18/05/2024
The fundamental component of the Renaissance - Oriental papermaking.
In the first year of Yuan Xing (105), the eu**ch CAI Lun improved the folk method of papermaking, using bark, h**p head, open cloth, fishing net to make paper, known as "CAI Hou paper", and presented it to Emperor Han. CAI Lun's papermaking technique is listed as one of the "Four great inventions" of ancient China and has made immeasurable contributions to the spread of human culture and the progress of world civilization. The improvement and dissemination of paper technology changed people's writing and reading habits, so that ordinary people can obtain information and knowledge; In addition, the combination with the development of printing has facilitated the preservation of characters, improved the efficiency of cultural transmission, and expanded the scope of civilization's influence to a certain extent. This has not only promoted the inheritance and development of Chinese culture, but also played a significant role in the development of world culture. It is a great gift from the Chinese people to all mankind. At the end of the 8th century, paper making began in Baghdad, then flourished in Damascus, and gradually spread to Europe. The famous Arab writer Taaribai of the 11th century wrote according to the writings of his predecessors: "The spread of paper making from China to Samarkand (present-day Uzbekistan) was due to the fact that some of the captured Chinese soldiers and captives could make paper." By setting up factories to make paper, famous. After the paper industry developed, paper became an important export of Samarkand's foreign trade." As a result, Chinese papermaking technology entered the territory of Arabia. Between the 12th and 13th centuries, paper mills were established in Spain, France, Italy, and Germany, and eventually, in the 16th century, paper mills spread throughout Europe. What is the background of CAI Lun's improvement in paper making? First of all, when the writing material of paper did not appear, the transmission of text was very inconvenient. The materials used in ancient China for writing records include tortoise shells, stone and bamboo slips. In addition to the use of stone, foreign ancient also used sedge pieces, shell leaves, bark and sheepskin and other materials. India and other South Asian and Southeast Asian countries dried and flattened coconut leaves as writing materials, so the Indian Buddhist classics introduced to China were written on the leaves and tied up, also known as the "shell leaf Sutra". However, whether they were carved on tortoise shells or animal bones, cast on bronze vessels, carved on stone, or written on bamboo or wood chips in the late Spring and Autumn Period, such writing materials were very cumbersome - long writing was not only time-consuming and laborious for the writer, but also not conducive to the spread and communication of writing. In Europe, before there was no paper, 300 sheepskins were used to copy a Bible. At that time, there were silk writing materials, silk will be lighter than other materials, but the price is also very expensive, the average person can not afford to use. Secondly, CAI Lun loves making and inventing. CAI Lun was born to a family of blacksmiths engaged in smelting in the early Eastern Han Dynasty, and he was very interested in production activities, such as smelting, casting, h**p planting, silkworm rearing, etc. About the 18th year of Yongping (AD 75), CAI Lun joined the palace as a eu**ch. By the time Emperor He ascended the throne (AD 89), he had been promoted to the imperial court, serving the son of the emperor, and became a eu**ch who conveyed edicts, handled documents, and participated in the imperial administration. According to Baigan Annals of the Later Han Dynasty, in the ninth year of Yongyuan (AD 97), CAI Lun "concurrently made secret swords and other instruments" and was in charge of supervising the manufacture of various artifacts used in the palace. At that time, the Imperial Palace workshop concentrated the world's skilled craftsmen and had the highest level of manufacturing at that time, which provided CAI Lun with a platform to show his ability to control production and manufacturing. Finally, the reason why CAI Lun's improved papermaking technique has been applied and spread is closely related to the support of the royal family. After the death of Emperor He, the young and ill prince was appointed Emperor Shang, and Empress Dowager Empress Deng came to reign. Empress Deng attached great importance to culture and education, and was fond of Chinese books, paper and ink. Therefore, after the administration, Empress Deng ordered Shang Fang, weaving room and other palace workshops not to produce objects for entertainment. Empress Deng's love for writing paper and ink contributed to the success, application and promotion of CAI Lun Paper making to a large extent: the official promotion made the improved papermaking technique of the royal workshop "Shangfang" spread to the people, and the improved papermaking technology was widely used in real life, benefiting the people. So, how did writing materials develop to the era of CAI Lun's improved papermaking? First of all, it needs to be clear that the concept of paper needs to contain four elements. First, the raw material must be plant fiber rather than any other material fiber, otherwise it can not be counted as paper in the traditional sense; Second, the raw material must be purified, mechanical dispersion, pulping, manufacturing and drying molding and other processes to become paper, without these processes, using another way is not the traditional sense of paper; Third, the surface of the paper must be smooth, the constitution is flexible, by dispersed fibers in an irregular direction, fiber distribution is more uniform, the whole is thin; Fourth, it is practical and used for writing, printing, packaging and so on. Only when the above elements are met can it be called paper in the traditional sense. So, before CAI Hou paper, is there really no paper? At first, in the Warring States Period, the main writing materials were bamboo slips , which was a step further than the oracle bones and stone used in the Shang and Zhou dynasties. Later, in the Qin and Han Dynasties, the silk slips used in the Warring States period were still used as writing materials. According to historical records, during the reign of the First Emperor of Qin, the daily grading of the paper was often measured in stones (120 jin per stone), which took a lot of time. If the First Emperor of Qin used stone to read the bamboo slips, then the Western Han emperors had to read even more: for example, Emperor Wudi of Han took two months to read the letters written by Dongfang Shuo on 3,000 bamboo slips. Therefore, both society and the imperial family urgently needed a lighter and more readable writing material to replace heavy materials such as bamboo slips. Zhang Huai, a connoisseur of calligraphy and painting in the Tang Dynasty , and some writers in the Song Dynasty (about the 2nd century BC) believed that there had already been paper that could replace bamboo sheets. However, due to the lack of physical proof, this argument was not widely supported, and CAI Lun was still generally regarded as the "inventor" of paper making. It was not until 1957 that one of the relics that was bulldozed out on the construction site of the brick factory in Xi 'an, China - the Ba Bridge paper was unearthed, which further confirmed the statement that "there was paper in the Western Han Dynasty". When the Ba Bridge paper was unearthed, it was initially glued on the copper mirror, with seven or eight layers. After magnifying the physical structure of fiber, fiber crushing and dispersion of the Ba Bridge paper, it is considered that the paper is indeed paper. In addition, it is said that at that time, a paper worker got a small fragment of Ba Bridge paper, which could even be written on the brush. After the identification of the unearthed artifacts, cultural relics and archaeologists will be located in the Ba bridge tomb of this batch of cultural relics in the era of the western Han Dynasty. In addition, in 1986, Gansu Fangmatan archaeological also found the Western Han Emperor Wen period paper, is the earliest known paper material. The paper unearthed in Fangma Tan is still a map, with mountains, rivers, roads and so on drawn by fine hair pen. The pre-Cai Lun ancient paper made in different periods of the Western Han Dynasty found in these sites all have the elements of paper and are paper in the true sense. These discoveries not only advance the origin of Chinese paper making by 200 years, but also show that paper making has a long history. So, in what way did CAI Lun improve paper making? According to the inspection of unearthed ancient paper and documents, the paper made in the early Han Dynasty was h**p paper. According to Chinese historian of science and technology Pan Jixing, h**p paper in the Han Dynasty generally needs to go through the following 11 processes to be made: raw rags, h**p ropes, etc., are soaked, chopped, then soaked in lime water, steamed, washed, rammed into mud, and mixed with water into slurry, which is made by mold into paper. CAI Lun expanded the source of paper materials and advocated making paper with "tree skin", that is, making paper with bark, so that woody plants became the choice of papermaking materials. In this way, the expansion of papermaking materials solves the problem of diversification of papermaking materials, and makes the development and popularization of papermaking technology possible. It can be said that CAI Lun is not only the innovator of paper technology, but also the promoter and organizer of paper technology. The continuous development and promotion of papermaking technology eventually promoted the emergence of printing during Emperor Yang's reign.
