Smoke hole

For other uses, see Smoke Hole (disambiguation).
A tipi of the Nez Perce tribe, c. 1900. The excess fabric at the top of the structure is the smoke hole and smoke flaps.

A smoke hole (smokehole, smoke-hole) is a hole in a roof for the smoke from a fire to vent.[1] Before the invention of the smoke hood or chimney, many dwellings had smoke holes to allow the smoke from the hearth to escape. Pre-modern English homes with unglazed windows or thatch roofs required no special vent for smoke. These structures typically had only one story for living spaces, and inhabitants made do with a band of relatively clear air near the ground.[2]

  1. ^ "smoke-hole" def. 1. Oxford English Dictionary Second Edition on CD-ROM (v. 4.0) © Oxford University Press 2009
  2. ^ Ruth Goodman (2020). The Domestic Revolution: How the Introduction of Coal into Victorian Homes Changed Everything. Liveright. pp. 63–64. ISBN 978-1631497636.