How was lightning protection in ancient times?

As early as the Warring States Period, China probably knew that lightning strikes could be avoided. According to ancient documents, there is a "lightning protection room" built with large bluestone.

Sheng Hongzhi of Liu Song in the Northern and Southern Dynasties described this in Jingzhou Ji: "In Huyang County, in the Spring and Autumn Period, Guo Fan only focused on the country. Mother was afraid of thunder, so she built a stone room for her to prevent lightning. It is known that aragonite is used as a step and still exists today. "

Ancient people didn't know the truth of insulation and lightning protection. They built stone chambers because they thought that the big bluestone was strong and could not be easily struck by lightning. But it shows that China was able to take appropriate measures to avoid lightning strikes.

There are dozens of such records in Hanshu Wuxing Zhi, such as "Gui You in June of the seventh year of Emperor Wendi, the disaster of Dongque in Weiyang Palace" and "the disaster of Bailiangtai in the first year of Tai Chu". When the White Balcony was rebuilt after being struck by lightning, an alchemist proposed to Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty the lightning protection method of setting a "tail" on the roof.

"Owl tail" is a device installed on the roof, with some metal tips made of copper and iron, which pierce the sky like horns.

After thousands of years of changes, the "tail" has many shapes. Some become dragons with iron tongues or whiskers, and their tails stab into the sky; There are birds, magpies or cocks. Although these decorations installed on the roof have different shapes, they all have several iron-like sharp objects that pierce the sky, which is the same feature of them.

In addition, many buildings in ancient China were equipped with ceramic tiles of various animal shapes, especially those kissing animals with their heads held high and their tongues sticking out, and were painted with a layer of metallic paint, which actually played the role of lightning protection.

For example, there is a "Baosheng Temple Tower" in the northwest of Gucheng Lake in Gaochun County, Jiangsu Province, which was built in 239 and has a total height of 3 1.5 meters. There is a 4-meter-high ancient iron temple at the top of the tower, which consists of a bowl, a wheel and a gourd. Although the tower was damaged many times for a long time, it was not struck by lightning. It seems that the iron gate at the top of the tower has also played a role in lightning protection.

In many high-rise buildings in ancient China, there are often so-called "Lei Gong Zhu" and other settings, and these settings usually use some materials that are easy to conduct electricity directly to the underground, which is actually the most primitive "lightning rod".

In the early Ming Dynasty, after Zhu Yuanzhang made a tripod for Jinling, he sent ministers to Beijing to destroy the old palace in Yuan Di. Xiao Xun, the assistant minister of the Ministry of Industry who participated in this matter, later wrote a book "The Legacy of the Forbidden City", which recorded his experience in Beijing at that time.

According to the book, he once read Jin Zhangzong's "Dragon Hard Core" beside Guanghan Hall at the top of Wanshou Mountain in Beijing.

When Jin Zhangzong spent the summer in Guanghan Temple, we had to consider the lightning protection of the buildings at the top of the mountain because of the thunder in summer. The "golden gourd" at the top of the iron bar is pointed, and the iron bar makes the golden gourd communicate with the earth; So the so-called "dragon slaying" is actually "lightning protection".

What Xiao Xun saw was the "dragon-lowering iron bar" built to protect Guanghan Temple from lightning, which can be said to be the earliest "lightning rod" in the world. It was built hundreds of years before Franklin invented the lightning rod.

lightning conductor