Before three thousand years B.C. (prehistory), mankind has widely used tools made of stone and bone. Tools such as rollers, crowbars and sleds were used to carry heavy loads, such as in the construction of the pyramids in Ancient Egypt. Shortly after 3500 B.C., Sumer in ancient Babylon had wheeled carts, which were made by attaching wheels to the underside of a sled.

Important tools in prehistory were the bow drill and the rotary table for making pottery. The bow drill consisted of a flint bit, a drill shaft, a nest and a bowstring. By pulling the bow back and forth, the drill rod could be rotated and used for drilling, reaming and extracting fire. The bow drill later evolved into the bow lathe, which became an even more effective tool.

Egypt's third to sixth dynasty (about 2686 BC ~ 2181 BC) of the early, began to pull the oxen of the original wooden plow and metal sickle used in agriculture. Copper tools were made mostly by forging. Two and four-wheeled wooden carriages were used in the area between Europe and Asia around 2500 BC. Two-wheeled chariots from around 1500 B.C. have been found in ancient Egyptian tombs. Hand mills for grinding grain were made in Syria in 1200 BC.

Simple tools such as levers, rope rollers, and leveling chutes have been used in building and loading materials. Pulleys first appeared in the 8th century B.C. and were used by the Assyrians as a mechanism for releasing arrows on castles. Winches were first used to extract ore from mines and water from wells. At this time, the Egyptian water clock, siphon, blower box and piston pumps and other ancient hydraulic machinery has also been the initial development and application.

Six hundred B.C. to A.D. 400 of ancient Greece and Rome is known as the classical culture period. This period in ancient Greece gave birth to some famous philosophers and scientists, they made outstanding contributions to the development of ancient machinery.

For example, the theory of the scholar Hiero about five kinds of simple machinery (lever, pointed split, pulley, wheel and axle, thread) to promote heavy objects is still relevant today. This period of woodworking tools have been greatly improved, in addition to woodworking commonly used sets of tools such as axes, bow saws, bow drills, shovels and chisels, but also the development of spherical drills, can pull nails of the crook hammer, felling with a two-man saw and so on. Long shaft lathes and treadle lathes were also widely used to make furniture and wheel spokes. Pedal lathes were used until the Middle Ages, laying the foundation for the development of modern lathes.

Punching coins was also a major achievement in metalworking during this period, and was the germ of modern batch production techniques. But with the fall of the Roman Empire, the technique was lost for centuries.

Around the first century B.C., the ancient Greeks made stone mills on the basis of hand mills. This was an advance in machinery and machines. Around the same time, ancient Rome developed donkey-drawn mills and similar stone-wheeled mills.

The earliest use of gear trains in Europe was in the odometers used in chariots to record mileage. The use of levers in machinery became more common at this time, such as in the construction of heavy loads lifting skid steers and compound skid steers. Horse-drawn carriages and chariots were also improved.

This period in the development of ancient hydraulic machinery is, first of all, expanding the use of water pulley tools and bucket type waterwheel; the creation of the turbine wheel and the Nose water mill and other new fluid machinery, the former by turning the threaded rod, will be raised to a high place by the low water, mainly used for the Roman city of water supply, the latter used to grind grains by the water to promote the rotation of square impellers, whose power is less than half a horse power. The greater power of the Vitruvian water mill, the water wheel by the downward flow of water to promote, through the appropriate selection of the number of teeth of the size of the gears, you can adjust the rotational speed of the water mill, the power of about three horsepower, and later raised to fifty horsepower, became the largest power of the prime mover at that time.

The use of pistons and cylinders made of pressure pumps and suction pumps, in this period there is also development. The earliest appeared is used to extinguish the fire Philo pressure pump, and later there is a suction pump and pressure pump from the well to lift water, as well as the Romans used to extinguish the double cylinder plunger pump.

Thermomechanics appeared at this time mainly as playthings for Greek scholars and philosophers. In the first century A.D., Hiero's steam ball (also called the wind god wheel) is an example. The lower part of the steam rotating ball steam pot contains water, which is connected to a hollow ball with a branch pipe. There are two tangential spouts in opposite directions on the ball. When the pot under the fire, the ball of water boiling into steam ejected, such as the resulting jet reaction thrust is large enough, it will push the ball constantly rotating. The steam rotating ball is famous as the first device to convert steam pressure into mechanical power, and it is perhaps the earliest application of the jet reaction principle.

The period from 400 to 1500 A.D. belongs to the Middle Ages, with the period before 1000 being the first part of the Middle Ages, the period from 1000 to 1500 being the second part, and the next 250 years being the period approaching the Industrial Revolution.

The first part of the Middle Ages stretched for about 600 years, and the development of mechanical technology came to a long halt as the classical cultures of ancient Greece and Rome languished. Later, with the development of agriculture and handicrafts, Italy, France, Britain and other countries have organized universities, the development of natural sciences and humanities, training of talents, and at the same time absorbed the advanced science and technology of China, Arabia and the Islamic Empire, mechanical technology began to recover and develop.

First of all, in Western Europe began to use coal smelting pig iron, manufacturing large castings. With the development of water turbines, there has been enough power to drive the leather-made large bellows, in order to obtain a high melting temperature, casting of cannons and bells of the workshop gradually increased, the weight of the castings gradually increased. In agriculture, plows with curved concave plates were created to replace the pointed split plows of Roman times.

This period also saw the emergence of hand-operated drills, the construction of which showed that the principle of the crank linkage mechanism has been used in machinery. In terms of processing machinery, there were lathes with large wheels, and in the 12th century and the second half of the 13th century, there were primitive clocks with rope escapements and balance clocks. The balance clock is the first practical application of mechanical clocks, which are equipped with hour and second hands, indicating a further development of the clock gear system, in the 15th century in European households has been more common.

The manufacture of watches began before 1500 AD. Important improvements were the use of coil springs instead of weights to generate power, in addition to the addition of a ratchet mechanism. The success of the creation of mechanical clocks was not only necessary for modern civilization, but also advanced the technology of manufacturing precision parts. Mechanical clocks and watches were later comprehensively improved, such as the single-pendulum clocks that replaced the original balance clocks, and the two precision clocks with different pendulum lengths that were made in England for the Greenwich Observatory in 1676. Pocket watches of this period used bimetallic strips to solve the problem of temperature compensation of the balance wheel.

In ancient hydraulic machinery, there were downward- or upward-flushing turbines (water mills), as well as wind mills and wind turbines. Horizontal downstroke turbines were improved from earlier water mills, and by the 12th and 13th centuries had been used to power mining, pulverizing, smelting, and other operations. This turbine was improved and then developed into a large upstroke turbine in the 14th century for lifting ores. This period of Western Europe in the use of water power has made great progress, turbine workshops increased rapidly.

A.D. 1500 ~ 1750, mechanical technology development is extremely rapid. Progress in materials is mainly manifested in the use of iron and steel, especially pig iron instead of wood to make machines, instruments and tools. At the same time, in order to solve the problem of transportation in mining, around 1770, Britain developed horse-drawn railed wagons. First, wooden rails were used, and then they were replaced with iron rails.

This period of tool machines also gained a lot of achievements, such as the manufacture of hydraulic rolling machinery and several machine tools, such as gear cutting machine tools, thread lathes, small foot grinding wheel grinder and grinding optical instrument lenses polishing machine. Pumps in this period has also developed, it is mainly used to solve the problem of mine drainage and urban water supply, including mine drainage pumps, positive rotary pumps (1588) and centrifugal pumps (1689) and so on.

This time Italy invented the water pressure air compressor (commonly known as the water wind box), which can be used as a blower for melting steel to replace the old leather tiger. 1759 and the emergence of large-scale blower. Wind power machinery such as wind mill is also more widely used, the number of increased, Britain alone has been thousands of units for grinding, pumping and sawing wood.

In terms of power machinery, in 1698, Britain's Saffrey manufactured mine steam pumps, known as the "Friends of the miners", which created the use of steam as a power precedent. 1705, Britain's Newcomen invented the atmospheric steam engine, which is very imperfect, but it is the first work of a more reliable steam engine, mainly used for water lifting, power up to six. Mainly used for water lifting, power up to six horsepower, this steam engine in 1750 in the former has been popularized in Europe, and later spread to the United States.

This period, the birth of engineering science in Europe. Many scientists, such as Newton, Galileo, Leibniz, Boyle, Hooker and so on, they laid the theoretical foundation for the new science in many ways.

In order to encourage creativity and invention, Italy and Britain established patent agencies in 1474 and 1561 respectively. Scientific societies, such as the Royal Society, were also established in the 1760s. England began publishing scientific reports in 1665, and France established the French Academy of Sciences at about the same time. Russia and Germany also established the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Berlin Academy of Sciences in 1725 and 1770 respectively. These academic institutions broke through the confines of the church at the time to start free discussion, exchange of academic views and experimental results, and thus greatly promote the development of science and technology as well as mechanical engineering.