I know we've had many threads over the years about the possibility of an Roman Industrial Revolution but Realistically, what is the earliest date that there could be an industrial revolution? Could it only happen in the late 18th and early 19th centuries or could it happen earlier? Perhaps during the renaissance? Or from the Byzantine Empire? Or, branching out of the European/Christian world, could the sciences of the Islamic Golden Age create an industrial revolution? Or hell even a Chinese dynasty?