Industrial Milling in the Ancient and Medieval Worlds: A Survey of the Evidence for an Industrial Revolution in Medieval Europe
By Adam Robert Lucas
Technology and Culture, Vol. 46: 1 (2005)
Synopsis: For reasons of space and clarity of focus, this article will not examine claims that an industrial revolution occurred during the Middle Ages that are based on rapid growth in the number of waterpowered and wind-powered grain mills. Nor does it examine such claims based on technologies other than those related to waterpowered machinery. Its aim is, in fact, quite limited. It is, first, to examine whether the evidence for waterpowered industry cited by advocates of the thesis of a medieval industrial revolution is sufficiently robust to support the claims that have been made for it. Second, it is to determine whether this same evidence can be better understood in the light of more recent empirical research and in what areas further research may be required. In developing its case, the article sets some basic conditions for the acceptance of evidentiary claims, then works through that evidence to convey a sense of the strengths and weaknesses of the various sets of data, including the trends and patterns that may reasonably be inferred from them.
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