With paper, all kinds of human knowledge can be preserved and spread. With paper, human culture and science can develop rapidly. It can be said that paper is a symbol of human civilization.
In order to meet the needs of the people, many paper mills were opened in China after liberation, and machines produced a large number of all kinds of paper for our use. In the eyes of many young friends, paper seems nothing strange.
But you should know that human culture has not been written on paper for a long time, because people could not make paper at that time. Papermaking was invented by our ancestors after long-term hard work and countless efforts.
The invention of paper shows the intelligence of the working people in ancient China, and it is a great contribution of the Chinese nation to human culture.
The story of "keel"
People could write long before paper appeared. According to the research of historians, Chinese characters originated six thousand years ago.
In the eastern suburb of Xi, Shaanxi Province, there is a banpo village. Six thousand years ago, a primitive clan commune lived here. 1954, archaeologists in China excavated the site of banpo village commune, and dug up a large number of stone tools, bones and pottery. Simple symbols and patterns are engraved on pottery. Historians believe that these symbols have the nature of characters, which can be said to be the earliest characters discovered in China.
It can be seen that Chinese characters had a long history before the invention of paper. In the Bronze Age, our ancestors also cast or carved characters on bronzes. Some bronzes of Shang and Zhou dynasties have been preserved to this day, and some historical events and social conditions at that time have been recorded in words.
Besides bronzes, what did our ancestors write on? Here, let's tell a story of "keel" first.
In the 25th year of Guangxu reign (A.D. 1899), there lived a man named Wang who liked to collect and study ancient cultural relics. One day, he was ill, and the doctor gave him a prescription, which contained a medicine called "keel". The so-called keel is actually the bones or skeletal fossils of ancient animals. When buying medicine, Wang opened it and found that some "keels" were engraved with many ancient characters. He felt very strange. I took the time to collect this "keel" engraved with ancient words. Later, some scholars became interested in these "keels". After collection and research, they learned that these "keels" engraved with ancient Chinese characters are a precious ancient cultural relic-Oracle bones left over from the Yin and Shang Dynasties, which has been more than 3,000 years ago.
This "keel" is actually a tortoise shell engraved with Oracle Bone Inscriptions.
What is Oracle?
Oracle Bone Inscriptions is the tortoise's bellybutton; Bones are the bones of animals, mainly the shoulder bones of cattle. Oracle Bone Inscriptions is the writing of that era. Because this kind of writing is engraved on the sacred village, it is called Oracle Bone Inscriptions.
These Oracle Bone Inscriptions were first discovered in Anyang, Henan. Anyang was the capital of the late Yin and Shang Dynasties. Local farmers dug up these things in the field and sold them to pharmacies as "keels". This is the origin of "keel".
Not many Oracle bones were unearthed at first. Later, archaeologists determined that it was a precious material for studying the history of Yin and Shang Dynasties, and they carried out large-scale excavations in Anyang and other places. Over the past decades, more than100000 pieces of Oracle Bone Inscriptions have been discovered.
Then, why did people carve words on Oracle Bone Inscriptions at that time?
It turns out that the Shang Dynasty was superstitious. When they go out, hunt, graze, and even have any diseases and disasters, they have to "divine" to predict their luck. Oracle Bone Inscriptions is their divination tool. In divination, they first drill a hole in one side of Oracle Bone Inscriptions with a copper drill, and then drill the good side with fire. As soon as the Oracle bones were burned, vertical and horizontal cracks appeared on the other side, and they judged the quality according to the cracks. After divination, they often carved the results on this piece of Oracle Bone Inscriptions.
There were many things about divination at that time. Therefore, the scope of Oracle Bone Inscriptions is very extensive, reflecting the activities of the Yin King and many aspects of the social life of the Yin Shang Dynasty.
Not only Oracle Bone Inscriptions in the Yin Dynasty, but also Oracle Bone Inscriptions in the Western Zhou Dynasty after the Yin Dynasty. 1977, archaeologists excavated15,000 pieces of Oracle Bone Inscriptions used for divination in the early Western Zhou Dynasty in Joo Won?, Shaanxi Province.
The excavation of Oracle bones in the Yin, Shang and Western Zhou Dynasties enabled us to obtain a large number of historical materials for studying ancient politics, economy and culture. This kind of Oracle Bone Inscriptions is a kind of "paper" that our ancestors first used to write.
How important is printing? You may not have thought about it.
We go to school every day and take some books with us in our schoolbags. These books are printed. We also read newspapers every day, and newspapers are also printed. If there were no printing, these books and newspapers would have to be copied by hand, and all of us would be in trouble if we were busy copying books and newspapers all day!
Before the invention of printing, newspapers could not do it, and books could only be circulated by copying. Aren't the Han bamboo slips unearthed in Juyan and the silk books unearthed in Mawangdui all written in one stroke? Later, paper was invented. If you want to learn, you have to borrow and copy from others. Even if a book has few words, such as tens of thousands of words, it will take many days to copy thousands of words a day; If it is a book with hundreds of thousands of words, it will take a lot of time.
Copying books by hand not only consumes a lot of time and energy, but also makes mistakes easily. So before the invention of printing, the spread of books was very slow, and it was difficult for people to get a book.
After the invention of printing, the situation was completely different. A book can produce hundreds or thousands of copies in a short time, which can not only meet the needs of many people, but also reduce or avoid mistakes. The more books are printed, the easier it is to popularize, and the easier it is to save them so as not to lose them. At an early age, our country invented the compass.
Compass is a tool to indicate the direction. The compass we see now is a small compass with a small needle in it. This kind of small needle has two thick tips in the middle and can rotate back and forth in the plate. No matter how you turn the plate, the small needle always points south at one end and north at the other. Because compasses and compasses are combined into one, they are usually called compass needles.
Although the compass is a small thing, it is very useful. For example, navigation, aviation, reconnaissance and reconnaissance are all inseparable from the compass.
Compass —— Talking from "magnet"
The compass is made of magnets. Magnets can attract iron and are often called "magnets". In ancient times, it was called "Ci Shi" because it attracted iron as soon as it touched it, just as a kind mother attracted her children. Later, people called it a "magnet".
The magnetic poles at both ends of each magnet are different, one is called S pole and the other is called N pole. The earth we live in is also a huge natural magnet with different magnetic poles at the north and south ends. The south pole is close to the north pole of the earth, and the north pole is close to the south pole of the earth. As we know, like magnetic poles repel and opposite magnetic poles attract, so no matter where on the earth's surface, take a magnetic needle that can rotate freely, and its N pole will always point to the north and its S pole will always point to the south.
Compass is made by using the characteristics of magnets. So, which country in the world first discovered magnets and their characteristics?
More than two thousand years ago, during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, China had already made farm tools out of iron. When working people are looking for iron ore, they find a magnet and know that it can absorb iron.
There is such a record in China's ancient book "Guanzi": "There are mercy stones on the top and copper and gold on the bottom." "Copper gold" is an iron ore. The book "Tube" was produced in the third century BC, which shows that China knew that magnets can attract iron at the latest in the third century BC.
In the Qin Dynasty, there was an interesting legend. After Qin Shihuang unified China, he built a large Epang Palace in Xianyang, Shaanxi. There is a magnet door in Epang Palace, which is made entirely of magnets. If someone wants to stab with iron, as long as they pass by, the magnet door will attract this person.
In addition, according to ancient records, when Emperor Wu was in power, there was a Lu 'an University in Jiaodong, which was dedicated to Emperor Wu as a chess game. As soon as these pieces are put on the chessboard, they will collide with each other and fight automatically. Emperor Wu of Han Dynasty was very surprised. Originally, the big chess pieces were made of magnets, so they were magnetic and could attract each other, but Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty did not understand this truth.
On major festivals, we often set off firecrackers and fireworks to celebrate. Firecrackers are crackling and ringing, and fireworks are colorful, which makes the festival full of happy atmosphere.
What are firecrackers and fireworks made of?
They are made of gunpowder.
The earliest inventor of gunpowder in the world was our people.
The gunpowder invented by China is now called black powder, also called brown powder, and is usually called "black powder" or "black powder". Black powder is made by grinding nitrate, sulfur and charcoal into powder and mixing them in a certain proportion. The ratio of saltpeter, sulfur and charcoal is generally 75: 10: 15.
Gunpowder has a strange temper, that is, it loves to be angry. As long as people use a little fire, it will burn immediately. After burning, the gas it produces suddenly expands thousands of times than the original volume, so it has strong explosive ability.
Gunpowder can not only be used as firecrackers and fireworks, but also be more useful. We also use gunpowder to make bullets and shells, mine, cut mountains, build roads and canals. Gunpowder plays an important role in our national defense and economic construction and is indispensable.
Black powder invented in ancient China is a low-grade explosive, and its explosive capacity and automatic combustion speed are far behind those of modern high-grade explosives. Modern advanced explosives are made of nitrocellulose and nitroglycerin, which are different from black powder, but they are all developed from ancient black powder in China.
Here, let's talk about the process of inventing gunpowder in ancient China.
"medicine" with "fire"
Say the name of gunpowder first. Why is gunpowder called "gunpowder"?
It is easy to understand when it is associated with "fire", because it is particularly easy to catch fire and has strong explosive ability.
However, why is it related to "medicine"?
To understand this problem, we have to start with the three components of black powder-sulfur, saltpeter and charcoal.
Sulfur is a mineral. About the Western Han Dynasty, abundant pyrite was discovered in Hunan, China. Later, sulfur mines were discovered in Shanxi, Henan and other provinces. In the book Huai Nan Zi written by Liu An in the Western Han Dynasty, there are records about sulfur.
Nitrite is also a mineral, which is produced in Sichuan and Gansu provinces. In all parts of North China, many low-temperature places, such as the roots of walls, often grow tiny white nitrate crystals, which are called "wall frost". In ancient times, this may be the main source of saltpeter. Nitrite has many names in ancient times. Some people call it smoke nitrate or fire nitrate because it can smoke and get angry. Some people call it bitter nitrate because it has a bitter taste; Some people call it ground frost because it is produced on the ground and its color is like frost. During the Western Han Dynasty in China, there was a Classic of Shennong Materia Medica, which contained 365 kinds of drugs, and saltpetre was one of them. It can be seen that saltpeter was discovered in the Western Han Dynasty.
Charcoal is a very common thing. In ancient times, people cut down trees and burned charcoal as fuel. It appeared much earlier than sulfur and saltpeter.
These three things, except charcoal, were used as medicine at that time.
Because sulfur and saltpeter are both medicines for treating diseases, and because these two things will get angry on the charcoal table, everyone calls the mixture of these three things "gunpowder". It means "medicine with excessive internal heat" or "medicine with excessive internal heat".
That's how the name gunpowder came from.