Cai Lun was a native of Guiyang (now Leiyang County, Hunan Province). In the 18th year of Emperor Ming Liu Zhuang Yongping of the Eastern Han Dynasty (AD 75), Cai Lun became a eunuch in the palace of Luoyang, the capital. Emperor Zhang, Liu Jin, and During the reign of Emperor Liu Zhao, he was promoted to "Xiaohuangmen" and "Zhongchangshi", and later also served as "Shangfangling". He first took charge of the affairs of the inner courtyard of the palace, and later became the head of the royal workshop that supervised the production of various royal utensils.
In normal times, Cai Lun watched the emperor reviewing a large number of bamboo slips and silk books every day, working hard and laboriously, so he always thought of creating a simpler and cheaper writing material to make the world's documents lighter and easier to use.
Legend has it that one day, Cai Lun took several young eunuchs out of the city to play, and came to the Chen River Valley in Fengshi County, not far from the city (referring to the ancient city of Han and Wei, southeast of today's Baima Temple). Phoenix Valley (today's Xuanzang's hometown). The stream was clear, the trees and grass on both sides were abundant, the birds were singing and the flowers were fragrant, and the scenery was very pleasant. While admiring the scenery, Cai Lun suddenly saw a cluster of dead branches accumulated in the stream, with a thin layer of white floc hanging on it. His eyes lit up, and he squatted down and picked it up with a branch to take a closer look. I saw this thing pulling and hanging like silk.
When Cai Lun thought about making silk floss in the factory, after rinsing the cocoon silk, there would always be some residual lint left on the bamboo mat. After the bamboo mat dries, there will be a thin layer of intertwined wadding attached to it, which can be peeled off to make writing very convenient. Cai Lun suddenly thought that the thing in the stream was very similar to the remnant lint, and he didn't know what it was. ??
He immediately ordered the young eunuch to find the farmer by the river for questioning. The farmer said: "This is the bark and rotten hemp washed down when the river rises. It is twisted together, washed, soaked, soaked and dried, and it becomes this rotten catkins!"
"This is What kind of bark is it?" Cai Lun asked eagerly.
"No, it's the paper tree (scientific name Chu tree) on the shore!"
Cai Lun looked at it, his eyes were full of green, and his face was filled with a smile.
A few days later, Cai Lun led several technicians from the royal workshop to come here and started trial production using the abundant water sources and trees. The bark was peeled off, mashed, soaked, and then added with pine strands to make a slurry. A thin layer was taken out with bamboo strips to dry, and then peeled off to create the original paper. But after trying it, it was found that it was easy to tear, so I smashed the rags and fishnets, and mixed the remaining wadding left over from the silk making process into the slurry, so that the paper would not tear easily. In order to speed up the progress of paper making, Cai Lun directed everyone to build a baking room and dry the wet paper on the wall. Not only did it dry quickly, but the paper was also smooth, and everyone was happy.
Cai Lun selected regular papers and presented them to Emperor He. After Emperor He tried it out, Longyan was delighted. On the same day, he visited the Chenhehe papermaking workshop and inspected the papermaking process. After returning to the palace, he rewarded Cai Lun generously and issued an edict to the world to promote papermaking technology.
Later, in the first year of the Yuan Dynasty (AD 114), Empress Dowager Deng saw that Cai Lun’s paper was getting better and better. It could be thick or thin, fine and tough, and it had the advantages of cheap slips and smooth silk. The advantages of Cai Lun, without the disadvantages of heavy bamboo and expensive silk, were really beneficial to the country and the people, so he happily named Cai Lun "Longtinghou" and granted land to 300 households. Soon after, he was also named "Changle Taipu". People called this new writing material "Caihou paper".