| ▲ | WalterBright 3 days ago |
| > Romans could have invented steam engines if they wanted to. They did not have the precursors to it, such as a lathe. Steam engine technology evolved out of cannon technology, which was developing for centuries before the steam engine. (The lathe also came about from cannon improvements.) |
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| ▲ | wqaatwt 3 days ago | parent | next [-] |
| You also needed cheap fuel and relatively expensive labour to make it feasible. Early engines were used to pump water out of coal mines because they were very inefficient and transportation was very expensive. Of course Romans actually had coal mines in Britain and the Rhineland so it wouldn’t have been entirely fat fetched. |
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| ▲ | WalterBright 3 days ago | parent [-] | | Most major inventions need a lot of available precursor technology, so it's actually kinda hard to think of things the Romans could have done if they only knew. I keep thinking of a primitive printing press, but the Romans didn't have paper, either. Paper didn't appear in Europe before 1000 AD. | | |
| ▲ | Ekaros 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | Actually it seems textile printing does have contemporary history. And maybe even older one. So jump from there to other materials might not be impossible. | |
| ▲ | UncleSlacky 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | They had papyrus, though. | | |
| ▲ | WalterBright 2 days ago | parent [-] | | Not really. They imported it, and never figured out how to make it. The papyrus plant would only grow in Egypt. Papyrus was also inferior to paper in that it tended to come apart when wet, or would just come apart. | | |
| ▲ | LtWorf 2 days ago | parent [-] | | Papyrus grows fine in sicily (I have a lot in the garden, besides some water it doesn't really need any special care). Besides egypt was roman so… | | |
| ▲ | wqaatwt 8 hours ago | parent [-] | | Papyrus is also not a very good material for writing outside of arid areas compared to paper and especially parchment. Unless kept in very good condition scrolls might last only a few decades. As far as we can tell many ancient texts were lost well before the Roman Empire declined because they weren’t popular enough for anyone to bother copying them. |
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| ▲ | idkfasayer 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] |
| The only reason the Romans could not have invented the steam engine was that the Greeks already did before them: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeolipile They had a Lathe too. |
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| ▲ | WalterBright 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | I didn't know the Romans had the lathe. Thanks for the correction. But they did not have a metal lathe, which is substantially more sophisticated. Invention of the metal lathe is credited to Henry Maudslay around 1800. While steam engines with pistons existed before, the poor sealing because of inaccurate bores and pistons, made them not very efficient. | |
| ▲ | mk89 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Incredible. I found this video that shows how the Aelopile works: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/trUtLLu_Ono What an awesome invention!!! | | |
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