Roman innovation.

[f1b0nacc1]

Zero

The Romans didn't have the Zero, which in turn means no calculus, which in turn means no steam engines (aside from Zeno and his demonstrator). As for the value of steam engines, consider mechanization of agriculture (though I do like the notion of improved horse collars, etc.) which would have left the Roman smallholders viable for far longer, which would have had the effect of prolonging the survival of the Republic. Steam engines also would make mining far easier (pumping water out of wells), and enabled transporation of grain across the Med far more easily than was the case in OTL. We might also remember that the Romans built superb roads and aqueducts, both of which would have benefitted from the use of steam technology (railroads and pumping stations).

My point is: get the zero, get calculus, and get steam engineering...

 

[f1b0nacc1]

Stirrups

The stirrup wasn't terribly useful for the Romans (their legions, composed of well-disciplined infantry were far more useful than cavalry), but they WERE useful for the barbarians that the Romans had to defend against. Many of the larger tribes had huge numbers of horsemen, but until the invention of the stirrup, they weren't terribly valuable against disciplined Roman infantry. Once the stirrup is introduced, these same tribes become far more potent militarily, and thus seriously undermine the basis of the empire.

So, if we could SUPRESS one invention, stirrups would be my choice...

 

[nyjoz]

How bout perfume and other luxury goods manufactured in the Mediterranean region. That way half the Roman gold doesnt wind up in India.

 

[carlton_bach]

Towards the later days of the Roman Empire, instead of wealthy landowners being patrons, it was the government itself. And what do you think commissioned aqueducts throughout Roman history?

Rich individuals trying to show off, mostly. Which is why a lot of them never got finished or were built very badly. Only the aqueducts of Rome herslf and those of the military are of uniformly high quality, because neither money nor skill ran out along the way.

Canals are likely to be strictly a government endeavour, though. If you sell them right, Emperors will love them.

 

[carlton_bach]

The Romans didn't have the Zero, which in turn means no calculus, which in turn means no steam engines (aside from Zeno and his demonstrator). As for the value of steam engines, consider mechanization of agriculture (though I do like the notion of improved horse collars, etc.) which would have left the Roman smallholders viable for far longer, which would have had the effect of prolonging the survival of the Republic. Steam engines also would make mining far easier (pumping water out of wells), and enabled transporation of grain across the Med far more easily than was the case in OTL. We might also remember that the Romans built superb roads and aqueducts, both of which would have benefitted from the use of steam technology (railroads and pumping stations).

My point is: get the zero, get calculus, and get steam engineering...

I'm not sure that follows. The Indians didn't exactly rush to build steam engines after they invented zero, after all. Roman engineering could portobably benefit sa good deal from modern maths easing the mind-numbing complexity of their own, but steam power has so many technological requirements and needs so many things to go right to become useful it is hard to see tzhe introduction of a new number system doing the trick.

Also, it will not benefit smallholders. Smallholders and peasant farmers are a low-tech solution. THe system only works as long as the more powerful can not directly nbenefit from amassing more land beyond a certain point because there is only so much a family can work. Introduce mechanised agriculture, and you hand a massive competitive advantage to the large landholders with the capital to afford machines and the skilled labour needed to use them. If the Romans get an effective seed drill, reaper or combine off the ground, smallholdinmg will vanish in a puff of smoke. Their legal system is set up that way.

 

[Spike Torch]

I'm not sure that follows. The Indians didn't exactly rush to build steam engines after they invented zero, after all. Roman engineering could portobably benefit sa good deal from modern maths easing the mind-numbing complexity of their own, but steam power has so many technological requirements and needs so many things to go right to become useful it is hard to see tzhe introduction of a new number system doing the trick.
.

Yeah but the greeks had the steam engine already, and not just a demonstrator as far as I know, it was actually used briefly - though yes I agree that calculous would help improve it.

 

[carlton_bach]

Yeah but the greeks had the steam engine already, and not just a demonstrator as far as I know, it was actually used briefly - though yes I agree that calculous would help improve it.

They had designs that relied on steam power to move things, but not what we wouild think of as a steam engine. The famous aeolipile was very similar to medieval 'blowing dolls' but for the rotating motion and the fact that it sered absolutely no purpose. Similar things were designed (and very likely built) in Renaissance Europe, and it was still a long way to proper steam power. Not that the Romans couldn#t have gotten there, but it's not easy.

 

[Bill Cameron]

Yeah but the greeks had the steam engine already, and not just a demonstrator as far as I know, it was actually used briefly...

The Greeks had nothing of the sort. They had toys, not engines. A revolving ball, a whistling statue, and a "bird" propelled by a brief jet of steam does not a water pump, riverboat, or railroad make.

If I had a dime for every time we have to shoot down these damn fantasies involving the aeolipile I would use the money to build a time machine and go back to strangle to stupid bastard who wrote the book that generations of school teachers and Wiki entry writers use to "prove" the Greeks had steam engines.


Bill

 

[Berra]

I have suggested a Roman water powered washing machine and earlier water powered refrigerators if somebody want to search.

 

[Mark-ITSOT]

Did they have windmills?

 

[Jovar]

and others will impact Rome to a far greater extent than gunpowder, balloons, and other fantasies.

The printing press came after gunpowder in OTL, yet you call gunpowder fantasy and the printing press not?
And how can you honestly say that gunpowder had little effect on human history? You think art, literature and a new fancy architechture brought down the age of knights. I tell you why we are where we are today. GUNS!

 

[Spike Torch]

The Greeks had nothing of the sort. They had toys, not engines. A revolving ball, a whistling statue, and a "bird" propelled by a brief jet of steam does not a water pump, riverboat, or railroad make.

They are a step on the road... The Romans had trains already, all they need is to make a leap, it happened OTL, why not earlier? I agree with previous posters about the need for mathmatics, and blast furnaces, but why not?

What could have triggered a Roman industrial revolution?

 

[Mark-ITSOT]

A lack of trees?

Wasn't it that that forced the British to turn to coal and charcoal for smelting?

 

[Ofaloaf]

They are a step on the road... The Romans had trains already, all they need is to make a leap, it happened OTL, why not earlier? I agree with previous posters about the need for mathmatics, and blast furnaces, but why not?

Think about it this way: the earliest steam engines used in the Industrial Revolution, like Newcomen atmospheric engine, were very expensive to use, and only really became cost-efficient compared to manual labor when used to pump water out of mines that provided fuel for it (ie, coal mines).

As far as I'm aware (and I'm not aware of much here), there wasn't nearly as much coal mining in the Roman era as there was in the Early Modern era. Without so many coal mines and so much demand for better pumps, early steam engines have little applicability. How is the steam engine supposed to develop to the point of powering giant textile mills and railroad locomotives if there's no need to invest in its early stages?

 

[Dave Howery]

Not much. The traditional theoryw as that it hurt the horse and made it impossible for it to be breathe deeply; but more modern (and I don't mean done in the 2000s, this is relatively old news) suggest it worked fine.

wasn't the advantage of the shoulder collar over the throat collar one of (literally) horsepower? As I understood it, the shoulder collar let the horse put more of it's weight and muscle into pulling... even if the throat collar didn't choke it, it was placed in a disadvantageous place to make full use of the horse's weight.

 

[minifidel]

The printing press came after gunpowder in OTL, yet you call gunpowder fantasy and the printing press not?
And how can you honestly say that gunpowder had little effect on human history? You think art, literature and a new fancy architechture brought down the age of knights. I tell you why we are where we are today. GUNS!

Couple of things: the Printing Press may have been invented later, but the techniques needed to invent it were already around (IIRC). Furthermore, the printing press had an immediate impact on history, unlike gunpowder, which was around for several centuries before it became in anyway useful beyond entertainment.

And the age of knights would have ended with or without gunpowder, there were social causes behind it as well as military, and the crossbow was probably just as deadly as gunpowder.

 

[Alamo]

The lowly horse drawn, wood railed railroad would be major improvement over regular carts for long distance freight movement. During their brief time in the limelight, they offered a transportation infrastructure rush similar to the plank road boom. They have a low overhead cost compared to roman roads, so they might catch on rapidly.

 

[f1b0nacc1]

Steam engines

Carlton,

The Indians had the zero, and even the beginnings of calculus, but what they didn't have was engineering on the scale (or of the complexity) that the Romans had. The Romans were practical engineers, and were particularly talented in hydraulic engineering, which would have made the effective development of steam engines over time virtually certain, whereas the Indians never really pursued that branch of technical development.

As for the use of steam engines, pumping water out of mines (mentioned by one of the other posters) is precisely where it would begin, and the Romans did a VERY significant amount of mining (tin, silver, gold of course, etc.) where such an innovation would be very attractive. Calculus would have been critical here, as it would have given engineers the basis for designing (and scaling) new engines, something that simply wasn't feasible without it.

As for smallholders, I believe that you might have missed my point. Steam engines would permit water pumping (irrigation anyone?), even primitive prime movers, something that smallholders would find fantastically valuable, yet would not offer similar benefits to the wealthy landowners, who were already heavily invested in slaves. Rail lines (a bit of a reach, to be sure) would have broken the monoply of the grain factors quite effectively, further enhancing the fortunes of the smallholders, and making possible long range transport of specialty crops and luxuries that could have also helped 'level the playing field'.

The capital investment for early steam engines was not excessive, and might have been lower still if metals were cheaper, which would have likely been an early effect of steam adoption by mines. This would have left such things within the reach of the smallholders, though in fairness, not without some barriers.

 

[Ofaloaf]

Carlton,

The Indians had the zero, and even the beginnings of calculus, but what they didn't have was engineering on the scale (or of the complexity) that the Romans had. The Romans were practical engineers, and were particularly talented in hydraulic engineering, which would have made the effective development of steam engines over time virtually certain, whereas the Indians never really pursued that branch of technical development.

As for the use of steam engines, pumping water out of mines (mentioned by one of the other posters) is precisely where it would begin, and the Romans did a VERY significant amount of mining (tin, silver, gold of course, etc.) where such an innovation would be very attractive. Calculus would have been critical here, as it would have given engineers the basis for designing (and scaling) new engines, something that simply wasn't feasible without it.

As for smallholders, I believe that you might have missed my point. Steam engines would permit water pumping (irrigation anyone?), even primitive prime movers, something that smallholders would find fantastically valuable, yet would not offer similar benefits to the wealthy landowners, who were already heavily invested in slaves. Rail lines (a bit of a reach, to be sure) would have broken the monoply of the grain factors quite effectively, further enhancing the fortunes of the smallholders, and making possible long range transport of specialty crops and luxuries that could have also helped 'level the playing field'.

The capital investment for early steam engines was not excessive, and might have been lower still if metals were cheaper, which would have likely been an early effect of steam adoption by mines. This would have left such things within the reach of the smallholders, though in fairness, not without some barriers.

Fibonacci, I believe you to be overly optimistic on the capabilities of early steam engines and the necessary intellectual advancements needed to reach that point.

As I pointed out above, the earliest steam engines were only effective as mine pumps at coal mines, since they consumed so much fuel in one day's work (I've heard claims of upwards 12 tons a day, from knowledgable steam enthusiasts) that the only way such machines could break even on their cost was to take some coal directly from the mines they were pumping out and feed it directly into the engine. Over time their efficiency improved from that point, yes, but to get money for improvements a Roman inventor would still have to sell the inefficient early models first, a much more difficult task in the Roman era compared to the Early Modern era.

The Romans had only fragments of Algebra to work with most of the time, much less Calculus, and so simply waving one's arm and saying "so then the Romans develop Calculus wholesale" is rather hard to accept.

Rather than banking on the sudden development of railroads in the Roman era and hoping that Roman government officials and merchants embrace this new technology, a much simpler and already-present technology would suffice: canals. Water transport is cheap and requires no long stretches of unattended iron just begging to be stolen. It's what was popular in the early industrial revolution, and the technology behind it is incredibly simple.


I beg pardon for any missing words or seemingly awkward phrases-- I have a tendency to think out sentences faster than I type them, and unintentionally skip words trying to keep up with my head as a result.

 

[MNP]

Horse railroads (wagonways) seem interesting. What's the history of the flange? That seems necessary.

Also, I've read that the Romans weren't into the kind of invention we were, I mean, culturally speaking. They could innovate yes, but they didn't prize technological progress the way our civilization does so things might be quite a bit slower.