History of lighthouses

The history of the lighthouses and beacons for ship navigation loses itself long in the dark history. Probably already very promptly isolates beacons ignited, in order to facilitate Fischern on their boats with poor visibility, particularly after break-down of the darkness, the way back to the safe bank. It might have mostly concerned open wood or coal fires, which was ignited in well visible places in beach proximity. Such fires, a superordinate control been subordinate, however hardly did not find entrance into the delivered writings, and so we can only courage-measure today.

It stands firmly however that a over-locally organized and controlled list of lighthouses and other navigation marks only with the intensification of the commercial routes at the beginning 18th Century world-wide spreading found. The British admiralty, which provided as one of the large sea powers also outside of Europe for the list of navigation marks, had relevant portion of it.

On the following sides we tried, which set most important stages of lighthouse history. So that the whole remains clear, we formed three epochs:

Antiquity | 500 v. - 500 n.Chr. Egypt, Greek and the Romans build the first lighthouses in the mediterranian sea.

Middel Ages | 500 - 1500 The Church and trading companies get the driving force in introducing night beacons.

Modern Times | 1500 - 1800 Entlang der großen Handelsrouten entstehen weitere Leuchtfeuer, die immer weiter verbessert werden.

Modern Times | 1800 - today Technische Innovationen und das Industriezeitalter sorgen für eine weltweitte Verbreitung von Leuchttürmen.