Inventions & Discoveries · Farming and food

Barbed wire

1865 · 19th century · Also known as barb wire

Barbed wire is steel fencing wire with sharp points set at intervals along its strands, used for cheap fences and, as a wire obstacle, in trench warfare. In France Leonce Eugene Grassin-Baledans proposed a fence of thin wire with bristling points in 1860, and Louis François Janin patented a double wire with diamond-shaped barbs in 1865. In the United States Lucien B. Smith of Kent, Ohio, received the first patent in 1867, and Joseph Glidden of DeKalb, Illinois, patented the modern form in 1874. It made fencing the western plains cheap, and the open range was closed amid the Fence Cutting Wars of the 1880s.

Barbed wire
Image: Prosthetic Head · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

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First known
1865
Where
France
Credited to
Louis François Janin · Lucien B. Smith · Joseph Glidden

NoteLucien B. Smith, who received the first United States patent in 1867, is regarded as the inventor; Leonce Eugene Grassin-Baledans had proposed a pointed wire fence in France in 1860.

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Cite this entry
APA
The Epoch Institute. (2026). Barbed wire. In The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/barbed-wire
MLA
“Barbed wire.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/barbed-wire. Accessed .
Chicago
The Epoch Institute. “Barbed wire.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/barbed-wire.
Harvard
The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Barbed wire’, The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/barbed-wire (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random entry ↻