Building for storing ice for summer use. Since antiquity ice has been stored in many different structures. In mountain areas it was common to pack ice into deep pits, often lined and roofed with straw or timber. Ice-houses were built of many different materials, such as timber, mud or brick. They were rectangular, square, conical or cylindrical structures, which until the 19th century were usually all or partly underground. The most usual form of British ice-house was an underground, inverted egg-shaped building with a diameter of c. 3–6 m and a depth of c. 5–10 m, with brick cavity walls, an entrance tunnel and a sump or drain at the base of the well. By contrast, the great ice-houses of Persia reached diameters of 14 m and overall heights of over 16 m. Ice-houses were built as early as the 2nd millennium bc in Mesopotamia and later in China and throughout the Greek and Roman worlds. Ice was always a luxury but a remarkably available one. The Italian courts of the 16th century enjoyed ice in many forms, and ...