Lack of Industrialization in Greco-Roman Civilization

[Simon_Jester]

In a thread over in SLAM, Serafina remarked:

It has already been mentioned that the roman empire (and the greeks of the same era) had most of the technology we had at the start of the industrial revoltion.
It is debatable wether they did not go the next step due to social reasons or due to the few technologies they were lacking.
However, such discussion would warrant a thread on it's own.

Reflecting on this, I think it's an interesting question. We know that Hellenic culture had, in one place or another, many things we now think of as typical of early industrial technology:
-Precision gearing, the Antikythera mechanism being the favorite example.
-A grasp of pneumatic pressure and the concept of steam power, as demonstrated by Hero of Alexandria; I have encountered references to a steam-powered catapult designed by Archimedes as well.
-Large scale infrastructure projects; the Romans were famous for this.
-Water powered machinery, such as the Barbegal Mill

So what didn't they have? Or if it wasn't material technology that was lacking, why didn't the existing technologies merge into something like the Industrial Revolution of the early 1800s?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Material technology. How the heck do you plan to mass produce iron and steel, when the means to produce all that in the quality and quantity required does no exist? Iron and Steel are quintessentially one of the most important ingredients of the Industrial Revolution.

[Simon_Jester]

Material technology. How the heck do you plan to mass produce iron and steel, when the means to produce all that in the quality and quantity required does no exist? Iron and Steel are quintessentially one of the most important ingredients of the Industrial Revolution.

Interesting. So what, specifically, was missing? They had iron production in at least limited quantity, after all; were the existing production methods were too crude (and in what ways)? Or was it that they lacked the happy combination of circumstances that made for successful ironworks in places like early industrial Britain?

[Marcus Aurelius]

-A grasp of pneumatic pressure and the concept of steam power, as demonstrated by Hero of Alexandria; I have encountered references to a steam-powered catapult designed by Archimedes as well.

So what didn't they have? Or if it wasn't material technology that was lacking, why didn't the existing technologies merge into something like the Industrial Revolution of the early 1800s?

The obvious answer is that the Romans did not have an actual steam engine, since Hero's experiment stopped just short of creating one. A more interesting question is, however, why did no one invent the steam engine? To me the answer lies in the slowness, expensiveness and certain exclusiveness of information dissemination which is based on oral teaching and hand-written documents. While it is perhaps too bold to say that industrial revolution would have been impossible without the printing press, there is absolutely no doubt that historically the flow of information and exchange of ideas were greatly facilitated by the affordability and relative abundance of printed documents and books.

[B5B7]

There are also a number of other factors other than technology itself - they didn't have the scientific method, nor Arabic numerals, nor as advanced agricultural practices as later, etc.

[OmegaChief]

Though this does raise the interesting question, that if by some chance of fate the Roman Empire was to attempt somthing like the industrial revolution, just short a few of the actual techs.

And of course how successful such a thing would be and how much of an impact it would have had on history, or would it? The empire could still have fallen regardless.

[Sea Skimmer]

Making a decent steam engine requires being able to make decent pistons, or turbine blades and bearings which are even harder. The Romans had no machine tools to let them do this, and mere castings alone would not be good enough. At best you could hope to manually hone a fit, but I'm not sure they even had hand tools that would really work for that. Then you've also got to consider that iron was just absurdly expensive to do anything with, while the Romans could always start a new war, harvest slaves from the people they conquered and power stuff with them. Slaves could grow food and make cloths which basically meant if you had land they are a free source of power.

Note that even when the first modern ideas for steam engines appeared around 1550, it still took over another 150 years to create a design which worked to any useful extent. It doesn't matter how good an idea is if you can't build it and have it operate with enough efficiency to be worthwhile. It makes no sense to put the slaves to work cutting down trees or mining coal to power a crude steam engine which does less work then the work required to fuel it.

[Simon_Jester]

So what was the development path for machine tools, historically?

[RedImperator]

Artillery, if I recall correctly. As cannons advanced, they drove advanced in metallurgy and metalworking.

Incidentally, the Romans missed gunpowder, too, which, unlike the steam engine, they could have found applications for right away.

[Gil Hamilton]

Another explanation I've heard is that the Romans and Greeks also didn't have the right mindset. Whatever tools and materials they didn't have they might have developed, but a significant problem is that they didn't seem to connect that much to the notion of deliberately making machines to replace human labor. That's a key point, the Greeks or Romans had enough people that they could simply throw manpower at most problems, which was good enough for most of what they attempted to accomplish.

[Simon_Jester]

And yet you have facilities like the Barbegal Mill, a water-powered flour mill that was perfectly normal by the standards of the High Middle Ages. Can it be that simple?

[Zed]

Why on earth would the Romans develop industrial technology? They had slaves.

The entire mindset displayed in the first post presumes that if the technology for a development is present, that development will occur. This is patently untrue: there also has to be sufficient awareness of these developments, and a social climate in which these developments can become influential.

[Zed]

I've looked up a more eloquent formulation of the point about the importance of cultural, social and economic context:

In the light of this discussion of the extent to which the conditions for economic expansion were fulfilled in ancient times it should now be possible to suggest a tentative answer to the question posed at the start of this paper. The Greeks of the classical period, it may be concluded, did perhaps have the right climate of opinion, though even this is doubtful in view of the bias against practical pursuits that was so widespread among the educated classes of society. If they did have it, it was about all they did have. For they did not have a large enough population, or the raw materials, or the sources of power to start themselves on a process of industrial expansion, and it is also very doubtful whether they had sufficient wealth for capital development. The Romans on the other hand almost certainly had the wealth, and probably a large enough population. But they lacked the right climate of opinion, and, like the Greeks, they also were short of easily available raw materials and adequate sources of energy. In these respects the Graeco-Roman world presents a marked contrast to the countries of north-western Europe where the Industrial Revolution did eventually start. For in addition to a large population and a flourishing agriculture to provide the financial basis, these countries also possessed abundant supplies of most metals and of coal, reliable water-power that could easily be exploited, and an extensive system of inland waterways to provide cheap and easy transport. But the Graeco-Roman world, lacking nearly all these advantages, was not in a position to develop itself technically. Consequently, in spite of its great achievements in literature, in the arts, and in the technique of government, it remained materially at much the same level as its predecessors, the ancient civilizations of Egypt and Mesopotamia.'

The Technological Weakness of the Ancient World
Author(s): David W. Reece
Source: Greece & Rome, Second Series, Vol. 16, No. 1 (Apr., 1969), pp. 32-47
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/642896
Accessed: 10/06/2010 05:34

[Simon_Jester]

The entire mindset displayed in the first post presumes that if the technology for a development is present, that development will occur.

As the first poster, I feel qualified to disagree. I don't think you know what the mindset displayed in the first post was at all. You see, for me the whole point of the exercise is to figure out why certain developments did not occur over a period of hundreds of years when the physical capability to achieve them existed or was within relatively easy reach.

That may be because the technology wasn't there after all. It may be due to social factors, which believe it or not I did mention:
"If it wasn't material technology that was lacking, why didn't the existing technologies merge into something like the Industrial Revolution of the early 1800s?

I mean, surely one can still ask "why not" when faced with something that, as far as we know, could have happened but did not happen. So jumping up and down and saying "social factors meant it didn't have to happen because the conditions didn't lead to it!" is meaningless by itself. How did conditions prevent it from happening? That's what I was asking about in the first place.

I've looked up a more eloquent formulation of the point about the importance of cultural, social and economic context:

In the light of this discussion of the extent to which the conditions for economic expansion were fulfilled in ancient times it should now be possible to suggest a tentative answer to the question posed at the start of this paper. The Greeks of the classical period, it may be concluded, did perhaps have the right climate of opinion, though even this is doubtful in view of the bias against practical pursuits that was so widespread among the educated classes of society. If they did have it, it was about all they did have. For they did not have a large enough population, or the raw materials, or the sources of power to start themselves on a process of industrial expansion, and it is also very doubtful whether they had sufficient wealth for capital development. The Romans on the other hand almost certainly had the wealth, and probably a large enough population. But they lacked the right climate of opinion, and, like the Greeks, they also were short of easily available raw materials and adequate sources of energy. In these respects the Graeco-Roman world presents a marked contrast to the countries of north-western Europe where the Industrial Revolution did eventually start. For in addition to a large population and a flourishing agriculture to provide the financial basis, these countries also possessed abundant supplies of most metals and of coal, reliable water-power that could easily be exploited, and an extensive system of inland waterways to provide cheap and easy transport. But the Graeco-Roman world, lacking nearly all these advantages, was not in a position to develop itself technically. Consequently, in spite of its great achievements in literature, in the arts, and in the technique of government, it remained materially at much the same level as its predecessors, the ancient civilizations of Egypt and Mesopotamia.'

And yet much of this is a matter of material factors, not social ones. Having a small population or a lack of coal and metal are not social factors.

[Zed]

I'll admit that I phrased my first post wrong - I couldn't edit it anymore by the time I'd looked up the second one. I'll note the 'right climate of opinion', though. I've also frequently read about a link between slavery and the lack of development of technology, but I can't seem to find any sources for that at the moment, so perhaps I'm misremembering.

[Marcus Aurelius]

I've looked up a more eloquent formulation of the point about the importance of cultural, social and economic context:
The Technological Weakness of the Ancient World
Author(s): David W. Reece
Source: Greece & Rome, Second Series, Vol. 16, No. 1 (Apr., 1969), pp. 32-47
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/642896
Accessed: 10/06/2010 05:34

Thanas is probably busy because he had not yet appeared in this thread, but my guess is that he will say that your source is outdated. In the 1960s the fairly extensive use of water power by the Romans for example was not yet very well known or understood. The 'they had slaves' argument simply does not hold, since there are numerous examples of the Romans using mechanical power, usually water, instead of slaves during the late Empire. Saying that they were not materially more advanced than the ancient Egyptians does not really seem correct either in the light of contemporary knowledge about Roman engineering and industry. Of course 'much at the same level' can mean almost anything in practice, so it isn't entirely incorrect, either.

[Zwinmar]

Something else one must consider when asking a question such as this. Are the people who are thinking upon this anachronising the thought processes of those who came before? It is easy to say that because we, as a society, thought of something 'simple' that our ancestors would have as well. However, that does not follow because modern society has a wealth of information that was simply not present in earlier stages of history. Of course, one must also be careful, the ancient peoples where just as smart as their modern counterparts, with both geniuses and those who are nothing more than simpletons.

One key component to this is education. In general, a greater percentage of the modern populace, at least in the wealthier nations, have been through a process that was once reserved for only the wealthiest (ex. Alexander ) would have recieved. Because of this education concepts such as zero are taken for granted, while in the Roman world there was no such thing, with Roman numerals becoming cumbersome very quickly.

Once one knows that something can be made, even if they do not know how, they have enough evidence to begin working on a solution, however, if one has no clue, where do they start?

[Zed]

I've looked up a more eloquent formulation of the point about the importance of cultural, social and economic context:
The Technological Weakness of the Ancient World
Author(s): David W. Reece
Source: Greece & Rome, Second Series, Vol. 16, No. 1 (Apr., 1969), pp. 32-47
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/642896
Accessed: 10/06/2010 05:34

Thanas is probably busy because he had not yet appeared in this thread, but my guess is that he will say that your source is outdated. In the 1960s the fairly extensive use of water power by the Romans for example was not yet very well known or understood. [...] Saying that they were not materially more advanced than the ancient Egyptians does not really seem correct either in the light of contemporary knowledge about Roman engineering and industry. Of course 'much at the same level' can mean almost anything in practice, so it isn't entirely incorrect, either.

That is quite possible - I was merely trying to give an impression of the type of explanation required to answer this question: a complex interaction of economical, social and cultural factors. I only did a quick search on JSTOR and came up with this.

[Simon_Jester]

Something else one must consider when asking a question such as this. Are the people who are thinking upon this anachronising the thought processes of those who came before?

It's certainly not my intention to do so. In fact, that's exactly what I'm interested in. We see a difference of outcomes between Europe in the 1700s and the classical era. That could be explained by a number of factors- lack of physical technology, lack of social conditions, lack of the idea that it's worth bothering to do things in a certain way, whatever.

The question is very general: what factors? Why was there a difference. Was it just blind chance? Were there deterministic factors in play? Can we figure out which specific things about the classical era were so different that they produced this huge difference in outcomes?

[Thanas]

The problem many people here are missing is the scale of advancement. The Industrial Revolution itself was not instantaneous, rather it is the culmination of an 600 year period that started in the middle ages.

The view that the Romans were not modernizing is really outdated, it is no longer really supported. The Romans made lots of advancements over the course of their history and were always eager to support new technologies. The problem for us is that many of those technologies (for example: Desert irrigation) does not fit the bill of what we today perceive as industrial advancement, though arguably it requires a lot of knowledge about water patterns, architecture, biology etc.

However, the Romans had already laid a lot of groundwork that is important for an industrial revolution:
- they used water power and had a lot of knowledge about mining
- they used mechanical tools for farming like treshers, though primitive ones
- they had started early but highly complex factories, which only got reintroduced en masse in central Europe during Colbert.
- production was spread out over parts of the empire
- good logistics, they were able to field cities of more than one million, a feat that was not achieved in Europe until London became a 1mil city in the late 18th century.

All of that points to a good and steady technological development. However, this is almost unrecognizable to the untrained eye. For example, take Helmets. Earlier roman helmets were nearly custom-made. Late Roman helmets were made out of several pieces, meaning they could be customized at will. You can see a lot of these improvements, but most people never recognize them.

So, would there have been an industrial revolution in Europe earlier if the Empire had not collapsed? Maybe, maybe not. Keep in mind that the Byzantine Empire still had a higher level of technology until the 12th century, despite having suffered much.

[Zed]

How long did this trend of modernization continue, Thanas? Did it continue until the Empire's eventual fall, or did it stop somewhat earlier? I ask as I've recently been informed that the quality of Roman ceramics decayed in the later Empire.

[Thanas]

How long did this trend of modernization continue, Thanas? Did it continue until the Empire's eventual fall, or did it stop somewhat earlier? I ask as I've recently been informed that the quality of Roman ceramics decayed in the later Empire.

This is one of the things that really is hard to pinpoint. In any case, saying that the quality of ceramics decayed in the later Empire is really pointless, unless you can say what ceramics and where in the Empire. If the ceramics are from a region that was occupied by the vandals, like say, north africa, then no wonder if the quality suffers.

On the other hand, a drop in quality of ceramics alone is not sufficient grounds to make a judgement. It may very well be that ceramics just fell out of favor for the rich, who seemed to prefer elaborately ornamented glass chrystals those days. Like this one:

Huge image

, which speaks to a height in manufacturing techniques seldomly seen on this planet. Yes, the entire glass stands on those tiny glass arches. Even today, we cannot replicate this easily, especially not handmade.


Note that both of these are of the 4th century.

[Zed]

I'm afraid I can't really tell the specifics - I've just digged up some slides related to the discussion. All I've managed to extract from them is that this is a thesis of Bryan Ward-Perkins' The fall of Rome and the end of civilization (2005). Based on the quality of archaeological findings, including ceramics, osteological materials and coins, Ward-Perkins argues that near the end of the Western Roman Empire, there was a drastic reduction in the quality of life. His justification (p. 94) is that "The sceptic can argue that ceramics only play a minor role in daily life, and that pottery production and distribution are a small part of any economy [...] Pottery in most cultures is vital in relation to one of our primary needs, food. Ceramic vessels, of different shapes and sizes, play an essential part in the preparation, cooking and consumption of foodstuffs [...] There is every reason to see pottery vessels as central to the daily life in Roman times."

[Thanas]

I'm afraid I can't really tell the specifics - I've just digged up some slides related to the discussion. All I've managed to extract from them is that this is a thesis of Bryan Ward-Perkins' The fall of Rome and the end of civilization (2005). Based on the quality of archaeological findings, including ceramics, osteological materials and coins, Ward-Perkins argues that near the end of the Western Roman Empire, there was a drastic reduction in the quality of life. His justification (p. 94) is that "The sceptic can argue that ceramics only play a minor role in daily life, and that pottery production and distribution are a small part of any economy [...] Pottery in most cultures is vital in relation to one of our primary needs, food. Ceramic vessels, of different shapes and sizes, play an essential part in the preparation, cooking and consumption of foodstuffs [...] There is every reason to see pottery vessels as central to the daily life in Roman times."

That quote says nothing about Roman innovations. He is talking about an era in which 80% of the Western Empire had already been overrun with Barbarians. Really, how anyone can read "when barbarians sack the cities, the quality of life declines" and then use this as an example for the loss of innovation. It is akin to asking why Germany did not built a new sports car when the Russians were knocking on the doors to the Reichstag.

[Zed]

Ward-Perkins isn't trying to argue against the notion that the Roman Empire was innovating - he's trying to argue against the claim that the change from the Roman Empire to medieval times was gradual and smooth, rather than a 'fall'. His thesis merely prompted me to wonder until when the Romans continued innovating technologically, and at what speed.