762-801 CE (Superpowers)

The emperor Valens was another one of Rome's finest leaders. Under his reign, the Viking threat made itself known to the world and, just as quickly, steps were taken to hold them off. More importantly, the advances in technology that Archaedavincus had been bringing the Romans for the previous 40 years were fully integrated into the functioning of the Empire. Finally, Valens made the greatest administrative reform of the Empire since the IVth Century, changing the very way that its vast area was governed.

Civil Events
Though the great inventor Archaedavincus was nearing his end, he still managed to be as prolific as ever. In 763 he invented a new crane design that was meant to be used in ports, something which greatly accelerating the loading and unloading of ships. In 765, he outlined the idea for a large mechanical clock which kept time in the manner of water clock. His design included over 300 drawings for different gear and pulley set ups for use in clocks of several different kinds. His final great invention was the design an construction of the world's first wind-powered grinding mill in 769.

Although the windmill was his last practical invention, it was not the last thing he worked on. During the last few months of his life, Acutula was reportedly drawing the designs for human-like machines that could operate on their own, powered by the flywheel he invented in 743. Though the machine was only capable of simple motions such as standing up and swinging a sword, or firing an arrow, it was still one of the most innovative ideas in history. The plans for the automatons came from a weapon firing system Acutula had invented in 759, one which allowed a celeballista to fire continuously, for one hour, without the aid of a human operator. All it needed was for the flywheel to be "charged" and it would work till it ran out of potential energy. This latter invention was widely used in towers for defense as several of them could allow one man to devastate massed troops with ease.