I was riding my bike the other day and I was wondering. Why did it take so long to develop the bicycle? I mean, it’s not really that complicated (I’m talking about a basic bike, like I had in the 50s, not one with multiple gears and hand brakes). However, the bicycle has only been around for about 100 years.
Then I wondered if they could have built bicycles during the Roman empire, assuming they had the plans for it. They could have used bronze or steel for the frame, sprockets, and chain. I’m not sure what they would have used for the tires but they probably would have to be solid rather than filled with air. I’m assuming that the streets were paved or cobbled so a bike would be practical.
Is this possible or should I remember to wear my helmet next time I go riding?
They didn’t have steel, for one thing. And no one had invented the chain drive, yet. They could have built bicycles with the existing materials, but it probably would have weighed several hundred pounds. Not very practical, when you already had horse-drawn chariots to pull you around.
I think KevinB’s got it when he mentions the alternatives already available. Bicycles are really only useful to haul one or two persons with no significant freight for reasonably short distances. The need to accomplish that task didn’t really exist until large cities evolved. Until then, it was immensely easier to use the transportation options already available, e.g. any handy beast of burden.
After all, necessity is the mother of invention, no?
That addresses the first part of my question (why we didn’t have bikes sooner). However, I’m just wondering if the Romans had the technology to make a bike if someone gave them the plans. If they didn’t have steel could they have used brass? Is there anything about the drive chain that prevents them from being able to make one? I admit it’s just an intellectual exercise but it keeps me busy while I’m riding along.
I’m not disputing your assertion, but a belt drive was certainly possible with Roman-era technology. If they had wind-driven mills, adapting the technology and concept wouldn’t be too much of a leap.
All those soldiers who needed to guard the vast empire might have appreciated a faster method of transportation than the march. I think weight was the major problem, but a wooden-framed bicycle, ableit fragile, would work.
I don’t think brass would work. They’d be better off using wood and iron, as the earliest bikes did. Given the plans, they probably could have built a hobby horse-type bike pretty easily. Again, given the plans, they could probably build a chain drive for it pretty easily, too. But how practical is an oak, iron, and bronze bicycle? Bikes didn’t become popular until light weight, thin-walled steel tubing was available to make them light enough to pedal easily. You can build a brick rocket ship, too, but that doesn’t necessarily make it practical.
Rome was a large enough city (1 million according to some estimates, at it’s peak), but I don’t think a bike would have been too useful. Even if they could have made one given the plans, it would have been much more expensive than a bike today, given that it would have been made by hand, and using “state-of-the-art” technology for the time. Anyone rich enough to buy one wouldn’t be driving himself around
The city itself was too crowded and convoluted to make biking around very practical.
I don’t think soldiers would use bikes today anymore than they have in the past when they were available. A Roman solder carried a lot of weight with him, and a wooden bike probably wouldn’t hold up to extended military use. The main use would probably be scouting/messengers/etc., and horses were probably faster and more reliable given the roads (or lack of roads).
Slight hijack – in Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Artur’s Court, he has the knights of the round table riding bicycles to the rescue.
I suspect that the widespread adoption of the bicycle was contigent on the development of smooth roads (cobblestones need not apply) and rubber wheels. Lacking big rubber tires and mountain bike gearing, bikes on dirt roads are pretty much useless. The original bikes had solid wheels (wood or rubber) but they were brutal to ride.
This same thought brought me back to this thread, but I see Finagle has already handled it. To my mind, it’s not the “smooth roads” so much as the “rubber wheels,” or more specifically the pneumatic tires that are the key element here. And vulcanized rubber was, AFAIK, beyond the capacity of the Romans.
I vote for the smooth roads. Bicycles are only good when you have a fairly smooth path to go on, and aren’t very useful when that path is turned to mud by the rain. Rubber tires would be next (I doubt the Romans had any access to rubber; it grew too far away).
And it all boils down to the basic, “no one ever thought of it.” Remember, people in different time periods thought differently than we do, and would not necessarily see things that we consider obvious.
Have you ever ridden a bicycle on a rough road. It’ll rattle your teeth and anything else that isn’t securely fastened down.
As far as brass chains and gears go I singlehandedly broke three steel chains as a kid and the roads I rode on were asphalt or gravel.
Not to mention the very large scab on my face when I tried to jump a pothole. I do not recommend using your face for a three point landing.
Another thought
The bendix brake system was not invented until later and it was quite complicated ,just ask my dad. I took mine apart when I was about 12.
30,000 Roman soldiers bicycling down the Alpian way would have given new meaning to mass suicide.
the industrial revolution brought the concept of standarization and made possible the manufacture of interchangeable parts. before that every item was pretty much custom made making complex machines extremely expensive.
The first firearms were all one of a kind with no interchangeable parts. They were extremely expensive. Then Colt and other manufacturers changed that.
It was the same with clocks.
The bicycle would have been a luxury toy for the extremely wealthy. And not that useful for lack of paved roads.
Also those people did not have the inclination to try new things that we have. For them life did not change as fast. Today it is obvious for us that new inventions open new possibilities but for them this was not so clear.
There are cases were technology goes unused and other cases were it is sought for decades or centuries. Two examples:
The marine chronometer was needed and sought for centuries but the technology wasn’t there yet.
OTOH we have the optical telegraph which was developed extensively in Europe in the early 19th century until its network covered all of europe. The technology it used was available to the romans 2000 years earlier and yet no one thought of doing it.
Early bicycles (like high wheelers) didn’t have a chain or belt, so that would not have been a prerequisite to inventing them. Before pedals were invented, they were a sort of walking scooter. As alluded to, they were of limited use except in “civilized” environments. This blurb on the history may be of use to this discussion:
