Hui Shih's love of books was legend, even in his lifetime. And for good reason. Anytime he went traveling, he felt a compulsion to take all his books with him—and not just a suitcase or two, but enough for five fully loaded oxcarts. The millennial Chinese saying, "knowledge rich as five oxcarts," is still current today when praising someone's scholarship.
Yet in all actuality, the amount of reading material in Hui Shih's five book-carts was probably less than that on the bookshelves of any of today's middle school students: The old books of Hui Shih's day were all composed of large and cumbersome carved bamboo "pages" strung together with strips of leather. The much heralded Chinese invention of the techniques of papermaking (just prior to the Christian era) was still in the future. It would, finally, not only enable the more convenient transport of book collections from place to place, but massively affect the development of first Chinese and, later, Western civilization.
The development of historical scholarship and advanced cultures is obviously linked to the existence of writing systems. Based on archaeological discoveries at the very end of the 19th Century, in Honan Province, we know that a rather well developed Chinese writing system existed during the Shang Dynasty, over 3,000 years ago. The materials upon which these ancient inscriptions were found included the scapula bones of oxen, and tortoise shells-hence the name, "shell-bone script." The uses of the ancient script were limited exclusively to royalty, not only because the commoner in ancient China was not afforded the privilege of literacy, but because preparation of the tortoise shells and oxen scapula involved difficult and time consuming processes which were beyond the means of most people.
As writing uses became somewhat more extensive, a need for greater quantities of convenient writing materials resulted, eventually, in the employment of bamboo, which was to prove most popular from the 8th Century B.C. till the invention of paper itself.
The notable Chinese era starting in the 8th Century has become known as the Spring and Autumn Period, a time of great philosophical and intellectual growth which marked the births of both Confucius and the Taoist philosopher Laotzu. Both for governmental purposes and the dissemination of the compelling philosophies of the time, the role of writing increased rapidly in importance.
As mentioned earlier, bamboo slips were the most widely seen writing materials; they were used mostly for recording governmental edicts and notable philosophical concepts. Though more practical than the bones and shells of previous ages, they were, obviously, far from ideal.
Firstly, preparation of the slips was not an easy task. After cutting the bamboo to size, the outer skin had to be removed; then the slips were fire-dried to make them more resistant to decay and by insect attacks. A given number of bamboo slips would be tied together into a "book," which could be carved in the manner of the shell-bones or written on with a writing brush. Obviously, the number of legible characters which could then either be easily etched or written on a bamboo slip were few, and the final bulk great.
Hui Shih's five carts of books existed at a time when writing was of mounting significance, and when there probably weren't sufficient (notable) written works to fill half a suitcase if they had been consigned to paper.
Though bamboo was a plentiful commodity in many parts of China, the labor involved to prepare the bamboo slips put such books beyond the reach of persons of common means. Consequently, many a bright and aspiring (but poor) scholar found himself using such materials as dried banana leaves to practice writing the Chinese characters, and as copybooks.
Due to the scarcity of all books, when a scholar of the period came across a worthwhile text on bamboo, he might first copy it on his own person or clothing then, returning home, recopy it on any material available. It is said that some scholars' homes were covered with writing-all over the walls, doors, and even the wooden eating vessels.
In 221 B.C., China was finally consolidated, after more than 300 years of continual internal wars, under the First Emperor of the Chin. To avoid a repeat of the internal feuding which had brought about the fall of the Western Chou Dynasty and fragmentation of the country, the Chin Emperor abolished the Chinese feudal system, vesting all power in the central government.
The governors of the various provinces, which the Emperor established in place of the previously existing feudal states, were responsible for reporting directly to the sovereign on a regular basis. It is recorded that, on an average, the Chin Emperor himself read 120 Chinese pounds of reports each day, and that he would never rest until he had finished reviewing all of them. This may seem a feat beyond human capability, unless we remember the weighty bamboo-slip books then in use.
China's territory during that time was the largest it had ever been under a single ruler, and the "paperwork" from running such an aggressively centralized government must have been tremendous. Although the Chin Emperor, during his brief rule—he died after only fifteen years on the throne, and his dynasty ended with him—did not manage to find a suitable alternative to the weighty bamboo slips, he did succeed in having the various written language forms of feudal China unified. This important contribution had even greater meaning with the invention of paper-making in the succeeding dynasty, the Age of the Han (the Han Dynasty is divided into two periods, the Western Han, 206 B.C.-24 A.D., and the Eastern Han, 25-220, the interruption is the brief, period when China was ruled by the Tsin).
Traditionally, the invention of papermaking was credited to a courtier, who lived during the middle of the Eastern Han period, by the name of Tsai Lun, a eunuch in the retinue of Emperor Hanho. Tsai Lun saw the need for convenient and economical writing material for the volumes of official correspondence, reports, and records of the Han imperial court-even more than during the Chin period. He reportedly experimented with many different materials, finally coming up with an economical, plant-fiber-based paper, and has often been credited with the invention of paper.
The fact is, however, that paper existed in China well before the time of Tsai Lun. Since the beginning of large scale archaeological excavations in China in the late 19th Century and early 20th Century, there have been many occasions for such conflicts between popular records and hard archaeological evidence.
Another example is the discovery of silk, traditionally attributed to Lei Tzu, the wife of the legendary Yellow Emperor (which would date the use of silk in China to roughly 4,700 years ago). However, recent excavation of a Chinese Neolithic site uncovered a silk scrap which predates Lei Tzu by a few hundred years, setting the date of silk weaving back earlier than had been imagined.
Similarly, excavations in the ancient Chinese capital of Hsian have uncovered a paper scrap dating back to the Western Han, conclusively proving the existence of paper in China prior to the time of Tsai Lun. But if Tsai Lun was not the inventor of the papermaking process, then how and when did papermaking start in China? Interestingly enough, the answer revolves around silk.
Silk and the origin of papermaking in China are inseparable. Actually, silk was used to a very limited degree as a writing material while bamboo slips were in widespread use. Throughout much of Chinese history, up to the 20th Century, imperial decrees were often written on yellow silk. Indeed, the use of silk as a writing material was limited to the royal class due to its prohibitive cost.
Byproducts of silk production were the raw materials for the first paper—left-over silk cocoons which were too difficult to draw out into strands, and the ends of the cocoons, which could not be drawn. These were processed for a totally different purpose-soaked and then boiled to remove the resins, and the boiled mixture then beaten to break up the fibers. The results were rinsed in the river on a bamboo screen, and the screen and its contents then dried in the sun. Once dry, these processed remnants would be used as silk batting in quilts, jackets, etc. They had the advantage of being both very warm and extremely light-weight.
After this dry silk batting was removed from the bamboo screen, remaining would be a very thin residue of short, resinous silk fibers which had clung together. Someone, or perhaps numerous people, apparently got the idea of removing this thin fiber film, which had taken the shape of the bamboo screen, and using it as a writing material-China's first paper. The Chinese character for paper, chih, utilizes the radical for silk, proclaiming its origins.
Although the basic principle of paper production was thus understood, the continued use of silk fibers would have been impractical from the point of view of both costs and the limited amounts available. People realized later that other types of fibers used in the manufacture of fabrics also contained short fibers suitable for paper making. The paper scrap uncovered at Hsian and dated to the Western Han period was made from hemp fibers, which would obviously prove more economical than silk.
If the above diminishes Tsai Lun's sometime-glory as inventor of the papermaking process, he shines, nevertheless, for his contributions to its further refinement. By the time of the Eastern Han Dynasty, there was a need for even more economical ways of producing paper. Tsai Lun experimented with cloth rags, old fishing nets, tree bark—anything which contained plant fibers and could possibly be made into paper. And he improved the process, making it possible to produce more paper in a shorter amount of time. For example, previously, the materials used for making paper were first soaked in water and then allowed to decompose naturally, after which the fiber could be easily separated out. This natural decomposition, however, was very slow. Tsai Lun bypassed this step by pounding his materials in a large mortar to break up the fibers, greatly reducing the processing time and making possible sharply increased production.
Since the names of Tsai Lun's papermaking predecessors are unknown to posterity, and since his contributions to the advancement of papermaking techniques were great, popular reports will undoubtedly continue to feature his name as paper's inventor, even though we now know that paper was in existence earlier.
In the 200-300 years following Tsai Lun, papermaking saw further improvements in terms of both the quality of the product and the economy of production. One major change in production techniques greatly increased the production capacity. During Tsai Lun's time, one bamboo screen was required for each piece of paper made. When the thin, paste-like fiber material was distributed across the bamboo screen in a filmy, even layer, this was left in the sun to dry. Only after drying was the paper gently peeled from the screen. Many screens were required to make a limited amount of paper, and much time was wasted waiting for the paper to dry before the screen could be reused.
This step was changed. Rather than letting paper dry on the screens, it would be removed while still wet by inverting the screens and stacking the still-moist papers one on top of another to be dried by indirect heat from a fire. Now one worker, rather than waiting a half-day or more for the paper to dry on the screen, could turn out sheet after sheet with only one screen. This made paper a much more economical commodity.
Also, more attention was being paid to the quality of the paper now that the basis for economical production had been set. Materials such as flax and mulberry bark took the place of cruder materials and resulted in papers much finer than before. In addition, techniques for producing colored paper, using plant dyes, also came into use at this time.
One of China's greatest calligraphers, Wang Hsi-chih, was active during this period; from those few remaining works of his, which have been passed down to the present, it can be seen that paper production in China had already reached quite an acceptable level of achievement.
While the demand for paper at that time in China continued to grow, with the advent of block printing during the early part of the Tang Dynasty (618-907), it skyrocketed. Block printing really came into its own in the years immediately following the Tang. The concurrent establishment of a literati-based civil government (which reached fruition during the Sung) then inflated that demand out of all previously known proportions. If production techniques had already reached their peak efficiency (which given the technology of the day they most probably had), then what was needed was even more readily available materials for papermaking than those presently in use. The Chinese, looking back to the past, came up with an old and familiar material—bamboo, then, as now, one of China's most prolific crops, and an inexpensive and readily available source material to meet China's runaway paper demand.
Following the Sung Dynasty, moveable-type printing came into use and printed materials were even more widely distributed, but there were no further major changes in papermaking techniques or materials until the advent of modern machine production.
A very clear and basic, illustrated explanation of Chinese papermaking techniques appears in the Ming Dynasty book Tien Kung Kai Wu, by a somewhat obscure but brilliant agricultural technologist, Sung Ying-hsing.
Described briefly: (1) The young bamboo poles are stripped of their leaves and placed in a pool of running water to be soaked and rinsed for a period of one hundred days. (2) The water-softened bamboo poles are boiled with lime in a stone kettle for eight days and eight nights. (3) After the boiling, the mixture is poured into a large mortar and pounded until it becomes paste-like. (4) The paper paste is poured into a wooden-framed bamboo screen, which is shaken back and forth in the water to distribute the residue in a fine, even layer. —This is the most difficult and crucial step in assuring a smooth and evenly finished product; the craftsmen for this phase required many years of experience before they could achieve an even distribution of paste over the screen. (5) The screen is removed from the water, and after excess moisture has drained away, is turned upside down and manipulated so that the paper falls from the screen and is stacked on top of other such sheets. (6) After a set amount of paper is produced, a wooden board is placed across the pile and weighted with a stone to help squeeze out the moisture. (7) Quite amazingly, these sheets do not adhere to each other; all that remains is to peel them off, one at a time, and stack them in a low-heat oven to dry. Once dry, the finished product is removed for packing and shipping.
The wet sheets, flipped off the screens onto a pile, were later weighted down with a rock to squeeze out moisture.
This technique, the culmination of centuries of Chinese ingenuity, remained unchanged until modern times. Even though most paper is now mass-produced in the Republic of China for newspapers, textbooks, novels, etc., paper for the finest Chinese calligraphy and other special uses is still produced by the ancient method (see the accompanying description).
Although more than 1,000 years had passed since the first appearance of paper in China, Europe's first paper factory, in France, was not started until the year 1157. This culture-revolutionizing process was passed to the French via the Arabians, who had learned it from the Chinese about four centuries earlier.
In the year 751, following warfare against Tang Dynasty forces, one of the Arabian states took some Chinese war prisoners, among whom were men skilled in the technique of papermaking. Brought back to the then capital of Samarkand, they passed the papermaking techniques to their captors. Not many years later, a papermaking factory was officially established in the area and, eventually, papermaking was spread to France by way of North Africa.
By the 13th Century, papermaking had become commonplace throughout Europe. By the latter half of the 19th Century, some Europeans even believed that paper had been invented by the Germans or the Italians. And by the end of the 19th Century, a European professor had specifically corrected that impression, pointing out that paper was definitely not a European invention, but had come from 8th Century Samarkand. Six years after his initial statement, he said that his studies now convinced him that paper had probably originated in China, a view fully confirmed by early 20th Century archaeological discoveries in China's Sinkiang and Kansu regions.
Not only were the Chinese the first to make paper, but the quality of their finer papers was unequalled anywhere in Europe prior to the modern era. And even our modern papers, machine-manufactured in chemical processes, start to deteriorate seriously after only 20 to 50 years, while many Chinese books from the Sung Dynasty of 1,000 years ago remain in excellent condition, with no signs of serious deterioration despite their age. A main reason for the old Chinese paper's durability is that such materials as bamboo and flax are less subject to change from contact with air and climate than the wood pulp which eventually became the major paper raw material in Europe.
The still-moist sheets were dried on racks over low heat.
The King of Sweden, during a visit to China in 1933, specially commented on the fact that books he saw in the National Palace Museum, despite several hundreds of years, had not discolored and showed no other signs of deterioration—a feat which European papermakers would have been hard pressed to match. On the same visit, the Swedish King also proposed a cooperative effort between the papermaking industries of China and Sweden.
From its accidental beginnings as a thin, byproduct layer of silk-fiber residues on the bottom of a bamboo screen over two thousand years ago, the Chinese invention of paper revolutioned not only the culture and civilization of China but, later, of the West as well. Paper and printed matter are taken for granted now, an integral part of our lives; it would be hard to imagine their absence, and the consequent, probable obscurity of many of the worlds greatest artists and artistic works. And notable also, even the magazine you now hold in your hand—even in that way—is a direct legacy of those early Chinese.