Prior to 1894, gypsum had been used for thousands of years as a building material and as an architectural detailing element. The first evidence of the use of gypsum in building construction appears to have occurred in 3700 B.C., when the Egyptians used gypsum blocks and plaster applied over woven straw lath in the building of the pyramid of Choeps. As a testimony to the strength and durability of gypsum, some of this construction, including walls decorated with murals composed of tinted plaster, is still intact and viewable. Further evidence of the historical use of gypsum includes its incorporation in the palace of King Minos of Crete in the period, around 1200 B.C. and the use of Alabaster, a form of gypsum, by sculptors during the Middle Ages.
In the late 1700s, the French chemist Lavoisier analyzed the chemical make-up of gypsum. His work and subsequent research by a group of his contemporary chemists, coupled with the discovery and mining of huge reserves of gypsum near Paris, led to the wholesale use of "Plaster of Paris" as a building material. Plaster of Paris-raw gypsum that is chemically altered by heat to remove much of the water contained in the gypsum molecule and then hydrated to make it useable as a plastering material-remains a viable product to this day.