801-837 CE (Superpowers)

Cassius, son of Valens, was unfortunate enough to be in charge when Rome faced its next greatest crisis, the Viking Hordes. Although it is true that they'd been attacking the Empire's coasts for some time now, Cassius was the one who saw both the problem's climax and its end. He was regarded by later historians as a simple and incompetent leader, unready for his position as emperor. His appeasement of the Vikings has most recently been regarded as one of the Top 10 worst decisions made by an Emperor.

Civil Events
Though the Empire was safe from falling into debt thanks to his father's streamlining, Cassius certainly seemed to have made every attempt possible to get it there. The Cassian Reforms between 804 and 816 were a costly an inefficient attempt to upgrade the Empire's infrastructure to reflect the advances in mechanics of the last century. Although there were many far reaching benefits from these programs, their cost was seen as being simply not worth it.

Nearly a quarter of the cost of the reforms was directed to the construction of windmills and other wind powered devices. This included a wind/man-powered pump that moved water to the top of a tall tower in Constantinopolis for it to be stored for later use, thereby creating the first water towers. The aggregate capacity of aqueducts throughout the Empire was also increased by about 25%, whilst several growing cities were given their own large cistern.

The island province of Melita especially received more attention than it had in a while. An underground cistern, built inside one of the island's highest hills, now provided a more efficient means of storing the water that was being transported to the island everyday by ship. When at full safe capacity the cistern could provide a continuous supply of water to the island for one and a half months. Cisterns on the other two major islands of the Archipelago were built with the intention to have continuous stream of water to certain parts of the islands so as to reverse the desertification process that was underway there.

Meanwhile, in 805 at the Academy in Parisium, Roman scientists built the first electric motor, a device that had been invented by Archaedavincus. Though it was a simple and largely impractical device, it performed the function it was intended for and that was enough of a success for the scientists there. For the time being however, the electric motor become little more than a novelty item for the rich, being used in toy automatons or in "magic" shows.

The construction of the motor was followed by a more practical develop in 809, ampulae that could be recharged after they were depleted without having to take them apart and replace the fluid and metal nodes. Although it gradually lost efficiency after each charge, and methods for recharging them were in fact more costly than building one non-rechargeable battery, the developed at great implications for the electroplating industry. Now, the richer firms had a far greater success than independent electroplaters, making the industry far more monopolized than it had previously been.