Reddit Reddit reviews Medieval Machine: The Industrial Revolution of the Middle Ages

We found 2 Reddit comments about Medieval Machine: The Industrial Revolution of the Middle Ages. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.

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Medieval Machine: The Industrial Revolution of the Middle Ages
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2 Reddit comments about Medieval Machine: The Industrial Revolution of the Middle Ages:

u/ncist · 2 pointsr/papertowns

It's actually in the link, here is the passage:

>Emperor Vespasian, engaged in rebuilding Rome after the destructive reigns of Nero, Otho, and Vitellius, was presented by an inventor with plans for a lifting device that would greatly reduce the need for human labor in the reconstruction. Vespasian rejected the machine because it would throw too many men out of work. "I must feed my poor," he said

I have seen the quote in Medieval Machine as "how will I feed my common?" which is also where I read Vespasian still paid the guy. I have it in paperback I'll get it out tonight and post the passage.

Edit - here is another telling of the story in the grippingly-titled History of the Middle Ages, 300-1500:

>The Romans neither gave social prestige to the engineer nor did they value technological innovation to the extent that medieval peoples did. The Roman attitude can be seen in a story during the reign of Vespasian about a machine that could haul huge columns up the Capitoline Hill at minimal expense. No details exist about this machine, but speculatively, the power source was probably steam, the principle for which had been invented but with little practical application. Vespasian offered the inventor a reward to destroy the machine because, he said, "I must always ensure that the working classes earn enough money to buy themselves food."

u/afshin · 1 pointr/atheism

Yes, these were the exact people who had a vested interested in creating the myth of the lack of technological progress in the Middle Ages. In fact, quite the contrary was true, the Middle Ages saw enormous growth in literacy, science, mathematics and actual on-the-ground technical achievements. You're espousing a point of view that is outdated and (at best) considered quaint by any serious modern historian.

If you need to back to the 18th century to find support for a position that modern scholars universally reject, perhaps the position is not particularly defensible.

Obligatory references: Wikipedia entry on "Medieval Technology", a classic book on medieval technology, "The Medieval Machine" by Jean Gimpel