Paper and Other Writing Materials: Part II
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Paper and Other Writing Materials: Part II Paper, a matted or felted sheet made primarily of cellulose fibers, is formed on a wire screen from water suspension. Due to its low cost and versatility, it has replaced many other materials in a variety of uses. Paper can be made with many specialized properties, some of the most désirable including high impact or tear strength, wet strength, résistance to water or water vapor, résistance to oil and grease, and résistance to fiâmes. Last month's Historical Note followed the development of writing materials used by early societies before the invention of paper. Some cultures used stone, clay bricks, wood, leaves, or bark to préserve their words and thoughts; others used the sheepskin (parchment), orcalfskin orgoatskin (vellum); the Egyptians laminated fibrous parts of the papyrus plant. The Chinese created finely woven cloth on which they could paint calligraphie characters. Still others created felts by matting and intertwining animal hairs. Thèse developments eventually led the Chinese to create true paper, in which vegetable fibers are "felted" together. The oldest surviving samples of paper date from about A.D. 264, but the Chinese court officiai Ts'ai Lun reported his invention of papermaking to Emperor Ho-ti in A.D. 105. Ts'ai Lun used fibers from old rags, mulberry bark, fish nets, and hemp waste. The fibers had to be macerated or beaten until the individual filaments became separated; the fibers were then suspended in water and lifted out on a fine screen. The water drained through the screen, leaving a thin layer of tangled cellulose fibers which, when dried, formed a sheet of paper. The technique for forming paper has not been fundamentally altered in nearly 1,900 years. The Chinese closely guarded their papermaking process, which remained a national secret for about 500 years, when the craft finally spread to Korea and Japan, brought by Buddhist monks who demonstrated how to make manuscript books from the bark of the paper mulberry tree. The Japanese made a thin, tough paper from a mountain plant called gampi; later they also used mitsumata bark and rice straw. The first block printing occurred in 770 in Japan, when the Empress Shotoku commissioned the printing of one million
MRS BULLETIN/JUNE1991
prayer papers; this job required six years to complète. The art of papermaking reached the Arabs in 751, when their city of Samarkand in central Asia was attacked by the Chinese. The Arab governor managed to repel the invasion and, while pursuing the retreating Chinese army, captured prisoners, some of whom turned out to be papermakers. Samarkand had ail the raw materials needed for the large-scale manufacture of paper: crops of flax and hemp and plenty of water. Baghdad began to produce paper in 793. Many 9th century Arabie manuscripts written on paper hâve been preserved.
The oldest surviving samples of paper date from about A.D. 264. Paper was not manufactured in Europe until 1151, more than a thousand years after its first invention in China. The craft passed f
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