Sunday, November 14, 2010

English renaissance inventions

tolietpaper.gif (1042 bytes)Flush Toilet
Sir John Harrington, godson to Queen Elizabeth, made the first flush toilet for himself and his godmother in 1596. He was teased by his friends and never made another one although he and Queen Elizabeth continued to use the one he did make.
Two hundred years later Alexander Cummings reinvented the flush toilet more commonly called the water closet. Cummings invented the strap. The strap was a sliding valve between the bowl and the trap.
Two years later in 1777 Samuel Prosser applied for and received a patent for a plunger closet. A year later Joseph Bramah invented a valve at the bottom of the bowl that worked on a hinge.
wallpaper.gif (949 bytes)Wallpaper
In 1496 the first paper mill came into operation in England. English artist soon make wallpaper decorated with hand painted designs, stencils, and wood-block prints. For the next 200 years England was a large producer of wallpaper for Europe.Before wallpaper was invented only the wealthy people could afforded to decorate the wall of their castles. They used woven tapestries. The tapestries kept the cold castle walls warmer. The designs woven into the tapestries told stories. The lower class hung cheaper painted cloth imitations for the walls of their homes
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