During the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD), the Chinese develop water-powered trip hammers for pounding grain, breaking ore, and operating piston bellows for blast furnaces in iron forging. This application of water power, which emerged independently from Western developments, was crucial to China's iron industry and agricultural processing. The technology, which used a vertical-set waterwheel to lift and release heavy hammers, significantly increased production capacity and contributed to the economic and military strength of the Han state.

The water-powered trip hammer is a testament to Han China's technological sophistication, a period that produced some of the earliest known poetry in the Chinese tradition. While not directly celebrated in surviving verse, such innovations are part of the broader material culture that shaped the world of poets like Sima Xiangru, whose rhapsodies often praised the imperial power and prosperity made possible by such technologies.