When I was younger, I dreamt of being visited by Santa Claus, and give me my Christmas presents personally. They said that Santa Claus will come down from the chimney wall and will secretly sneak my presents under the Christmas tree. With that information, I made it a habit to stay near the fireplace from where I know our chimney is connected. When I grew older, the idea made me smile. However, my knowledge about Santa’s passage widens when I had a research project on architectural history; it is the evolution of the chimney.
A long time ago in the Roman Era people enjoyed the convenience of having pipes inside their houses that keeps the smoke from filling up the whole house. However, everything came to an end, when the Roman Empire fell; most people went back to their old ways of keeping themselves warm. The cold and chilly nights obliged them to put up fire inside their houses. It started with a simple bonfire where they assemble in the place where it could heat up the whole shelter. The inconvenience of having this bonfire inside are countless; of course the suffocating smoke stuffing the whole place is number one, not to mention the embers and ashes that can will eventually dominate your place. To let the smoke out that makes the villagers bore a hole on their ceilings. However, most of their roofs are having that black ashen trademark. As time passed by, people were also embracing development and so as their houses. Influences from different invading cultures gave birth to two-storey houses. With this design, the homeowner cannot afford to put a bonfire in the middle of their house because they cannot just simple poke their ceiling because there is another floor. This dilemma of not heating the whole place gave the people the idea to excavate in their walls and build fire, and then they poke a hole in the external part so the smoke can be vented out. Men were naturally smart that they develop a venting system that brings the smoke outside the house. It was developed further when the houses needing chimneys are getting larger in sizes. Thus they created a way in which all the flues and smoke piping are interconnected and smoke will eventually be released in one main outlet on top of the roof.
Modernization also allowed the structure of the chimneys to evolve and be more stylish. However, the traditional ones are more appealing for they somewhat give an ambiance of being in the medieval times. This part of our home, though sometimes we find it insignificant but it also reminds us on how intelligent men were and how they struggled to survive. A simple chimney evolution can make us see how ingenious and smart men are.