I recently watched a video that explained why Roman coinage was of such a higher quality than medieval coinage. A lot of it had to do with how the dies for the coins were made. The Romans had a lot more resources at their disposal, in terms of both raw materials and manpower. It really shows in the letterforms, where the Romans had distinct punches for each letter in the alphabet, as opposed to medieval times when less punches were used for making composite shapes.
Now, think about this: if you have a full set of letter punches AND YOU MAKE MANY MORE, what does that enable?
Answer: the printing press.
The Romans were that close, yet they didn’t see it.
The Chinese had movable type during the Viking Era.............