what about in the roman cities?

Also they didn't have good enough metallurgy to do a proper industrialisation

they could have devolped better metallurgy

The urban patricians had plantations

They could have

But didn't

Possibly

the demand created by a steam engine would have driven better metalurgy

Not really

Steam locomotives+road

farming advances would be necessary?

It requires a significant investment from the medium to large stakeholders to do industrialisation, you could still have artisanal high quality metallurgy, they did in the high medeival ages

@Asdrubal =choo choo train

Sure, but the initial investment would never be fielded

Needs to be profitable every step of the way or for someone with enough power to force it through to a seen profitable end

@Joe The Communist yes, train go choo choo

whee

Rome didn't have a seen profitable end and slavery prevented it being profitable short term

but a steam engine would have made up some of the work

Idk it would change that much.

"Why didnt they put slaves in the factories?" They did lmao

Industrial revolution was a lot more things than steam machines.

and it could spur more interest in making shit

Theoretically yes

But you could get a steam engine

Or you could get 10 more slaves

And guarantee a profit

steam engines dont revolt

And once you have the steam engine you've developed its limited in use

Slaves rarely revolted either

10 slaves

A large enough slave revolt would do it

or 3 slaves+steam engine

Not really, you lose out on 10 slaves and get a single use steam engine

It'd take much much much variation to produce the industrial possibilities we know of

Probably bigger cities assuming they wont develop steam traina

Trains

Needs way more investment

They'd develop trains

That could save the empire

Same with long distance rapid communication