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Paper, as we all know, is commonly used for various purposes including printing, wrapping and writing. These days, it is normal for paper to be prepared using wood that is acquired from rapidly growing tress like:
- Pine
- Fir
- Spruce
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Now when it comes to the invention of paper, the one thing that we know is that the very first paper was produced in 3500 BC. It was the ancient Egyptians who did so. what they basically did was that they took strips of papyrus reeds, dampened them and produced a more so criss-cross pattern that was later pressed into sheets. Believe it or not, but the word paper has actually been derived from these ‘papyrus’ reeds.
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Now, in terms of modern civilization, paper that can be considered closer to the type that we use today was invented back in 705 AD in China. It was basically a scholar who went by the name of Ts’ai Lun (a.k.a. Cai Lun) who created it. The idea came to him in a rather interesting manner. What happened was that he watched a wasp, which was busy making its nest. For it, the wasp chewed pieces of bamboo mixed them up really well with its saliva and produced a ball with it. Next, it produced a flat sheet, which it used to build a wall within its nest. Ts’ai Lun started copying the wasp and created a paste of water and bamboo. Next, he created a flat sheet, which he later set out to dry in the sun.
If we go back in time, you would learn that a certain form of paper was already being used in China. This paper was actually created using a suspension of hemp waste in water, which was to be washed, soaked and then a wooden mallet was used to create a pulp out of it. Later, a paper mold was used in order to stretch it out in a four-sided bamboo frame, where it was left to dry. With the passage of time, other different materials including plant fibers, bamboo and tree bark.
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The spread of papermaking all through Asia
After papermaking spread all through China, it advanced to Korea. It was a Korean monk who went by the name of Don-Cho who introduced the concept of papermaking in Japan. Later on, Chinese papermakers taught this art to Tibetans who gave up on the utilization of traditional writing materials to take to the creation of their own paper. If truth be told, the shape of paper books that Tibetans still continue to use depicts the narrow and long structure that was given to their original palm-leaf books. It was basically due to the efforts made by Chinese papermakers who further spread their craft into different parts of Persia and Central Asia. From there on, the art of papermaking gained immense popularity in India too.
If truth be told, the craft of papermaking sure has come a long way. What basically started off in ancient Egyptian times has now literally taken on the entire world with papermaking becoming an important part of modern life.
