The World’s First Air Conditioning, and How People Stayed Cool Throughout History

There are times during the summer when getting in a car feels like crawling in an oven. Tiny beads of perspiration cling to your head, and it feels like the seventh dimension of hell. But here comes some cool air to save you from insanity. Of course, we have the convenience of modern air conditioning, but how did people throughout history handle excessive heat?

Turning that knob on the AC and blasting cold air so you won’t melt took some amazing discoveries and a whole bunch of ingenuity. It’s been over 110 years since Willis Carrier created the modern version of air conditioning. But humans have been able to handle the heat for hundreds of thousands of years. Nomads lived in the desert, and people were able to thrive in the tropics and jungles. How did they do it?

The first documented attempts at staying cool on a large scale came from the Romans and their system to circulate cool aqueduct water through the walls of their homes. Emperor Elagabalus even transported snow from the mountains to store next to his villa during the summer in order to stay cool. People in desert areas made villages with tall buildings that provided shaded paths between the buildings, which had small windows facing away from the sun. In addition, the buildings were set up to catch the best cooling tool —…