Universal History Annotation << Back AT THE START OF THE «COAL AGE»: THE 200TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE INVENTION OF SAFETY LAMP FOR COALMINES E.V. Minina The article describes the historical aspects of the problem of preventing of fi re damp explosions in coalmines. Due to increase in demand of coal in the beginning of XIX cen. deeper coal layers with higher gas content began to be worked out. Fire damp explosions caused by an open fl ame of miner lamps led to numerous casualties and attracted some public attention to the problem of creating of safety underground lighting. 200 years ago, William Сlanny, Humphry Davy and George Stephenson independently designed some constructions of safety lamps. These technical principles had been developed in subsequent constructions of fl ame safety miner lamps, including the most popular of them – Karl Wolf’s lamp. Solving the problem of prevention fi re damp explosion by providing of safety miner lighting allowed not only to save thousands of human lives, but also it played an important role in the development some European countries, where coal became a material and energetic base of the industrial revolution. In the history of mankind «coal era» which lasted more than 100 years has started. Keywords: fi re damp, сoalmines, coal mining, safety miner lamp, William Сlanny, Humphry Davy, George Stephenson, Karl Wolf. Contacts: E-mail: MininaPM@yandex.ru Pp. 24-31.