The history of mudbrick production and construction in the
southern Levant may be dated as far back as the
Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (e.g., PPNA Jericho). These sun dried mudbricks, also known as adobe or just mudbrick, were made from a mixture of sand, clay, water, frequently tempered with chopped straw and chaff branches, and were the most common material for constructing earthen buildings throughout the ancient Near East for millennia. Unfired mudbrick is still made throughout the world, using both modern and traditional methods. The 9000 BCE dwellings of
Jericho were constructed from mudbricks, affixed with mud, as were those at numerous sites across the
Levant over the following millennia. Well-preserved mudbricks from a site at
Tel Tsaf, in the Jordan Valley, have been dated to 5200 BCE, though there is no evidence that this site was the first to use the technology. Evidence suggests that the mudbrick composition at Tel Tsaf was stable for at least 500 years, throughout the middle
Chalcolithic period. Mudbricks were used at more than 15 reported sites attributed to the 3rd millennium BCE in the ancient
Indus Valley civilization. In the
Mature Harappan phase, fired bricks were used. The
Mesopotamians used sun-dried bricks in their city construction; typically these bricks were flat on the bottom and curved on the top, called plano-convex mudbricks. Some were formed in a square mould and rounded so that the middle was thicker than the ends. Some walls had a few courses of fired bricks from their bases up to the splash line to extend the life of the building. in
Sudan, 2016 In
Minoan Crete, at the
Knossos site, there is
archaeological evidence that sun-dried bricks were used in the
Neolithic period (prior to 3400 BCE). Sun-dried mudbricks were the most common construction material employed in
ancient Egypt during pharaonic times and were made in pretty much the same way for millennia. Mud from some locations required sand, chopped straw, or other binders such as animal dung to be mixed in with the mud to increase durability and plasticity. Mudbrick use increased during the time of
Roman influence. In the
Ancient Greek world, mudbrick was commonly used for the building of walls, fortifications and citadels, such as the walls of the Citadel of
Troy (Troy II). These mudbricks were often made with straw or dried vegetable matter. ==Adobe==