China Inventions: The Paper and Printing


Chinese Inventions


Chinese people have become an important part of humanity’s development with valuable inventions such as paper and printing which are still being uses by society these days.



I. Printing



1. Printing was invented by the necessity to save time and do faster the transcription of books.


a) The first type of printing was created in China in the second century A.D. They began printing using wet paper, inscriptions carved on marble pillars and ink.



b) In the years of 1040’s a Chinese man named Pi Sheng implemented a new method of printing known as “movable type”, which was made of clay and glue.

c) The movable type was called “typography” and it was extended to other places in Asia such as Mongolia, Turkistan and Korea.


d) About 400 years later, a German named Johannes Gutenberg improved the printing from primitive to a modern model which is important because it could make several copies of one sheet at the same time.



II. Paper



1. The paper was created by Chinese people to replace the first type of paper introduced by Egyptians, which was made of animal skin, and known as papyrus.



a) Paper was discovered by the second century B.C.E. In the year 105 C.E. Cai Lun invented how to make paper.



b) In the beginning paper was used to wrapping different things because it paper was very thin and did not served to write on it.

c) Paper creation was spread from China to Islamic world and Europe many years later. Also, paper began to use for write and had many important improvements through the history.



III. In conclusion, printing and paper are inventions that have changed the history of humanity since they were created in China, they have transcended the limits of the world and have been maintained through time.





MLA
"printing." World History: Ancient and Medieval Eras. ABC-CLIO, 2011. Web. 7 Nov. 2011.
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Theodore Levin, The Hundred Thousand Fools of God: Musical Travels in Central Asia (Indiana University Press, 1996)
J. P. Mallory & Victor H. Mair, The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West (Thames & Hudson, 2000)
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http://ancienthistory2.abc-clio.com/Search/Display/602528?terms=paper+invention+in+china