Namely papermaking, compass, gunpowder and printing.
The four great inventions greatly promoted the development of politics, economy and culture in ancient China. and
It has also had a great impact on the history of world civilization development.
The British philosopher Francis Bacon pointed out that printing, gunpowder and compass "changed the whole face and situation of things all over the world: first, academically, second, in war, and third, in navigation; Moreover, it has caused countless changes: unexpectedly, no Sect, no empire or any planet has a greater impact on human affairs than these mechanical discoveries. "
Marx commented: "gunpowder, compass and printing-these are the three great inventions that predict the arrival of bourgeois society." Gunpowder blew chivalry to pieces, compass opened the world market and established colonies, while printing became a tool of Protestantism, a means of scientific rejuvenation in general, and the most powerful lever to create the necessary premise of spiritual development. "
Although papermaking was not mentioned, it provided the necessary conditions for the emergence and popularization of printing.
The important position of the four great inventions in the history of human civilization: printing, compass, gunpowder and papermaking, are the four great inventions in ancient China and one of the symbols that China has become an ancient civilization. In ancient times, China's science and technology were in the forefront of the world in many aspects. Thousands of years after the 5th century, Europe was in a feudal society. In this long period, China's science and technology has been developing, while Europe's science and technology has stagnated. Only in 15 and 6th centuries, due to the disintegration of feudal system and the gradual formation of capitalist system, modern natural science in Europe was born.
China's four great inventions were introduced to the west one after another before the emergence of modern European civilization, which became "the necessary prerequisite for the development of the bourgeoisie" (the complete works of Marx and Engels), providing a material basis for the bourgeoisie to step onto the political stage: the appearance of printing changed the situation that only monks could study and receive higher education, which facilitated the spread of culture; The use of gunpowder and firearms destroyed feudal castles and helped the bourgeoisie defeat feudal nobles; The arrival of the compass in the hands of European navigators made it possible for them to discover America and sail around the world, which laid the foundation for the bourgeois world trade and the development of workshop handicrafts. In a word, the four great inventions of ancient China left a brilliant page in the history of human science and culture. These great inventions have influenced and benefited the whole world and promoted the progress of human history.
Cai Lun invented papermaking in the first year of Yuan Xing in the Eastern Han Dynasty (105). He used plant raw materials such as bark, hemp head, cloth and fishing net to make paper through crushing, ramming, copying and baking.
One of four great inventions of ancient china. Pointers made by using the north-south finger polarity of magnets in the earth's magnetic field have many shapes.
The earliest "compass" During the Warring States period, our people used magnets to create a tool to indicate the direction, called "compass". "Sina" means guide.
In 960, Song Taizu established the Song Dynasty, ending the feudal regime in the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period. During the Northern Song Dynasty, agriculture, handicrafts and commerce all made new progress. On this basis, China has made brilliant scientific and technological achievements. During the Song Dynasty, China made great progress in making compasses, just like papermaking and printing.
About the early years of the Northern Song Dynasty, China also created a guiding tool-guiding blind fish.
It is more convenient to use guide fish than Sina. You don't need to make a smooth copper plate, just a bowl of water. Even if the water in the bowl is put unevenly, it will not affect the function of the guide, because the water in the bowl is flat. Moreover, because the friction of liquid is smaller than that of solid, it is more flexible to rotate, so it is more sensitive and accurate than Sina.
Guide turtles are also carved from wood, and magnets are placed in the tail like wooden guide fish. The tortoise was not put in the water. People dig a hole under its belly and put it on a smooth bamboo nail to let it rotate freely. The pointer on its tail will automatically point south.
The invention of gunpowder
One of four great inventions of ancient china. When making drugs, ancient alchemists gradually discovered that the mixture of sulfur (S), flame nitrate (KN□) and charcoal (C) had the ability to burn and explode. At the end of the Tang Dynasty (904 ~ 906), gunpowder arrows began to appear in the war, and there was also a record that "Fei Huo was the starting soldier", that is, a trebuchet was used to throw gunpowder bags as combustible weapons. In the Song Dynasty, Kaifeng Prefecture in Tokyo (now Kaifeng, Henan Province) set up a wide range of siege fortifications, including the department that made gunpowder. Wu Yao recorded three formulations of gunpowder, and the production of gunpowder has reached a considerable scale. Although the production technology was strictly confidential, it was introduced into Liao Dynasty. Therefore, while importing a large amount of sulfur from Japan, it is forbidden to export sulfur and mirabilite to Liaoning. When Zhao Zhuan was in Song Shenzong, a large number of border guards were equipped with gunpowder bows and arrows, gunpowder artillery arrows and other weapons. During Liao Daozong's reign, he also analyzed the Japanese artillery in Tianjin (now Beijing) in Nanjing. In the Southern Song Dynasty, the water army was also equipped with thunderbolt guns, artillery, rockets and other weapons, and set up gunpowder weapons manufacturing industries in Jiankangfu (now Nanjing, Jiangsu), Jiangling (now Jiangling, Hubei) and other cities. Early gunpowder weapons had limited power and could not replace cold weapons. However, since the mid-Southern Song Dynasty, the proportion of gunpowder weapons in weapons has obviously increased (see colorful arrow (model), which is one of the gunpowder weapons equipped by the army in the Song Dynasty by tying the gunpowder barrel to the front end of the arrow and using the back thrust generated by gunpowder combustion to push the arrow forward). The gunpowder manufacturing technology in the Jin Dynasty originated from the Liao Dynasty, and the Jin army used artillery at the beginning of attacking the Song Dynasty. Since then, gunpowder has been used more and more frequently in the wars of Song, Jin and Yuan Dynasties. At the end of the Jin dynasty, when fighting against the Mongolian army, firearms such as thunderbolt and flying hair gun were used. Iron cannons similar to modern artillery shells appeared in the Song Dynasty, but they were still projected by trebuchets. He also invented a musket, which used giant bamboo as the barrel to launch a "sub-nest", similar to later guns, but did not use a metal launch tube. This is the limit of the progress of gunpowder weapons in Liao, Song and Jin Dynasties, but it determines the development direction of gunpowder weapons in later generations. In a word, the Liao, Song and Jin Dynasties can be regarded as the foundation period of human use of gunpowder. In the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, tubular firearms made of copper and iron-spears and cannons-were found.
During the Southern Song Dynasty, the use of gunpowder became more and more common, and firearms were further developed. In order to resist the invasion of Jin Bing in the Southern Song Dynasty, the military strategists constantly tried to improve their weapons. In the early Southern Song Dynasty, in the second year of Shaoxing, Song Gaozong (A.D. 1 132), the military strategist Tao Jing invented the tubular fire.
Weapon-musket, which is a great progress in the history of firearms.
The invention of papermaking
In the first year of Yuan Xing in the Eastern Han Dynasty (105), Cai Lun reformed and popularized papermaking technology on the basis of predecessors' papermaking technology. The new papermaking technology has changed the old hemp paper that is inconvenient to write into a good paper technology with the same general structure.
Before Cai Lun papermaking appeared, in China, Oracle Bone Inscriptions was used in Shang Dynasty, bronze ware was used in Western Zhou Dynasty, and bamboo slips, wooden slips and silks were used in Spring and Autumn Period. In the Han Dynasty, agriculture was developed, economy was prosperous, national strength was strong, and cultural undertakings were prosperous. Thick bamboo slips and expensive silk can no longer meet people's needs, and seeking new writing materials has become the general trend, so papermaking came into being.
The Biography of Cai Lun in the later Han Dynasty records that before Cai Lun made paper, the paper for writing notes was actually silk, while Cai Lun made plant fiber paper from bark, hemp, rags and fishing nets through a series of technological processes, such as crushing, ramming, copying and baking. It is a kind of good paper with the same structure and is also a real paper. 105, Cai Lun presented paper to Emperor Han Xian, which was praised by the Emperor. Papermaking is well known all over the world, and the paper made by Cai Lun is called "Cai Hou Paper"; 105 is generally considered as the invention era of papermaking.
It's quite fine, and the papermaking technology has reached a certain level.
The use of paper in the Eastern Han Dynasty was recorded in many manuscripts and documents. For example, the tribute paper mentioned in the biography of Deng in the later Han Dynasty and the imperial edict of Shaofu Palace and the imperial edict of Shangshu in charge of paper and ink recorded in the book of Guan Baizhi in the later Han Dynasty all show that paper has been widely used in the court. However, the notes, writing paper in the Biography of Yan Dou in the Later Han Dynasty and the letterhead in the Book of Bei Tang show that ordinary officials and scholars also write on paper.
The invention of papermaking is one of the greatest inventions in ancient China and the most outstanding achievement in the history of human civilization. The emergence of paper is the foundation of human civilization. As a new information carrier, it first appeared in China, making the civilization of Han Dynasty in China more prosperous than other civilizations. Around the 8th century, Arabs began to use China's technology and equipment to make paper.
The invention of printing
Since the advent of paper, with the development of economy and culture, more and more people are reading books, and the demand for books has greatly increased.
In the early years of the Jin Dynasty, there were 29,945 books in the government. During the Northern and Southern Dynasties, Emperor Liang Yuan collected more than 70,000 books in Jiangling, and the Sui Dynasty collected 370,000 books in Jiazetang, which is the highest collection record of the ancient National Library of China.
Besides official books, there are more and more private books. For example, Mrs. Guo of the Jin Dynasty has a collection of 5,000 volumes; When Zhang Hua moved, one person used thirty cars to transport books.
Before the invention of printing, only the government and the rich like Mrs. Guo and Zhang Hua could have so many books, and it was not easy for ordinary people to get one or two, because all the books at that time were manuscripts. How much manpower it takes to copy so many manuscripts! If this situation does not change, how can we meet the needs of society?
Inscriptions are generally written in female, and the development is white on a black background, which is not eye-catching. Moreover, the rubbing process is complicated and it is not convenient to print books. But rubbings have a great advantage, that is, the area of stone tablets is relatively large, and many words can be rubbings at a time.
What if we learn from each other's strengths and combine the characteristics of rubbing? Of course the situation is different.
Inspired by the two methods of rubbing, the working people in our country invented block printing.
At the end of Sui Dynasty and the beginning of Tang Dynasty, the large-scale peasant uprising promoted the development of social production and the vigorous development of cultural undertakings, which objectively produced an urgent demand for block printing.
In the past, people called the carved stone "mole", but in the Tang Dynasty, the carved stone was also called "mole". The word "Moller" here means block printing.
There is such a record in the Book of Old Tang Dynasty. In December of the ninth year of Daiwa (AD 835), Tang Wenzong ordered all localities not to engrave almanac privately. What's going on here? According to other ancient books, it is like this: people in Jiannan, Liangchuan and Huainan Road at that time. Almanac is printed by block printing and sold on the street. Every year, Si Tiantai, who is in charge of calendars, has never called a new calendar, but new calendars printed by the people are everywhere. It was the privilege of feudal emperors to issue calendars. Su Feng, our envoy to Dongchuan, called for banning private publication of almanac in order to safeguard the prestige of the imperial court. Almanac is related to agricultural production and farmers need it very much. How to ban orders? Although Tang Wenzong gave this order, the almanac engraved by the people is still popular everywhere. Even in the same area, there is more than one kind of folk printed almanac.
Liu Pi, who fled to Sichuan with Tang Xizong at that time, also said in the preface of family instruction that he had seen many books about Yin and Yang, miscellaneous notes and dreamers in the bookstore in Chengdu. Most of these books are woodcut. It can be seen that the printing industry in Chengdu was relatively developed at that time, not only printing almanac, but also printing various other books.
There is only one book, The Diamond Sutra, which was carved in the Tang Dynasty by Xian Tong in nine years. Xian Tong was nine years in 868, and it has been more than one thousand years since now. How did this printed matter 1000 years ago survive? This is another story.
There is Mingsha Mountain in the southeast of Dunhuang, Gansu. As early as the Jin Dynasty, some Buddhists made holes here, carved Buddha statues and built temples. With more and more caves, the number of Buddha statues is also increasing, so people call it "Thousand Buddha Cave". /kloc-in 0/900, when Taoist Wang was repairing a cave, he came across a closed darkroom. He opened it and found bundles of paper rolls, many of which were copied in the Tang Dynasty, and one was the Diamond Sutra carved in the Tang Dynasty.
The Diamond Sutra is about one foot long and one foot high. This is a piece of paper made of seven printed sheets. There is a painting in front of the scroll, which depicts the immortal story of Sakyamuni's statement to his disciples, and the expression is vivid, followed by the full text of the Diamond Sutra. There is not a word in the volume, which means that it was engraved by Xian Tong in nine years.
In the Song Dynasty, the printing industry was more developed, and books were carved all over the country. In the early years of the Northern Song Dynasty, Chengdu printed the Tripitaka, with 130,000 pieces of rigidity; Imperial academy, the central educational institution of the Northern Song government, has more than100000 books on Indian history. From these two figures, we can see the scale of printing industry at that time. There are more than 700 kinds of books printed by block printing in Song Dynasty, with neat and simple fonts and elegant appearance, which have been consulted by Chinese people ever since.
Woodcarving was widely used in the Song Dynasty, but some people carved it with copper plates. The Shanghai Museum has the copperplate used in the printing advertisement of "Liu Jinan Jiagongfu Needle Shop" in the Northern Song Dynasty, which shows that the technology of carving copperplate was mastered at that time.
When it comes to printing books, block printing is indeed a great creation. A book can be printed in many copies as long as it is engraved once, which is many times faster than handwriting.
But in this case, you have to carve a board once to print a book, and it still takes a lot of manpower, and it is impossible to print a large number of books quickly. Some books have a lot of words, and it often takes years to engrave them. In case the book is printed once and not reprinted, no matter how well carved the board is, it is completely useless.
Is there any way to improve it?
By the middle of 1 1 century (during the Qing Dynasty in Song Renzong), an inventor named Bi Sheng in China finally invented a more progressive printing method-movable type printing, which greatly improved the printing technology in China.
Bi Sheng made a long rectangular column out of clay, engraved with words and hardened with fire. This is a movable type. When printing books, prepare an iron plate, put rosin and wax on it, and there is an iron frame around the iron plate. Iron shelves are all movable type, and an iron shelf is a version. Then bake it under the iron plate with fire to melt the rosin and wax. In addition, a movable type board is arranged by pressing the arranged movable type with a flat plate and flattening the words. Like engraving, it can be printed as long as the words are inked.
In order to improve efficiency, he prepared two iron plates and organized two people to work at the same time, one for printing and the other for typesetting; When one board is printed, the second board is ready. The two iron plates are used alternately, and the printing speed is fast.
Bi Sheng carved a few words every word; It is very convenient to carve more than 20 unfamiliar words in Chinese characters, then carve them temporarily and burn them with fire. After printing, heat the iron plate on the fire to melt the rosin and wax, and then the movable type can be removed for next use.
This is the earliest invention of movable type printing. This type of clay is called clay type. Compared with Printing 2 invented by Bi Sheng today, it is primitive, but the three main steps of movable type printing-making movable type, typesetting and printing-are already available. So Bi Sheng's contribution to printing is very remarkable. Shen Kuo, a famous scientist in the Northern Song Dynasty, recorded the movable type printing invented by Bi Sheng in Meng Qian Bi Tan.
After Bi Sheng invented movable type printing, the Korean people began to print books with clay type, and later printed books with wood type. /kloc-In the 3rd century, they first invented printing books with copper movable type. China printed books with copper movable type later than North Korea. The Korean people also created lead movable type and iron movable type.
/kloc-At the end of 0/6th century, Japan invaded Korea and took away a lot of Korean copper movable type and wooden movable type. As a result, the Japanese also learned movable type printing.
Printing in China also spread to Vietnam. /kloc-In the 5th century, Vietnam began to print books with block printing. In the early 18th century, they also began to print books with wooden movable type.
The appearance of European printing was also deeply influenced by China printing.