Genesis 11:3

“And they said one to another, go to, etc.] Advising, exhorting, stirring up, and encouraging one another to the work proposed, of building a city and tower for their habitation and protection; saying, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly; they knew the nature of bricks, and how to make them before: according to Sanchoniatho f795, the brothers of Vulcan, or Tubalcain, before the flood, were the first inventors of them; for he relates, that “there are some that say that his brothers invented the way of making walls of bricks: he adds, that from the generation of Vulcan came two brothers, who invented the way of mixing straw or stubble with brick clay, and to dry them by the sun, and so…”

“brick--There being no stone in that quarter, brick is, and was, the only material used for building, as appears in the mass of ruins which at the Birs Nimroud may have been the very town formed by those ancient rebels. Some of these are sun-dried--others burnt in the kiln and of different colors. slime--bitumen, a mineral pitch, which, when hardened, forms a strong cement, commonly used in Assyria to this day, and forming the mortar found on the burnt brick remains of antiquity.”

“- The Confusion of Tongues 1. נסע nāsa‛ “pluck out, break up, journey.” מקדם mı̂qedem “eastward, or on the east side” as in Genesis 2:14; Genesis 13:11; Isaiah 9:11 (12). 6. החלם hachı̂lām “their beginning”, for החלם hăchı̂lām, the regular form of this infinitive with a suffix. יזמוּ yāzmû as if from יזם yāzam = זמם zāmam. 7. נבלה nābelâh usually said to be for נבלה nābolâh from בלל bālal; but evidently designed by the punctuator to be the third singular feminine perfect of נבל nābal “to be confounded,” having for its subject שׂפה śāpâh, “and there let their lip be confounded.” The two verbs have the same root. 9. בבל bābel Babel, “confusion,” derived from בל bl the common…”

“11:3 Stone was plentiful in Canaan; in Mesopotamia, stone was scarce and brick technology was developed. • Tar was made from bitumen, a natural, cement-like, waterproof asphalt (see 6:14; Exod 2:3).”