SNAPSHOTChinese Technological Achievements
Before the technological explosion of the European Industrial Revolution during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, China had long been the major center of global technological innovation.28 Many of those inventions spread to other civilizations, where they stimulated imitation or modification. Since Europe was located at the opposite end of the Eurasian continent from China, it often took considerable time for those innovations to give rise to something similar in the West. That lag is also a measure of the relative technological development of the two civilizations in premodern times.
Innovation | First Used in China (approximate) | Adoption/Recognition in the West: Time Lag in Years (approximate) |
Iron plow | 6th–4th century B.C.E. | 2,000+ |
Cast iron | 4th century B.C.E. | 1,000–1,200 |
Efficient horse collar | 3rd–1st century B.C.E. | 1,000 |
Paper | 2nd century B.C.E. | 1,000 |
Wheelbarrow | 1st century B.C.E. | 900–1,000 |
Rudder for steering ships | 1st century C.E. | 1,100 |
Iron chain suspension bridge | 1st century C.E. | 1,000–1,300 |
Porcelain | 3rd century C.E. | 1,500 |
Magnetic compass for navigation | 9th–11th century C.E. | 400 |
Gunpowder | 9th century C.E. | 400 |
Chain drive for transmission of power | 976 C.E. | 800 |
Movable type printing | 1045 C.E. | 400 |