Tide mill
Molino de marea
- Date
- c. 620 · confidence high
- Place
- Nendrum, Strangford Lough, Northern Ireland
- Credited to
- Nendrum monastery
- Field
- Matter & energy
What it is
A mill that impounds water at high tide and releases it over a wheel as the tide falls. It exploits a renewable, predictable energy source on rivers-less coasts.
Dated by dendrochronology to 619-621; there is a possible, doubtful Roman example in London.
What it led to
- energy exploitation of estuaries in England, Brittany and Portugal
- economic self-sufficiency for coastal monasteries
- a conceptual precedent for modern tidal barrages
Built on
- Roman watermill
- dams