There’s nothing more unsettling than turning a corner in an abandoned mine and encountering a wall of cobwebs. It’s not that I’ll have to battle a swarm of cave spiders — that’s manageable, but rather the fact that I will inevitably forget to bring scissors with me, forcing me to carve my way through using my increasingly sticky sword.
Cobwebs gradually became a part of Minecraft. Textures were incorporated into the game files back in 2009, and they were transformed into actual blocks in beta version 1.5 at the beginning of 2011. By the end of that year, along with the adventure update that introduced abandoned mineshafts and fortresses, cobwebs began to spawn naturally throughout the world.
Currently, cobwebs can be found in numerous remote locations throughout the Upper World. These include not only fortresses and abandoned mines but also forest mansions, basements, and deserted villages.
Collecting cobwebs is quite simple with scissors, allowing you to easily obtain one or even two stacks. However, if you lack scissors, a sword enchanted with Silk Touch will do the trick. While a regular sword can also break cobwebs at a similar speed, it will cause strings to drop instead.
Cobwebs are surprisingly useful for such a rare block. You can place blocks on them, including paintings and signs, which can disguise a secret entrance (though you’ll move very slowly when walking on them). Additionally, they can be utilized in traps to slow down mobs and players attempting to infiltrate your base.
One of the most beneficial uses of webs in Minecraft is in redstone circuits. The delay for an item to fall onto a pressure plate or into a hopper can be as long as 25 seconds. For instance, this feature is useful when opening a door: you press the button, enter through the door, and it automatically closes behind you.
In English, the term for a spider’s web is “cobweb“, with the word “cob” tracing back to the Old English term “coppe“, which means “spider”. This etymology likely relates to the fact that webs are constructed by spiders. However, it’s important to note that not all spiders create webs, as there are numerous species that do not spin them at all.
In reality, webs have existed for over 100 million years, evidenced by fossilized webs discovered in amber from the early Cretaceous period. They come in various shapes; some spiders weave more intricate designs while others produce simpler geometric patterns. Additionally, certain species collaborate to build their webs, and many spiders coexist within these structures.
Spider silk is produced within the spider’s body and extruded from specialized organs known as “spinnerets.” Spiders are capable of generating several types of silk: sticky, fine, or thick, each tailored for specific functions. Some spiders can create up to eight different varieties throughout their lifespan.
In 1973, astronauts took spiders into orbit aboard the Skylab space station to observe whether they would spin webs in space and how those webs might appear. Two spiders, Arabella and Anita, needed some time to adjust to microgravity, but eventually, they spun webs that resembled terrestrial ones, albeit thinner in certain areas.
