Ruina montium
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The landscape of Las Médulas is a result of ruina montium.
Ruina montium (Latin, "wrecking of mountains") was an ancient Roman mining technique that draws on the principle of Pascal's barrel.[1] Miners would excavate narrow cavities down into a mountain, whereby filling the cavities with water would cause pressures large enough to fragment thick rock walls.[2] It was described by Pliny the Elder (Natural History 33.21), who served as procurator in Spain.
References[edit]
- ^ Ancient Engineers' Inventions: Precursors of the Present (Springer, 2009), p. 135.
- ^ Rossi, Cesare; Russo, Flavio; Russo, Russo (2009). Ancient Engineers' Inventions. 8. Springer. pp. 133–141. ISBN 978-90-481-2252-3.
| This Ancient Rome-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
| This fluid dynamics–related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |