Industrial revolution before the first millenium!

ChaosTheory

For those who know, Heron of Alexandria developed a little machine that used steam to spin around in circles. A big sphere was filled with water and at opposite ends of the sphere there are 2 tubes pointing at opposite directions. As the water boiled inside the sphere it would escape through the tubes and made the sphere spin.

What if Heron was looking at his toy spin and a cart happened to pass by right behind it being pulled by a slave child that was half dead. He would have felt pity for the kid which would give him time a stroke of genius. What if he can somehow make his toy spin the wheel of the cart? Other scientist would then expand on this further leading to a very early industrial revolution. What would have happened to the world as a whole? Would the Romans take advantege of this? Will there be horseless carts in the early 5th Century?
 

Flocculencio

Donor
There are two arguments people generally bring up against this POD

i) In a slave-labour based society there is no incentive for people to go out on a limb and invest in newfangled and initially less efficient technology. Quite simply, the first few models wouldn't be very powerful- if I have a handcart and the slave pulling it dies, I can just go out and buy another slave who will be able to pull said handcart much more efficiently than Heron's Steam Engine Mk I can (of course, if I was a sensible manager I wouldn't have let my slave deteriorate to that state in the first lace). It's a vicious cycle- Heron won't be able to sell his first inefficient model to get the funds to develop a more powerful model since there's no reason to take a chance on the kooky Hellene when slaves are cheap and plentiful.

ii) Before sometime in the 2nd millennium AD metallurgy hadn't advanced to the point where you could produce high-quality metal in quantities necessary to build a cheap, strong steam engine. This is probably the more important factor. IIRC steam engines were used in very specific novelty applications (there was a temple whose gates were "magically" opened by the priests through a device based on steam turning a primitive turbine) commissioned by people with the money to pay for the expensive metal needed for something that size (and even then they still weren't particularly efficient). Unfortunately the metalworking technology didn't exist which would allow relatively cheap steam engines, which is what you really need to make them widespread.

I'm just paraphrasing points other chaps have made in other threads so hopefully some of them will come along and elaborate.
 

Riain

I think steam power came very late to industrialisation. The first steam engines were used to drive pumps and machinery, much like wind and water power had done for centuries. It was only after steam machinery was developed for these uses was it applied to ships and trains.

So I'd think that for a steam powered industrial revolution to occur other means of driving machinery would have to have reached the point were they were losing utility. Pumping out mines is a great example, when there was no handy source for a water or wind driven pump then other means were devised; steam.
 

Hendryk

Banned
Your earliest serious chance of having an industrial revolution take place is the 11th-12th centuries in China. The Song dynasty nearly got there, but didn't quite meet all the preconditions.
 

Guarnasco

Everyone seems to forget that industrial revolution began and evolved both indipendently of and before steam power was a reality.

subdivision of work process will be easy to do in the context of an entity as large as the roman empire, that and standardization (one thing that romans actually did) will have a real chance to boost an industrial revolution.
 

Flocculencio

Donor
Guarnasco said:
Everyone seems to forget that industrial revolution began and evolved both indipendently of and before steam power was a reality.

subdivision of work process will be easy to do in the context of an entity as large as the roman empire, that and standardization (one thing that romans actually did) will have a real chance to boost an industrial revolution.
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Going by the first post, however, he seems to be more interested in the application of steam power specifically.
 

Elidor

Hendryk said:
Your earliest serious chance of having an industrial revolution take place is the 11th-12th centuries in China. The Song dynasty nearly got there, but didn't quite meet all the preconditions.
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That would be a very interesting POD. Such a revolution can spread to the rest of the world fairly quickly after the Mongol Conquests, if the Mongols aren't butterflied out, and perfected in sparsely populated areas of the Mongol empire where they can't rely on serfs.
 

biffer

Elidor said:
That would be a very interesting POD. Such a revolution can spread to the rest of the world fairly quickly after the Mongol Conquests, if the Mongols aren't butterflied out, and perfected in sparsely populated areas of the Mongol empire where they can't rely on serfs.
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Oooh primitive Mongol tanks rolling across the Urals. Lovely:D
 

Nicksplace27

Elidor said:
That would be a very interesting POD. Such a revolution can spread to the rest of the world fairly quickly after the Mongol Conquests, if the Mongols aren't butterflied out, and perfected in sparsely populated areas of the Mongol empire where they can't rely on serfs.
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Mongol Steampunk... very very cool....
 

rewster

I say they skip the industrial revolution and steam whats-its, and just focus on improving their wind and water mills, then discover electricity, and invent solar panels. Then you could have a green-wank. :D
 

Faeelin

I'm surprised no one ever considers a Roman "early modern revolution". Heavy use of waterpower, printing, canals dotting Gaul. Sugar cane growing in Spain, while Rome's banking system becomes even more complex.

That, IMO, is pretty plausible.
 

admkenshin

Faelin is right. Steampower is not a necessity for an industrial revolution. What is necessary is the idea to produce cheap everyday stuff even cheaper.
 

Analytical Engine

Seriously, though, the Byzantine Empire could have industrialised quite early on as well... It was already using water-powered devices like saws to cut blocks of marble...
 

Burton K Wheeler

Moderator
To continue on what Faeelin said, banking is the key. Europe's Industrial Revolution came about only because of the availability of finance and the concept that capital was more than just land. Consider the factors that led to the emergence of banking in Europe:

1. Silver became devalued due to the Spanish discovery of the Potosi mines and their policy of minting as much of it as fast as possible.

2. A network of banks owned by individual families or groups that covered a large geographic area. This also goes along with a government or governments strong enough to guarantee commerce across a large area.
 

Tyr

You probally also need the huge potential markets that existed for the OTL IR to make it worthwhile. Rome doesn't really have such great contact with India and China and they weren't yet what they would one day become.
 

Burton K Wheeler

Moderator
Leej said:
You probally also need the huge potential markets that existed for the OTL IR to make it worthwhile. Rome doesn't really have such great contact with India and China and they weren't yet what they would one day become.
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Good point. In the OTL 16th century, silver currency percolated from the Americas to the treasuries of China and India via European trade. Luxury goods returned from Asia in small, easy to transport quantities. Originally the Portuguese (economically and socially closely tied with Spain) were the major engine of this trade, but the Dutch and to a lesser degree the French and English cut in on it as much as possible. These other powers now needed a means to draw silver into their coffers. With a shortage of natural resources compared to Spain and France, the English and Dutch poured their capital into industrial development rather than agricultural, which is why their societies came to be ruled by bourgeois traders and not landowning aristocrats. The Dutch fell short of England's impressive industrialization not because of any financial failings, but because reclaimed bottomland is short in coal, iron, and timber.
 

Faeelin

Leej said:
You probally also need the huge potential markets that existed for the OTL IR to make it worthwhile. Rome doesn't really have such great contact with India and China and they weren't yet what they would one day become.
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What about internal demand?
 
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