was expensive (steel in particular). So before then, while wire theoretically could have been used for baling hay or other low-impact, high-volume things, I wouldn’t expect very much actually was. ---
**Author:** ![SirRay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@SirRay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SirRay)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/18 "2013-11-27T14:34:12Z")
Thanks for the replies so far. I should have qualified my question by adding a somewhat arbitrary cut-off, say 1745 (when the Leyden jar was invented). This would exclude usage such as Barbed Wire (although, did they have other types of wire fences before 1745?). That said - coil springs (I guess fusee clocks use springs of a sort), that’s a good answer - this leads to the question of how much wire would mechanical clocks/watches use in their workings besides springs and pendulums (this use would go beyond the jewelry/decorative usage already mentioned). As for Piano/Guitar/other string instruments, I’m lumping those with the Harp & Lute I mentioned in my OP. > [@Quercus](#): > > One thing to remember is that before the mid-1800s or so, iron and steel was expensive (steel in particular). This I agree was true, and keeping it in mind, let me rephrase the question a bit - say I was a Western European natural philosopher in 1700, and wanted to study this cool phenomonon of electricity, and didn’t want to fool with amber or silk. What would have been the most likely source of suitable metal wire available to a civilian of the time? Music wire? Wire that would be otherwise used for pins/combs? Wire for military usage? Other souces that I can’t think of? ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/19 "2013-11-27T15:20:41Z")
> [@SirRay](#): > > As for Piano/Guitar/other string instruments, I’m lumping those with the Harp & Lute I mentioned in my OP. Weren’t gut strings more common for musical instruments prior to the 20th century? I thought steel strings were around for folk/blues guitar in the 19th century, but didn’t really get popular for other instruments until after the electric pickup was invented. But I could be wrong, and a quick search didn’t bring any enlightenment. Someone please fight my ignorance. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/20 "2013-11-27T15:36:54Z")
> [@SirRay](#): > > Thanks for the replies so far. > > I should have qualified my question by adding a somewhat arbitrary cut-off, say 1745 (when the Leyden jar was invented). This would exclude usage such as Barbed Wire (although, did they have other types of wire fences before 1745?). see my post. Barbed Wire didn’t come out until after 1850. I haven’t sen reference to wire used in any other type of fence before then, but I don’t really know. I suspect not – Historical re-creations, like Sturbridge Village or Farmer’s Village, which re-create life from the first half of the 19th century, don’t have wire fences. Chicken wire was apparently invented in 1844: > **[Chicken wire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_wire)** > > Chicken wire, or poultry netting, is a mesh of wire commonly used to fence in fowl, such as chickens, in a run or coop. It is made of thin, flexible, galvanized steel wire with hexagonal gaps. Available in .mw-parser-output .frac{white-space:nowrap}.mw-parser-output .frac .num,.mw-parser-output .frac .den{font-size:80%;line-height:0;vertical-align:super}.mw-parser-output .frac .den{vertical-align:sub}.mw-parser-output .sr-only{border:0;clip:rect(0,0,0,0);clip-path:polygon(0px 0px,0px 0px,0px 0px)... …as was chain-link fencing: > **[Chain-link fencing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chain-link_fencing)** > > A chain-link fence (also referred to as wire netting, wire-mesh fence, chain-wire fence, cyclone fence, hurricane fence, or diamond-mesh fence) is a type of woven fence usually made from galvanized or linear low-density polyethylene-coated steel wire. The wires run vertically and are bent into a zigzag pattern so that each "zig" hooks with the wire immediately on one side and each "zag" with the wire immediately on the other. This forms the characteristic diamond pattern seen in this type of fe... [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886.md?page=2)