Vorontsov Palace in Alupka was built in the 1820s from a particularly hard stone dolerite (old name - diabase).
Dolerite is such an interesting material with a hardness of 6-7 on the Mohs scale. To make it clearer, the material of hardness 6 is taken with a file, while the hardness 7 is taken only with a diamond. You can translate into more understandable units of hardness. In other words, how much force must be applied to the chisel so that it can enter the material and be machined.
As you can see, diabase is 6 times harder than marble, 2 times harder than granite and 62% harder than such a stubborn material as basalt. To build buildings out of it means the same thing as to build out of diamonds. The material is so hard that it is commonly used to pave roads, such as Red Square.
Subscribe and share >> S E E | Secret History
