ShmoopTube

00:01

No writing in the ancient world was difficult expensive and

00:07

slow as molasses Imagine having to write an essay using

00:10

a triangular stick to squish shapes into clay porches Loe

00:15

letter into stone We're having this skin animal brian d

00:19

hair the hide and stretch it flat for weeks just

00:22

to have something to write on Actually i don't imagine

00:26

that one Yeah anyway it's safe to say that the

00:29

tools for the written word were limited today of course

00:32

we use paper which is so plentiful that the average

00:34

office worker prints ten thousand pages a year Sorry tris

00:40

We're so much paper that we actually use it to

00:42

wipe our noses along with you know other things Sorry

00:46

again trees When technologies are this old we often have

00:50

a hard time pinning down a specific time place and

00:53

person behind him Eyeglasses for instance were invented in the

00:57

thirteenth century on our way newer than paper But we

01:00

have no idea who first put a round lens up

01:03

to his eye and noticed he could see better But

01:06

guess what the cool thing about paper is that we

01:08

actually have a specific name Year and place Kai loon

01:14

In one hundred five c e china There we go

01:16

Yes he had some newfangled way to write down his

01:19

invention huh Wonder what that could be So who was

01:23

this mysterious chi loon with the amazing paper making skills

01:28

Well we know he was in service of the emperor

01:31

and we know that he was a unique meaning that

01:34

you know he had his boy parts cut off there

01:38

Yeah no this wasn't necessarily considered cruel and unusual punishment

01:42

in china Many chinese emperors used units as key servant

01:46

and bureaucrats And this way you know emperors didn't have

01:50

to worry about their underlings impregnating any of their many

01:53

royal concubines or wives or whatever Anyway being a unit

01:59

must have worked out great for kyle alone sorta without

02:02

having to worry about dating He had plenty of free

02:04

time to do productive things like you know invent paper

02:08

Maybe more of us should get off tinder Of course

02:12

skylines paper was a lot different from the stuff we

02:13

use today Instead of making it from trees Cailin made

02:17

it from leftover rags and fishing nets not the most

02:21

fragrant of choices but now we're just complaining for the

02:24

halibut victim the first step in kylie's process was toe

02:28

let the rags and nets rot slightly in water so

02:32

that they degraded in tow loose fibers Then he squished

02:35

the fibers together and dried them out creating what is

02:39

believed to be the first sheet of paper in the

02:40

world Well kyle owns rag paper could be made out

02:44

of any fibrous material silk linen cotton hamp rommel berry

02:48

It tended to be rough and uneven but it's way

02:50

better than the paper we invented which doesn't exist over

02:56

the next couple of centuries cailin successor was worked to

02:59

make the fibers mohr evenly sized They also added substances

03:03

like glue and flour to make the paper absorb ink

03:05

better of course as impressive as something called rag paper

03:09

is it didn't immediately start a paper revolution Be kind

03:14

should talk to somebody about for ending papermaking state a

03:17

hobby of the upper class in ancient china for a

03:19

long time where it was perfected it was only when

03:22

islamic people's conquered bits of western asia that the technology

03:26

began to spread across the world Kyle owns little invention

03:30

was about to give all human society a makeover proving

03:34

the old chinese saying never underestimate a pile of rotten

03:38

rags Correct Okay that's Probably not an ancient chinese saying 00:03:43.08 --> [endTime] but uh well hey it's Still true

Full Transcript