08-16-2017, 09:48 PM
Civil engineering the art of construction of all kinds of
buildings has been at man's service since the beginning of
civilisation evolution. These buildings are dwelling as well
as public buildings, industrial buildings, bridges, viaducts,
tunnels, roads and railways, highways and airports, liquid
reservoirs and loose-material containers, weirs, dams, offshore
structures, TV towers, and a lot of other structures that
form the environment that we live in.
Human activity in the eld of civil engineering goes far
back into the past, when man observing nature around him
began to imitate and to improve it in order to create safer and
better living conditions. Moreover, relatively early he
noticed that his engineering works'' apart from reliability,
durability and functionality had to have elements of harmony
and beauty. The same opinion was expressed by
Socrates when he said that everything created by man should
be functional, durable and beautiful.
The development of civil engineering in the course of
centuries meant a constant struggle with available materials,
spans, or height, active loads and the forces of nature
water, re, wind and earthquakes. Some of those elements
have primary and the other secondary signi cance. Amongst
those mentioned rst, an essential role has always been
attributed to the in uence of the material on construction
development.
First of all, ancient communities had at their disposal
natural materials such as stone and timber. In the course of
time, they learned how to use clay to form bricks, an
arti cial stones, which were rst dried only in the sun
and then baked. In the main civilisation centres (the Middle
East, the Near East, and the Mediterranean region) the hot
climate and inconsiderate economy led, in a short time, to
the elimination of timber as a building material. It did
not happen in the wood-abounding countries of Middle
and Eastern Europe, Scandinavian and the Asiatic part of
Russia.
Stone and brick brittle materials dominated civil
engineering in the region of European civilisation for several
centuries: from stone pyramids in Egypt 3000 years B.C. until
the so-called First Industrial Revolution in England (the turn
of the 18th and 19th centuries). They were suitable building
materials for erecting walls and columns but at the same
time, due to their low tensile bending strength, they caused a
lot of problems in horizontal elements. Therefore a vaulted
arch that was popular in ancient Rome, semicircular in its
primary form, was the pattern that was to be employed for
elements or structures of larger span.
The arch in the course of time became lighter and
less massive. The ratio of span-to-width of piers carrying
vertical and horizontal loads became increasingly greater.
During the early Middle Ages no improvements were
implemented. It was not until Gothic and the Renaissance
that new forms and ideas were introduced. However,
still they were always based on elements that were in the
forms of arches, curvilinear vaults with more and more
developed forms (e.g. cloister vault, cross vault, barrel
vault, lierne vault).
