History, asked by ss37303, 5 months ago

The wheel was used to make posts ​

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Answered by diyamalick779
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The wheel is probably history's most important technological innovation. Yet, as obvious as the device seems today, in ancient times it was anything but that. Archaeological evidence indicates that although human beings first settled in villages about 10,000 years ago, nearly 5,000 years would pass before anyone invented a wheel or, at least, before the idea would become popular enough to leave evidence of its existence. Through that time, people hauled heavy loads of lumber, stone, farm produce and other things without wheeled vehicles. The oldest evidence of a wheel, dating from 5,500 years ago, is a Sumerian picture, carved in clay, of a sledge equipped with wheels, making it a cart. Sumer, in what is now southern Iraq, also produced some of the world's first cities and, more important, invented writing. Historians of technology suspect that the idea for the wheel came from an older technology that used logs as rollers. This is probably how ancient Egyptians moved blocks of stone, weighing many tons and used to build pyramids. As the rolled cargo overshot the frontmost roller, workers would carry one left behind and place it in front of the block or sledge. What distinguishes a wheel from a log roller is its axle, the rod attached to the cart's platform that keeps the wheel in place under the cargo,eliminating the need to lay more rollers ahead of the moving load. The earliest wheels consisted of three carved wooden planks clamped together by wooden cross pieces, or battens. A hole in the center was fitted with a carved, wooden, cylindrical axle. To keep the axle from wearing away, bearings were added. The simplest was a sleeve of leather fitted between axle and wheel. Some historians think that the idea of the wheel then spread slowly. The oldest evidence of wheels in India, for example, dates from 4,500 years ago. The wheel did not reach Europe until 3,000 years ago. In the Old World, one of the last peoples to adopt the wheel were the Britons just 2,500 years ago. In the New World, the only evidence that anyone thought of wheels consists of small toy carts made of clay that were dug up in ancient Mexican sites.

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