1. introduction bricks are one of the oldest known building materials in 7000bc southern turkey and jericho found to prepare the brick. at that time sun dried mud bricks were prepare after that fired bricks were found to be more resistant to construction and weather conditions, which made them a much more reliable brick for use in permanent buildings construction. fired brick were also useful for absorbing any heat generated throughout the day, then releasing it at night. the ancient egyptians also used sun dried mud bricks as building materials, evidence of which can still be seen today such as harappa and mohenjo-daro. paintings on the tomb walls of thebes portray slaves mixing, tempering and carrying clay for the sun dried bricks. the romans further distinguished those which had been dried by the sun and air and those bricks which were burnt in a kiln. using mobile kilns, the romans were successful in introducing kiln fired bricks to the whole of the roman empire. the bricks were then stamped with the mark of the legion who supervised the brick production. these bricks differed from other ancient bricks in size and shape. roman bricks were more commonly round, square, oblong, triangular or rectangular. the kiln fired bricks were generally 1 or 2 roman foot by 1 roman foot, but with some larger bricks at up to 3 roman feet. the romans preferred this type of brick making during the first century of their civilization and used the bricks for public and private buildings all over the empire. the greeks also considered perpendicular brick walls more durable than stone walls and used them for public edifices. they also realized how the modern brick was less susceptible to erosion than the old marble walls. gothic style buildings can be found in the baltic countries sweden, denmark, poland, germany, estonia, belarus and russia were produce bulky bricks at that time, but could be identified by the use of split courses of bricks in varying colors, red bricks, glazed bricks and white lime plaster and broken brick pieces known as brickbat was used with lime mortar in building foundation work. “brickbat is brocken pieces of bricks”. bricks are more commonly used in the construction of buildings than any other material except wood. brick and terracotta architecture is dominant within its field and a great industry has developed and invested in the manufacture of many different types of bricks of all shapes and colours. with modern machinery, earth moving equipment, powerful electric motors and modern tunnel kilns, making bricks has become much more productive and efficient. bricks can be made from variety of materials the most common being clay but also calcium silicate and concrete. with clay bricks being the more popular, they are now manufactured using three processes soft mud, dry press and extruded. also during 2007 the new ‘fly ash’ brick was created using the by-products from coal power plants. good quality bricks have a major advantage over stone as they are reliable, weather resistant and can tolerate acids, pollution and fire. bricks can be made to any specification in colour, size and shape which makes bricks easier to build with than stone. brickwork is also much cheaper than cut stone work. however there are some bricks which are more porous and therefore more susceptible to dampness when exposed to water. for best results in any construction work, the correct brick must be chosen in accordance with the job specifications.