LOW←TECH MAGAZINE English

Rediscovering the Handcart

Wed, 22 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Image: The handcart, equipped with a sail. Photo by Kris De Decker.

The human-powered handcart is the oldest of vehicles, and it will likely be the last one around in the future. Of all vehicles, it’s the cheapest and least complex to build and use. It offers a large advantage over carrying a load on your back or dragging it over the ground - the even older concept of the sled. On the other hand, the handcart is cheaper and easier to use than the animal-powered cart. Oxen and donkeys eat more than humans, and they have their own will, which can work against the driver.

Like any other wheeled vehicle, the handcart requires roads to drive on. This infrastructure has not always been available anywhere or at any time in history. For example, in medieval Europe, porters and pack animals were more common than handcarts because of poor roads. ¹ In the West, the handcart only reached its heyday during the first decades of the Industrial Revolution, when it connected fast-growing cities to train stations and harbors. In China, on the other hand, the handcart was the backbone of the transport network for millennia. ²

Of all vehicles, the handcart is the cheapest and least complex to build and use.

There are still many human-powered carts in modern society: strollers, grocery carts, roller suitcases, and various utility and folding carts. However, these modern carts are to their predecessors what birds are to dinosaurs. They are small, often with very small wheels, and we use them for very short distances, usually inside buildings. In contrast, old-fashioned handcarts were often large and had big wheels, and they were pushed or pulled on roads and over longer distances. Many crafts and professions had their own type of handcart.

Image: Low-tech Magazine's handcart. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Why I need a handcart

People still use large handcarts in so-called “developing countries”. However, they can be just as useful again in the large cities of the industrialized world, as I can testify after using one for a couple of months. Last autumn, I received an internship application from Kozimo, who studies at the Design Academy Eindhoven. In his application, Kozimo sent a video of a large handcart he made, which he was driving on the streets of Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

I have always dreamt of a handcart. I have never owned a car, and the only times I miss one are when I have to move stuff, something which has become increasingly common lately. Consequently, I proposed to Kozimo to build a handcart for me.

Now, I can no longer imagine living without it. I have used the vehicle to move houses and offices, pick up materials and objects I bought online, new or second-hand, and transport workshop and event materials (bike generators, solar panels, solar ovens, books, sound systems). I have done the same for friends. During these trips, I often took home materials, furniture, or objects that I found for free on the streets of Barcelona.

Image: Kozimo and Kris De Decker with Low-tech Magazine's handcart, halfway through a 30 km trip along the coast of Spain. Photo by Linda Osusky.

Unlike a van or a car, my handcart doesn’t need gasoline, electricity, or batteries, making it entirely independent from energy infrastructures. Neither do I need to pay taxes and insurance. The handcart is a very democratic vehicle. It allows anyone to carry a load wherever they want, while older, less affordable cars and vans are no longer allowed to enter city centers due to the installation of Low Emission Zones.

A handcart doesn’t need gasoline, electricity, or batteries, making it entirely independent from energy infrastructures.

It would make a lot of sense to offer vehicles like this at community centers, where they are available for all neighbors to use when needed. Few people would need a handcart each day, and communal use would solve the parking problem. Although our handcart can also be parked vertically, it won’t fit in most apartments.

Description of the handcart

This article will not explain in detail how to build a handcart. We want to do that another time with a simpler handcart model, because the vehicle we present in this article is not one that most people can make themselves. You need good woodworking and metalworking skills, and in fact, two people made the handcart.

Kozimo designed and built the whole structure from wood, while Guilhem Senges - visual artist and one of my neighbors - designed and made several essential reinforcements from metal; the wheels, the brakes, and the handlebars are all connected to the wood structure with custom-made iron parts.

Image: The underside of the handcart. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Images: The front and back of the handcart. Photos by Kris De Decker.

Image: The lights are mounted in coconuts. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Load weight and volume

Low-tech Magazine’s handcart is 250 cm long and 100 cm wide, while the platform itself measures 210 by 85 cm. Assuming a load height of 50 cm, the cargo volume is roughly 1.55 m3 (37 cubic feet or 1050 liters). That’s two to four times the typical trunk space in a European car. We have transported cargo that is wider or longer than the cart: a large heated table measuring 140x140cm, and several loads of wooden beams, each three meters long.

The load weight is limited by the wheels, which come from a wheelchair. They can support up to 150 kg. ³ The cart itself weighs 32 kg, so the practical maximum cargo weight is about 120 kg. The loading platform consists of slats with gaps between them, making it easy to secure various types of cargo.

Images: The handcart with various cargoes. Upper left: a 6m2 wooden floor and a chest. Upper right: 3-meter-long wood beams. Below: A heated table ready for transport.

It drives itself!

Over the past few months, we’ve learned that people have many misconceptions about handcarts. For example, you may think that pushing a handcart takes a lot of effort, perhaps based on your experience pushing supermarket carts through parking lots or pulling heavy suitcases through city centers (which is how I moved stuff before I had a handcart).

However, using the handcart can be so effortless - even when it’s heavily loaded - that it feels like you are not pushing at all. Once in motion, you can often guide it with one hand, and it sometimes feels like the cart is pulling you forward. It’s no exaggeration to say that pushing the handcart with a 100 kg load is more comfortable than walking while carrying a 10 kg heavy backpack.

Using the handcart can be so effortless - even when it’s heavily loaded - that it feels like you are not pushing at all.

There are several reasons for this light operation, rooted in physics. Each vehicle has to overcome three forces: rolling resistance, air resistance, and gravity. Air resistance is negligible at walking speed, meaning that a handcart user on flat terrain mainly needs to overcome rolling resistance. That’s the friction between wheels and road surface, a factor that’s largely independent of speed.

In contrast, air resistance increases with the square of speed. A cyclist, going at 15-20 km/h, already spends more effort overcoming air resistance than overcoming rolling resistance, which is the same in both cases because both vehicles have similar wheels. In short, the handcart’s low speed minimizes air resistance, while its narrow wheels minimize rolling resistance.

Image: Driving the handcart. Photo by Linda Osusky.

Second, accelerating a vehicle requires more energy than maintaining a constant speed. You only need to sustain momentum, not build it. Our handcart is pushed by a person walking, so the effort to accelerate lasts no longer than one or two seconds. In contrast, a cyclist takes much longer to reach cruise speed, and because of the higher air resistance, it takes more effort to sustain that speed. If the handcart is heavily loaded, it also gains significant kinetic energy, even at low speed. That explains why it sometimes feels like the cart is pulling you forward - because it actually is.

Finally, our wheels are much larger than those used on modern pushcarts. That makes for comfortable driving on asphalt and sidewalks, which are not as smooth as airport or supermarket floors. Large wheels increase air resistance, but because of our low speed, that doesn’t matter.

Handcarts and gravity

However, an effortless ride requires two conditions: flat terrain and a well-balanced load. Both involve the third force any vehicle must overcome: gravity.

Balancing the handcart: distributing the load

A two-wheeled cart becomes heavy and difficult to use when too much weight is placed on the front or back. Consequently, you need to load the vehicle so that the weight is equal on both sides of the wheels. That’s easy to check: the cart should remain in a horizontal position for several seconds without you touching it. If there’s just one piece of cargo, place it above the center of the wheels. If there are more things to carry, the total weight should be divided equally over the two sides. Finetuning the balance often involves moving a backpack from the front to the back of the cart, or vice versa.

You need to load the vehicle so that the weight is equal on both sides of the wheels.

A two-wheeled cart also needs additional support to keep it horizontal when parked, for instance, when loading or unloading cargo. Otherwise, the cart may suddenly flip to the other side. Our handcart carries four support beams, two on each side. When the cart is moving, they are in a horizontal position. When the cart is parked, we remove one or more beams and place them in a vertical position. Each beam can be set to a different length, allowing us to stabilize the cart on uneven terrain. We tighten the beams with screws.

Image: The handcart is parked with four supporting legs. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Image: Detail of the supporting beam holder. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Many people have asked us why we didn’t build a four-wheeled cart that wouldn’t need to be balanced. However, four wheels would double the rolling resistance and thus the effort required to push the cart. Furthermore, a four-wheeled cart is less maneuverable and more difficult to drive on uneven terrain. You also need to get two extra wheels, and you need to build a steering mechanism. Throughout history, the two-wheeled handcart (or one-wheeled handcart in the case of China) was much more common than the four-wheeled cart. ¹

Going uphill: you need help

An effortless ride also requires more or less flat terrain, which is what you get here in many parts of Barcelona. If you go up a steep slope, you suddenly feel the weight of the cart and its cargo. Climbing with a heavily loaded cart can be as strenuous as running up stairs or cycling at top speed. People tell us we should put an electric motor on the cart, and that’s perfectly possible.

However, we found a simpler solution: if necessary, we ask for help from another person. Our handlebars are wide enough for two or even three people to push together, which makes going uphill a lot easier. Adding an electric motor and a battery would significantly increase the vehicle’s weight, and it only makes sense if you regularly have to climb hills.

Going downhill: brakes

Going downhill, you have to counter gravity forces to prevent the handcart from hurling down a slope, which would be very dangerous. Rather than pushing the cart, you’ll have to pull it back instead. Here, cyclists have all the advantage, as they can use gravity to its full benefit during a descent.

We made going downhill a lot easier by adding bicycle brakes. In combination with the large wheels, the brakes also allow the handcart to be taken down sidewalk curbs or even stairs without damaging it. They double as a hand brake as well, by tightening two lashing straps around them. That allows leaving the cart unattended on a slope or in high winds.

Image: The brakes. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Handcarts go on the sidewalk

Many people assume that handcarts go on the road, with the cars, or on the cycling path. That’s not the case: you use it on the sidewalk. Legally, handcart users are in a similar position to other pedestrians pushing a smaller handcart, such as a stroller. The only difference is that, when they are forced onto the road because there’s no sidewalk or it’s blocked, handcart users should walk on the right side of the road, while other pedestrians should walk on the left. For now, the police have stopped us only once, and they were just curious.

Legally, handcart users are in a similar position to other pedestrians pushing a smaller handcart, such as a stroller.

We could find no traffic laws that limit the size of a handcart, at least not in the handful of countries we researched, including Spain. However, in practice, there are clear limits. If your vehicle is wider than the space between traffic bollards that keep cars out of pedestrian streets, all pedestrian zones will become inaccessible to you. You should also take into account other obstacles on the sidewalk, such as building scaffolding. Consequently, it’s rarely practical to build a handcart more than one meter wide.

Barcelona has very wide sidewalks in most of the city. We rarely have to share the road with cars or cyclists. Of course, that’s not the case in every city, and then the use of a handcart becomes less attractive. Using a handcart on the road or cyclepath is rather dangerous because other vehicles are much faster.

Image: Kozimo pushes the handcart through a narrow walkway. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Respecting other pedestrians

Driving a large handcart on the sidewalk demands your full attention. You don’t want to hit any infrastructure, and you surely don’t want to hit someone’s legs. You need to drive it with respect for other pedestrians and their pets (some dogs start barking at the vehicle). In general, the handcart is very safe to use because it travels at a very low speed. That makes accidents less likely in the first place and less impactful if they do happen. You also have a very good overview of your vehicle, much better than for a car or a bicycle. As long as you keep your eyes on the handcart, you are unlikely to hit anything or anyone.

However, our handcart is so silent that people don’t hear it coming. We added a bicycle bell to warn people, but we hope to find a better tune in the future: every vehicle needs its own type of sound. We also need a bell for oncoming pedestrians who are watching their phones while walking and expect others to make space. With the handcart, we cannot always make that space. Our handcart has front and rear lights as well, wired to a USB power bank mounted underneath the platform. Lights are very helpful on sidewalks, both day and night, as they make the vehicle more visible. Furthermore, lights are essential if you need to move onto the road after dark.

Images: Kris De Decker drives the handcart through Barcelona. Photos by Guillaume Lion.

Even in Barcelona, sidewalks can get crowded, and a busy sidewalk will slow down the vehicle considerably. With little chance to overtake someone, we tend to get stuck behind the slowest walkers.

A handcart is not a difficult vehicle to drive, but nowadays people in industrialized societies have no experience with it. Apart from driving it attentively, you also need to be careful when rounding blind corners (take the turn as wide as possible) and when you leave a garage or any other type of exit (pull rather than push the cart). By the time you see oncoming traffic, you already have 2 meters of your handcart on the road or around the corner.

Why not a bike trailer?

Almost everyone who sees the handcart for the first time asks the same question: how do you attach it to a bicycle? You don’t. You push it while walking. When we say that, there follows a silence. Pushing a handcart seems like one step too far back, even for people committed to living more sustainably. Why would you push a handcart if you could just as well use a much faster bike trailer, or a cargo bike?

In fact, there are several practical reasons to opt for a handcart rather than a bike trailer, and we have already mentioned many of them. First, a handcart lets you go anywhere a pedestrian can, while cyclists often need to get off their bikes and push them - just like a handcart. A handcart is also more agile. For example, although the cart is 2.5 meters long, it takes just two seconds and little space to turn it around and walk in the opposite direction from where you came from.

Why would you push a handcart if you could just as well use a much faster bike trailer, or a cargo bike?

A handcart can be built larger than a bike trailer as well. Although it’s perfectly possible to build a bike trailer the size of our handcart, its higher speed would pose much greater risk of accidents and damage, both to the cart and to other road users. As a bike trailer, it would also need to be made sturdier, and it would need a more elaborate mechanism to operate the brakes.

All this does not mean that bike trailers are a bad idea. We have used the handcart mainly for trips between 5 and 10 km, which comes down to one to two hours of walking. For longer distances, the bike trailer has the obvious advantage of speed. If you need to cover 40 km, you would need to travel eight hours with a handcart, compared to just two hours with a bike trailer.

Image: Guilhem Senges, who built the vehicle's metal parts, pushes the handcart to a welding job a few streets up in the neighborhood.

The merits of slow travel

However, when people ask us why we don’t use it as a bike trailer, we can also answer differently: why the rush? Deciding to travel with the slowest vehicle possible is subversive because it questions values we take for granted in the modern world, such as speed and utility.

To many people, walking a handcart seems like a waste of time, but our experience is exactly the opposite. Every trip is an adventure, and we always look forward to using it again. It’s a pleasure to drive the vehicle, more like steering a boat than driving a land vehicle. It’s easy to chat with other pedestrians, who tend to be very curious about our vehicle. Consequently, the trip takes even longer.

To many people, walking a handcart seems like a waste of time, but our experience is exactly the opposite.

Driving a handcart feels entirely different from using any other mode of transport. When people are walking, they usually cannot carry much with them, either in terms of weight or volume. In contrast, the handcart allows you to walk with a lot of stuff close at hand: drinks, food, a sound system, books, extra clothes. Furthermore, you have a large platform, which allows you to rest and invite others to do the same. It becomes a vehicle for wandering and roaming, and for connecting to other people.

Image: It's a pleasure to drive the vehicle, more like steering a boat than driving a land vehicle. Model: Rocío Sánchez. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Image: The handcart with rain protection. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Handcart Accessories

Once the handcart proved its utility as a cargo vehicle, Kozimo began designing and building additional structures to expand its uses. These objects make use of the slatted platform or the support beam design. Unfortunately, Kozimo’s internship ended before we could test all these extensions, but the little experience we gained by now shows that the handcart can be much more than just a cargo vehicle.

Passenger seat

The first, and perhaps most powerful addition, is a foldable seat. While our handcart can be - and usually is - operated by only one person, it’s ideally handled by two people, especially for longer voyages. Thanks to the seat, one person can push the cart while the other one rests in the vehicle.

As long as the road is flat, the extra weight of the passenger does not significantly increase the effort to push the cart. Consequently, two people can travel faster or farther in a single day. When climbing hills or bridges, the passenger gets off the seat. If necessary, he or she also helps to push the cart.

One person can push the cart while the other one rests in the vehicle, increasing the distance that two people can travel in a day.

An extra pair of eyes on the road is also handy. The seat can be put in two positions, so that both the passenger and the driver are either looking in the same direction or facing each other, which makes it easier to talk and allows the passenger to serve as the rear-view mirror.

We used the seat on a 30 km day trip along the coast of Catalunya, Spain, moving stuff from my old place to my new place. For one person, this would have been an exhausting trip. However, there were several people on the way there, and two people on the way back. The fact that we could rest from time to time - without stopping - made a great difference, especially on the way back. An extra person also proved useful when unexpected obstacles arose. For example, there was a bridge under repair, which forced us to carry the cart down the rocks, over the beach, and up the rocks again.

Image: A foldable seat on the slatted platform. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Image: Kozimo drives the handcart along the coast. Linda Osusky is filming while resting in the seat. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Images: Carrying the handcart over the rocks. Photos by Linda Osusky.

Digital nomad office

As a second addition, we combined the seat with a work table that doubles as a solar power plant, resulting in a digital nomad office. The table fits onto the sides of the handcart and slides back and forth. The solar panel can be in a horizontal position or at various tilted angles. It can charge a laptop or any other device requiring up to 100 watts of power.

If you’re two people traveling, one person can work at the table while the other drives. If you’re alone, you can wheel the vehicle to the nearest park or beach, set up the four support legs, and work all day. In 2016, I took my home office off the grid with solar panels on the window sills. ⁴ Ten years later, both the office and the solar panels have become mobile.

Images: Digital nomad office. Photos by Kris De Decker.

Image: Digital nomad office. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Renewable power plant

Although we built only one solar panel support structure, the handcart platform is large enough to support a total of four 100-watt solar panels. That would provide us with 400 watts of solar power for a concert or emergency power, for example. The handcart can also transport the two bike generators Low-tech Magazine has in Barcelona. ⁵Consequently, the cart enables us to quickly provide power within a radius of several kilometers, at any time of the day. The handcart could also be wheeled into a sunny spot during the day, charging a battery bank to power a household during the night and in bad weather.

Mobile home

If you want to get back home the same day, the handcart’s range is roughly 40-80 km (8-16 hours of walking, back and forth). However, at least in my case, nobody obliges me to come back home the same day. I could use the handcart for longer voyages, especially since it offers me a place to sleep.

The four supporting legs that make loading and unloading the cart more practical can also be used to turn the vehicle into a bed. After Kozimo went back to the Netherlands, I bought a foldable mattress that fits neatly on the platform. During a trip, I can store the other cargo under the cart at night. Alternatively, I could push a passenger who’s lying in the bed, turning the vehicle into an adult version of a baby stroller.

Images: A foldable sleeping mattress on the handcart. Photos by Kris De Decker.

Image: A mosquito net covers the handcart with a sleeping mattress. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Kozimo also made four supporting legs that are almost two meters long. I can use them to erect a tent around the bed, and cover the structure with modern tent materials, wool blankets, or a mosquito net. The large poles can also dry laundry. Furthermore, I could use the supporting legs in various combinations to convert the cart into a podium, expo stand, market stand, or a cinema or presentation screen.

The seat, table, solar panel, sleeping mattress, and longer poles can all be carried on the handcart simultaneously, leaving ample space for other luggage. That means that I could potentially work, live, and travel in the vehicle, turning it into a nomadic home. It fits somewhere between the tiny house on wheels, the tipi, and the homeless shack. Rents got very expensive in Barcelona, so I may as well give it a try.

Image: The handcart is packed for a longer trip. Photo by Kris De Decker.

Sailing and roller skating the handcart

Finally, Kozimo made a small sail for the handcart to help pull a heavy load in a good wind; the vehicle is sometimes used along the coast. Of course, we got the inspiration from the use of sails on the historical Chinese wheelbarrow. For a longer trip, the sail fits on the cart, so I could use it whenever the opportunity arises.

Images: The handcart with a 1m2 sail. Model: Iris De Decker. Photos by Kris De Decker.

We could increase the speed of the handcart by using a larger sail, and combining it with roller blades, inline skates, or a skateboard. In that case, the cart would pull the driver in good winds. It’s also possible to push the cart while using roller blades, inline skates, or an electric unicycle, without a sail. For now, we did a first small test on flat terrain using inline skates, with very good results. If you would take enough cargo, the kinetic energy of a skate-powered handcart would regularly pull you forward even without a sail.

The higher speeds of these configurations obviously introduce more risk and, most likely, trouble with the police. Higher speeds require ample space, free of pedestrians. That almost always pushes the handcart on the road, between the cars, as most cycle paths are not wide enough. However, it shows that sustainable vehicles could take many different forms if only we would give them the space to flourish. There are more than enough roads suitable for sailing and roller-skating handcarts; we need to empty them of cars and vans.

Images: Julia Steketee drives the handcart on online skates. Photos by Kris De Decker.

Handcart design and construction: Kozimo, Guilhem Senges.
Photos: Kris De Decker, Linda Osusky, Guillaume Lion.
Special thanks to: AkashaHub Barcelona, Carmen Tanaka, Gaston Quispe Castros, Linda Osusky, Guillaume Lion, Rocío Sánchez, Iris De Decker, Lili-Roos Noeyens, Julia Steketee, Tim Rudolph, Guilherme Maglio, Selcen Küçüküstel.
Marie Verdeil and Roel Roscam Abbing contributed to the selection of images.

Bulliet, Richard W. The wheel: inventions and reinventions. Columbia University Press, 2016. ↩︎ ↩︎
How to downsize a transport network: The Chinese wheelbarrow, Kris De Decker, Low-tech Magazine, 2011. https://qelnixcor.cloud/2011/12/how-to-downsize-a-transport-network-the-chinese-wheelbarrow/ ↩︎
You could build a handcart with stronger wheels, either heavy-duty wheelchair wheels (available up to 350 kg) or cargo-bike wheels. However, stronger wheels are likely wider, which increases rolling resistance. It would also become more difficult to push these heavier loads up a steep incline. ↩︎
How to get your apartment off-the-grid, Kris De Decker, Low-tech Magazine, 2016. https://qelnixcor.cloud/2016/05/how-to-get-your-apartment-off-the-grid/ ↩︎
How to build a practical household bike generator, Kris De Decker & Marie Verdeil, Low-tech Magazine, 2022. https://qelnixcor.cloud/2022/03/how-to-build-a-practical-household-bike-generator/ ↩︎

Thematic Book Series: How to Downsize a Transport Network?

Sat, 07 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Image: Book cover. [How to downsize a transport network?](https://www.lulu.com/shop/kris-de-decker/how-to-downsize-a-transport-network/paperback/product-42n4p7.html?q=&page=1&pageSize=4), Kris De Decker, 166 pages, Low-tech Magazine, 2023.

Fast and cheap transportation props up industrial societies, both for the moving of people and cargo. However, our transport networks are very wasteful of energy and utterly dependent on fossil fuels. In this series of articles, Low-tech Magazine critically examines the call for electrified vehicles, which depend on unsustainable batteries and infrastructures.

Much more important than the chosen power source is vehicle design: size, weight, speed, acceleration, and comfort level. Furthermore, public transport is more resource efficient, and we could electrify it without batteries.

The book’s second part deals with long-distance transportation: planes, trains, sailing ships, and ocean liners. By placing transportation technology in a historical context, Low-tech Magazine challenges our high-tech approach to sustainability and highlights the possibilities of alternative solutions.

Contents table:

How to Downsize a Transport Network: the Chinese Wheelbarrow
The Citroën 2CV: Cleantech from the 1940s
The Status Quo of Electric Cars: Better Batteries, Same Range
Electric Velomobiles: as Fast and Comfortable as Automobiles, but 80 times more Efficient
Get Wired again: Trolleybuses and Trolleytrucks
High Speed Trains are Killing the European Railway Network
Life Without Airplanes: from London to New York in 3 Days and 12 Hours
How to Design a Sailing Ship for the 21st Century?

How to downsize a transport network?, Kris De Decker, 166 pages, Low-tech Magazine, 2023. Ebook edition.

Patrons get free access to ebooks, as well as early access to new print books at a reduced price.

Other thematic books in the series:

How to build a low-tech internet?, Kris De Decker, 162 pages, Low-tech Magazine, 2023. Ebook edition.

Heating people, not spaces, Kris De Decker, 142 pages, Low-tech Magazine, 2023. Ebook edition.

The Low-tech Magazine archives are also available as a chronological series consisting of four volumes.

How to Downsize a Transport Network: The Chinese Wheelbarrow

Thu, 29 Dec 2011 00:00:00 +0000

A Chinese wheelbarrow equipped with sails. Public domain.

For being such a seemingly ordinary vehicle, the wheelbarrow has a surprisingly exciting history. This is especially true in the East, where it became a universal means of transportation for both passengers and goods, even over long distances.

The Chinese wheelbarrow - which was driven by human labour, beasts of burden and wind power - was of a different design than its European counterpart. By placing a large wheel in the middle of the vehicle instead of a smaller wheel in front, one could easily carry three to six times as much weight than if using a European wheelbarrow.

The one-wheeled vehicle appeared around the time the extensive Ancient Chinese road infrastructure began to disintegrate. Instead of holding on to carts, wagons and wide paved roads, the Chinese turned their focus to a much more easily maintainable network of narrow paths designed for wheelbarrows. The Europeans, faced with similar problems at the time, did not adapt and subsequently lost the option of smooth land transportation for almost one thousand years.

Transport options over land

Before the arrival of the steam engine, people have always preferred to move cargo over water instead of over land, because it takes much less effort to do so. But whenever this was not possible, there remained essentially three options for transporting goods: carrying them (using aids like a yoke, or none at all), tying them to pack animals (donkeys, mules, horses, camels, goats), or loading them onto a wheeled cart or wagon (which could be pulled by humans or animals).

Carrying stuff was the easiest way to go; there was no need to build roads or vehicles, nor to feed animals. But humans can carry no more than 25 to 40 kg over long distances, which made this a labour-intensive method if many goods had to be transported. Pack animals can take about 50 to 150 kg, but they have to be fed, are slightly more demanding than people in terms of terrain, and they can be stubborn. Pack animals also require one or more people to guide them.

Image: Carrying stuff.

When carrying goods - whether by person or by pack animals - the load is not only moved in the desired direction but it also undergoes an up and down movement with every step. This is a significant waste of energy, especially when transporting heavy goods over long distances. Dragging stuff does not have this drawback, but in that case you have friction to fight.

Pulling a wheeled vehicle is therefore the most energy-efficient choice, because the cargo only undergoes a horizontal motion and friction is largely overcome by the wheels. Wheeled carts and wagons, whether powered by animals or people, can take more weight for the same energy input, but this advantage comes at a price; you need to build fairly smooth and level roads, and you need to build a vehicle. If the vehicle is drawn by an animal, the animal needs to be fed.

Image: A Chinese wheelbarrow.

When all these factors are taken into consideration, the wheelbarrow could be considered the most efficient transport option over land, prior to the Industrial Revolution. It could take a load similar to that of a pack animal, yet it was powered by human labour and not prone to disobedience.

Compared to a two-wheeled cart or a four-wheeled wagon, a wheelbarrow was much cheaper to build because wheel construction was a labour-intensive job. Although the wheelbarrow required a road, a very narrow path (about as wide as the wheel) sufficed, and it could be bumpy. The two handles gave an intimacy of control that made the wheelbarrow very manoeuvrable.

East and West: a very different story

The wheelbarrow tells a very distinct history in both the Western and the Eastern world. Although to this date its origins remain obscure, it is clear that the vehicle played a much larger role in the East than in the West. While in recent years there has surfaced some evidence that the wheelbarrow might have been used on construction sites by the Ancient Greeks at the end of the fifth century BC, there is no mention at all of wheelbarrows in Ancient Rome (although that does not exclude the possibility that they in fact did use them).

Image: Application of wheelbarrows during flood control projects, Shandong, before 1973. Jinian Mao zhuxi ‘Yiding yao genzhi Haihe’ tici shi zhou nian yingji 1963-1973 : 60/61, 118. Translation: “Collection of Photos from 1963 to 1973 in Commemoration of the Tenth Anniversary of Mao Zedong’s Slogan ‘We Must Control the Rivers and Seas’.”

The first sound evidence of the wheelbarrow in the Western world only emerged in the early thirteenth century AD. In China, their use is documented extensively from the second century AD onwards - more than a thousand years earlier. It is interesting to note that the wheelbarrow appeared at least 2,000 years later than two-wheeled carts and four-wheeled wagons.

Handbarrow

When the wheelbarrow finally caught on in Europe, it was used for short distance cargo transport only, notably in construction, mining and agriculture. It was not a road vehicle. In the East, however, the wheelbarrow was also applied to medium and long distance travel, carrying both cargo and passengers. This use - which had no Western counterpart - was only possible because of a difference in the design of the Chinese vehicle. The Western wheelbarrow was very ill-adapted to carry heavy weights over longer distances, whereas the Chinese design excelled at it.

On the European wheelbarrow the wheel was (and is) invariably placed at the furthest forward end of the barrow, so that the weight of the burden is equally distributed between the wheel and the man pushing it. In fact, the wheel substitutes for the front man of the handbarrow or stretcher, the carrying tool that was replaced by the wheelbarrow (illustration above).

Superior Chinese design

In the characteristic Chinese design a much larger wheel was (and is) placed in the middle of the wheelbarrow, so that it takes the full weight of the burden with the human operator only guiding the vehicle. In fact, in this design the wheel substitutes for a pack animal. In other words, when the load is 100 kg, the operator of a European wheelbarrow carries a load of 50 kg while the operator of a Chinese wheelbarrow carries nothing. He (or she) only has to push or pull, and steer.

Image: A Chinese wheelbarrow in Shanghai, 1910. Institut d’Asie Orientale / Lyon Institute of East Asian Studies.

The result was an extremely powerful and agile vehicle. In 1176 AD, the Chinese writer Tsêng Min-Hsing noted enthusiastically:

“The device is so efficient that it can take the place of three men; moreover, it is safe and steady when passing along dangerous places (cliff paths, etcetera). Ways which are as winding as the bowels of a sheep will not defeat it.”

The large central wheel of a Chinese wheelbarrow takes the full weight of the burden with the human operator only guiding the vehicle

The Chinese wheelbarrow - which was also widely in use in present-day Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos - originally appeared in two basic variants. One was originally termed the “wooden ox” (“mu niu”), which had the shafts projecting in front (so that it was pulled), while the other was termed the “gliding horse” (“liu ma”), which has the shafts projecting behind (so that it was pushed).

A combination of both types was also used, being pulled and pushed by two men. From these two basic types, many variations evolved. Later, the Chinese also used western-style wheelbarrows alongside their own design.

Image: A Chinese wheelbarrow. Source: “Hommel: China at Work”, Rudolf P. Hommel, 1937.

Western praise

The characteristic vehicle stupefied Western foreigners who visited China during the early modern period. In “Science and civilization in China”, Joseph Needham quotes the Dutch-American merchant Andreas Everardus van Braam Houckgeest, who visited the country in 1797 and gives an excellent description of the contraption:

“Among the carriages employed in this country is a wheelbarrow, singularly constructed, and employed alike for the conveyance of persons and goods. According as it is more or less heavy loaded, it is directed by one or two persons, the one dragging it after him, while the other pushes it forward by the shafts. The wheel, which is very large in proportion to the barrow, is placed in the centre of the part on which the load is laid, so that the whole weight bears upon the axle, and the barrow men support no part of it, but serve merely to move it forward, and keep it in equilibrum.”

A Chinese traveller sits on one side, and thus serves to counter-balance his baggage, which is placed on the other

“The wheel is as it were cased up in a frame made of laths, and covered over with a thin plank, four or five inches wide. On each side of the barrow is a projection, on which the goods are put, or which serves as a seat for the passengers. A Chinese traveller sits on one side, and thus serves to counter-balance his baggage, which is placed on the other. If his bagage is heavier than himself, it is balanced equally on the two sides, and he seats himself on the board over the wheel, the barrow being purposely contrived to suit such occasions.”

Wheelbarrow trains

“The sight of this wheelbarrow thus loaded, was entirely new to me. I could not help remarking its singularity, at the same time that I admired the simplicity of the invention. I even think, that in many cases such a barrow would be found much superior to ours.”

Image: The Chinese wheelbarrow was used to transport people and cargo. Image from 1880. Institut d’Asie Orientale / Lyon Institute of East Asian Studies.

Urban transportation by wheelbarrow, 1907. University of Bristol - Historical Photographs of China, reference number: Bk05-02. From the book ‘Shanghai’ (published by Max Nössler, c.1907).

The American soil scientist F.H. King shows himself equally impressed in his 1911 publication “Farmers of Forty Centuries”:

“We had observed long processions of wheelbarrow men moving from the canals through the streets carrying large loads of [crops] in bundles a foot long and five inches in diameter. These had come from the country on boats each carrying tons of the succulent leaves and stems. We had counted as many as fifty wheelbarrow men passing a given point on the street in quick succession, each carrying 300 to 500 pounds of [crops] and moving so rapidly that it was not easy to keep pace with them, as we learned in following one of the trains during twenty minutes to its destination. During this time not a man in the train haltened or slackened his pace. This same type of vehicle, too, is one of the common means of transporting people, especially Chinese women, and four, six and even eight may be seen riding together, propelled by a single wheelbarrow man.”

This description would not be complete without mentioning the squeaking of the unoiled axle, a nightmare to foreigners, which does not bother the Chinese in the least

Rudolf Hommel, in his 1937 book “China at work” (based on a 1921 travel through the country), seems to be most intrigued by the ingenuity of the low-tech design, going into technical details:

“While there are many kinds of wheelbarrows, the one shown [here] is typical of them all; the principle always being the same, i.e. one large wheel surrounded by a framework, guarding the upper part of the wheel from contact with merchandise or persons transported. The two long shafts, held at a proper distance from each other by two crosspieces, terminate in the handlebars, and form the basis of the whole vehicle. Into them is mortised the lattice work which surrounds the wheel. On each side a carrying frame is formed by curved bars attached to the main shafts by crosspieces.”

Image: A Chinese wheelbarrow carrying passengers.

Low-tech masterpieces

“The wheel, about 3 feet in diameter, is made entirely of wood and has two iron bands around the hub, and an iron tire. The axle is made of some very strong wood. From the frame of the wheelbarrow two pieces extend downward with the bearing holes for the axle. This looks rather precarious, and yet these pieces stand up splendidly under the heavy strain of immense loads and the considerable bumping over the miserable roads. These wheelbarrows are masterpieces of joinery and special care is bestowed on the selection of the best grades of hard wood for all parts. This description would not be complete without mentioning the squeaking of the unoiled axle, a nightmare to foreigners, which does not bother the Chinese in the least.”

Image: A train of wheelbarrows.

Just as other Western observers, Hommel watched the vehicles pass by in admiration:

“Besides transporting goods with these wheelbarrows, the Chinese use them also for passengers. I have seen as many as six people on them, three sitting on each side with their feet dangling down. If only one person is conveyed the driver balances the wheelbarrow skilfully with the wheel tilted at a considerable angle from the vertical. If a peasant wants to take a pig to the market, he saves himself all the trouble of guiding the recalcitrant beast, by tying it upon the wheelbarrow and wheeling it to the market.”

Mobile forts

As so many other innovative technologies, the Chinese wheelbarrow was orginally developed for military purposes. The first records mention its use for supplying food to the army. The wheelbarrow gave the Chinese armies such an advantage in moving goods that it was kept secret - early Chinese writings talk about wheelbarrows in code. True to its origin, the wheelbarrow remained in use for military operations, though not only to supply food to soldiers. In 1176, Tsêng Min-Hsing alluded to the military use of the wheelbarrow in forming protective layers.

The Ancient Chinese used their wheelbarrows as a defence against the onslaught of cavalry, a tactical system that remained in use during later times using two-wheeled carts

His words are quoted by Joseph Needham:

“Not only is it useful for transporting army rations, but at need it can be employed as a defensive obstruction against cavalry. Since the digging of trenches and moats, and the building of forts, take time, the wheelbarrows can be deployed round the perimeter so that the enemy’s horses cannot easily pass over. This kind of vehicle can readily go forward and withdraw, and can be used for any purpose. It might well be called a ‘mobile fort’.”

Image: A Vietnamese wheelbarrow carrying a pig. Old postcard.

Watching the Vietnamese wheelbarrow pictured above, the defensive use of the vehicle is easy to imagine. According to Needham, it was the Chinese with their wheelbarrows who pioneered the use of ’laagers’ or ‘mobile forts’ as a defence against the onslaught of cavalry, a tactical system that remained in use during later times using two-wheeled carts.

Animal traction

A remarkable feature of the Chinese wheelbarrow was the combined use of human and animal traction, which became common from an early date on. This practice can be seen in a 1126 painting by Chang Tsê-Tuan, which is described by Joseph Needham:

“The painting depicts the popular life of the capital Khaifêng at the time of the spring festival. Many wheelbarrows are moving or stationary in the streets of the city. All but one have the large central wheel and some are very heavily laden. During the loading and unloading the wheelbarrows rest on the side-legs. One is being pushed by a single man, and in all cases the porter steadies the vehicle by the shafts behind, while traction is effected either by one man in shafts and one mule or donkey with collar-harness and traces, or by two animals side by side similarly attached.”

Image: A Chinese wheelbarrow, pushed by a man and pulled by a donkey. Old Postcard.

The latter configuration is shown again in a picture in the Thien Kung Khai Wu (1637), where in the text we read:

“The northern one-wheeled barrow (tu yuan chhê) is pushed by one man from behind, with (one or more) donkeys pulling it from the front; it is hired by those who dislike riding (on horseback). The travellers sit on opposite sides to balance it, and a mat roof shields them from sun and wind. This kind of conveyance goes as far north as Chhang-an and Chi-ning, and also comes to the capital. When not carrying passengers these barrows will take as much as 4 or 5 tan of goods [about 6 cwt or 300 kg]. The one-wheeled barrow (tu lun thui chhe) of the south is also pushed by one man (but without animal aid), and carries only 2 tan. When it meets pot-holes (in the road) it has to stop; in any case it seldom goes more than 100 li [50 km].”

Wind powered wheelbarrows

An even more surprising method to augment human power in moving the wheelbarrow was the use of sails. The date of the introduction of the sailing wheelbarrow is unknown, but Joseph Needham notes that this contraption (the chia fan chhê) was still widely used in China at the time of writing (1965), notably in Honan and in the coastal provinces such as Shantung. Rudolf Hommel and F.H. King also spotted and described the vehicles. While some sails were very simple pieces of cloth, others were perfect miniatures of the ones used on a junk (a Chinese sailboat), easily adjustable by the driver.

Image: Wheelbarrows with sails, near Xi’an, China, c.1905. John Shields.

Image: Sail wheelbarrow in Shandong province, 1928. National Archives and Record Administration (NARA).

The use of auxiliary power from animals and wind (the two were sometimes combined) made it possible to design larger wheelbarrows that could take more cargo. Again, it is worthy to quote Andreas Everardus van Braam Houckgeest, writing in 1797:

“Near the southern border of Shantung one finds a kind of wheelbarrow much larger than that which I have been describing, and drawn by a horse or a mule. But judge of my surprise when today I saw a whole fleet of wheelbarrows of the same size. I say, with deliberation, a fleet, for each of them had a sail, mounted on a small mast exactly fixed in a socket arranged at the forward end of the barrow.”

“The sail, made of matting, or more often of cloth, is five or six feet [1.5 to 2 m] high, and three or four feet broad,, with stays, sheets, and halyards, just as on a Chinese ship. The sheets join the shafts of the wheelbarrow and can thus be manipulated by the man in charge.”

While some sails were very simple pieces of cloth, others were perfect miniatures of the ones used on a junk (a Chinese sailboat), easily adjustable by the driver

“One had to grant the apparatus was not a freak, but an arrangement by which, with a favourable wind, the wheelbarrow porters could be greatly assisted. Otherwise such a complicated thing would have been only a bizarre curiosity. I could not help admiring the combination, and was filled with sincere pleasure in seeing twenty or so of these sailing-wheelbarrows setting their course one behind the other.”

Wheelbarrows on rails

The Chinese wheelbarrow kept evolving even after the arrival of the Industrial evolution, adapting modern materials and wheels. Another noteworthy example of this is the so-called ‘piepkar’, which showed up on the island of Billiton at the coast of Sumatra at the turn of the twentieth century. There, a Dutch tin mining company was faced with very bad roads. The solution? A great example of combining Eastern and Western knowledge; wheelbarrows equipped with very narrow wheels, guided by iron rails. The technology - which was in use from the 1880s to around 1920 - reminds of the horse-drawn rail cars that became popular in Western cities at the time.

The decay of the Chinese road infrastructure

The importance of the Chinese wheelbarrow can only be understood in the context of the Chinese transportation network. Prior to the third century AD, China had an extensive and well-maintained road network suited for animal powered carts and wagons. It was only surpassed in length by the Ancient Roman road network. The Chinese road infrastructure attained a total length of about 25,000 miles (40,000 km), compared to almost 50,000 miles (80,000 km) for the Roman system.

The importance of the Chinese wheelbarrow can only be understood in the context of the Chinese transportation network

The Chinese and Roman road systems were built (independently) over the course of five centuries during the same period in history. Curiously, due to (unrelated) political reasons, both systems also started to disintegrate side by side from the third century AD onwards, and herein lies the explanation for the success of the Chinese wheelbarrow. As we have seen, the one-wheeled vehicle appeared during this period, and this is no coincidence. Increasingly, it was the only vehicle that could be operated on the deteriorating road network. As F.H. King observed: “For adaptability to the worst road conditions no vehicle equals the wheelbarrow, progressing by one wheel and two feet”.

Image: A Chinese wheelbarrow.

In 1937, Rudolf Hommel goes on complaining about the Chinese roads:

“In olden times, excellent wide roads were in existence in China, suitable for chariots, coaches, and wagons of many descriptions. Present-day conditions show a different picture, especially in Southern and Central China where the two-wheeled cart is not known. The splendid roads are gone, and in their place, we find only narrow paths, scarcely wide enough for foot passengers and wheelbarrows. The two-wheeled cart survived only in North China under the sway of the court of Peking, where the important business of victualizing the capital was sufficient urge to keep up the roads.”

“The Chinese peasant, ever intent to gain more ground for the cultivation of his crops, has gradually reduced the width of former highways, unhampered by a watchful government. In fact, the greedy officials winked at such encroachments, as long as they have been thereby enabled to exact increased contributions in taxes from the hardworking peasants. It is only within the last five years that an extensive program of road building has been carried out.”

Pathways designed for wheelbarrows

However, it seems that Rudolf Hommel got it wrong, and was looking at the Chinese roads with a Western bias. Joseph Needham tells a more positive story, noting that the network of wide roads was gradually replaced by an informal, low-tech infrastructure that was not less ingenious than the wheelbarrows that operated on it. The Chinese answer to a decaying road infrastructure went much further than the adaptation of their vehicles:

“In many periods the government was interested primarily, and sometimes exclusively, in those roads and water-ways which were significant for tax-grain transportation and the conveyance of official messages. The upkeep of a multitude of local roads and paved pathways devolved, therefore, upon the people themselves, acting in their co-operative capacity under village elders and small-town worthies. In this context, religious associations, such as the Taoists Yellow Turbans about 180 AD, later so politically important, or the Buddhist fraternities afterwards, played a significant part. Making good roads was nothing less than a pious duty.”

The network of wide roads was gradually replaced by an informal, low-tech infrastructure that was not less ingenious than the wheelbarrows that operated on it

Image: wheelbarrow road. Credit: Joseph Needham.

“Thus in the course of time, quite apart from the Ancient and medieval imperial highways, China’s landscape became shot through with millions of miles of well-paved paths, suitable chiefly for pedestrians, porters with carrying poles, pushers of wheelbarrows, and men carrying litters. Rough unpaved cart-tracks predominated only in the Eastern plains. Those who, like the author, have followed these paved ways past woods and rice-fields for many a mile cannot think of them without intense nostalgia. There was a long tradition of such privately initiated roads going back to the Han or even earlier, and their total mileage far outstripped that of the government main roads as the ages passed.”

Interestingly, the modern, twentieth-century road network that appeared in China, and that Hommel was alluding to in 1937, did not immediately gave way to the automobile, but to another low-tech vehicle that is a worthy competitor for the wheelbarrow: the bicycle, a product of the Industrial Revolution that is even more efficient. It will probably take us (and the 21st-century Chinese) another few decades before we realise how smart the Chinese transport infrastructure was.

The decay of the Western road infrastructure

The use of wheelbarrows in combination with specially designed narrow pathways made land transportation in China considerably more efficient than in Europe for a period of almost 1,500 years. Today, critcism on the omnipresent automobile is often ridiculed by saying that we cannot go back to horses and carts, without realizing that the combination of horses and carts is far from evident and not as low-tech as it seems. History clearly shows that an extensive road infrastructure is a very vulnerable thing.

Europe was also left with a deteriorating road network after the demise of the Roman Empire, though the Europeans could buy some time. Because it was sturdier (using piles of stone and concrete rather than the early form of asphalt applied by the Chinese), the Roman road infrastructure remained relatively useful until about the 11th century AD, after which it was largely abandoned. But even before that time, the destruction of bridges and road facilities by the barbarians - or by the locals in order to defend themselves against the barbarians - gradually dimished its usefulness. Lack of maintenance and the plundering of paving stone did the rest. Moreover, the appearance of new towns and capitals (such as Paris) required new routes that did not always coincide with the existing Roman roads.

Image: Chinese wheelbarrows.

Contrary to the Chinese, the Europeans did not develop a new vehicle and appropriate infrastructure of paths to make up for the loss of the Ancient highways. New roads appeared during the economic revival of the late Middle Ages, but these were not paved or hardened in any other way. This made them at best inefficient in good weather and nearly impassable when (and after) it rained. Furthermore, because of the absence of foundations, soil erosion caused by heavy rains could wash entire roads away. As a result, the use of carts and wagons all but disappeared in medieval Europe, while nothing else came in place. For people, the options of land transportation again became limited to walking or - only for the rich - horseback riding.

In most European countries, smooth wheeled traffic only made a comeback during the nineteenth century

Cargo was most often transported by pack animals (mostly donkeys and mules, sometimes horses), or simply by carrying it. With the exception of England, where wheeled traffic resurged from as early as the 14th century in some places, and France, where some sturdier roads (unpaved but with foundations) appeared in some regions during the late 16th century, smooth operating wheeled traffic only made a comeback in Europe during the nineteenth century - at the same time as the first railroads appeared.

Ox drawn carts

Carts and wagons drawn by oxen remained in use throughout the centuries in Europe, for heavy or large-sized loads that could not be transported by rivers or by sea. However, road conditions often required large spans of oxen, which made wheeled transportation of heavy loads ridiculously expensive and limited to very short distances. Because of friction, the nature of a road surface greatly determines how efficient wheeled transport will be. In “Energy in world history”, Vaclac Smil writes:

“On a smooth, hard, dry road, a force of only about 30 kg is needed to wheel a 1 tonne load. A loose, gravelly surface may easily call for five times as much draft. On sandy or muddy roads the multiple can be seven to ten times higher.”

This had important consequences, as we have seen in the article about the pre-industrial use of fossil fuels. Many countries could not capitalize on most of their energy resources, be it wood or peat or coal, because transporting them over land took more time and energy (in terms of animal feed) than they could afford. If they would have been aware of the Chinese wheelbarrow, the Europeans could have followed a similar strategy as the Chinese, using their limited resources to construct and maintain smooth but narrow pathways (and bridges) while downsizing their vehicles. As was noted in several of the historical sources mentioned above, the Chinese wheelbarrow, aided by a second man, an animal, or wind power, could transport up to 300 kg of cargo. This was almost as much as the maximum allowed cargo for horse and ox drawn carts in Ancient Rome (326 kg and 490 kg respectively).

Lessons for the future

Of course, it was not only the wheelbarrow that kept Chinese communication running after the second century AD. At least as important was the impressive network of artificial canals that complemented it. This infrastructure became ever more important after the detoriation of the road network. For example, the Grand Canal, which ran from Hangzhou to Bejing over a distance of 1800 km, was completed in 1327 after 700 years of digging.

Image: Wheelbarrow acrobatics.

In Europe, the first (relatively modest) canals were only built during the 16th century, and most of them only appeared in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The Chinese wheelbarrow alone could not have given Europe an equally effective transport infrastructure as the Chinese, but there is no doubt that it could have made life in medieval Europe a great deal easier.

The story of the Chinese wheelbarrow also teaches us an obvious lesson for the future. While many of us today are not even prepared to change their limousine for a small car, let alone their automobile for a bicycle, we forget that neither one of these vehicles can function without suited roads. Building and maintaining roads is very hard work, and history shows that it is far from evident to keep up with it.

In this regard, it is important to keep in mind that we won’t be as lucky as the medieval Europeans who inherited one of the best and most durable road networks in the world. Our road infrastructure - mostly based on asphalt - is more similar to that of the Ancient Chinese and will disintegrate at a much faster rate if we lose our ability to maintain it. The Chinese wheelbarrow - and with it many other forgotten low-tech transportation options - might one day come in very handy again.

Sources:

“Science and Civilisation in China, Volume 4: Physics and Physical Technology, Part 2, Mechanical Engineering, Joseph Needham, 1965 (the wheelbarrow)
“Science and Civilisation in China, Volume 4: Physics and Physical Technology, Part 3: Civil engineering and nautics, Joseph Needham, 1971 (the road network)
“Hommel: China at Work”, Rudolf P. Hommel, 1937
“Farmers of Forty Centuries, or, permanent agriculture in China, Korea and Japan”, F.H. King, 1911
“The medieval wheelbarrow”, Andrea L. Matthies, in “Technology and Culture”, Vol. 32, No.2, April 1991
“The origins of the wheelbarrow”, M.J.T. Lewis, in “Technology and Culture”, Vol.35, No.3, July 1994
“Roads and pavements in France”, Alfred Perkens Rockwell, 1895
“Voyager au Moyen Age”, Jean Verdon, 2007 (original edition 1998)
“Histoire générale des techniques” (Tome I / Tome II), Maurice Dumas, 1962
“Horse hauling: a revolution in vehicle transport in 12th and 13th century England”, John Langdon, 1984
“A social and economic history of medieval Europe, Gerald Hodgett, 1972
“Science and Technology in Medieval European Life”, Jeffrey R. Wigelsworth, 2006
“Medieval sourcebook: Richer of Rheims: Journey to Chartres, 10th century”, Michael Markowski (webpage)
“Inland transportation in England during the fourteenth century”, J.F. Williard, 1926
“The use of carts in the fourteenth century”, J.F. Williard, 1932
“Energy In World History”, Vaclac Smil, 1994
“The Subterranean Forest, Rolf Pieter Sieferle, 2010
Coming home with riches: the wheelbarrow as an auspicious motif in popular Chinese prints, Antje Richter, 2004
The wheelbarrow, Engines of our ingenuity, John Lienhard
Institut d’Asie Orientale: pictures (overview).
Lantern slide collection, Art, Architecture and Engineering Library.