Reinforcing bars in masonry construction have been used since antiquity, with Rome using iron or wooden rods in arch construction. Iron tie rods and anchor plates were later employed across Medieval Europe, as a device to reinforce arches, vaults, and cupolas. 2,500 meters of rebar was used in the 14th-century Château de Vincennes.
During the 18th century, rebar was used to form the carcass of the Leaning Tower of Nevyansk in Russia, built on the orders of the industrialist Akinfiy Demidov. The wrought iron used for the rebar was of high quality, and there is no corrosion on the bars to this day. The carcass of the tower was connected to its cast iron tented roof, crowned with one of the first known lightning rods.
However, not until the mid-19th century, with the embedding of steel bars into concrete (thus producing modern reinforced concrete), did rebar display its greatest strengths. Several people in Europe and North America developed reinforced concrete in the 1850s. These include Joseph-Louis Lambot of France, who built reinforced concrete boats in Paris (1854) and Thaddeus
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