The inventor of paper Cai Lun is the greatest inventor in ancient my country and the inventor of papermaking. Before paper was invented, people from all over the world in ancient times tried their best to use stones, bricks, leaves, bark, wax tablets, copper, lead, linen, animal skins, sheepskins, etc. to record things in writing. During the Shang Dynasty in my country, people carved characters one by one on tortoise shells and the shoulder blades of cattle, sheep, pigs and other animals; later, people also used wood chips (also called slips) and bamboo slips (also called bamboo slips) of the same size. To write articles; later, silk fabrics were also used as paper to write. During the Eastern Han Dynasty, with the development of economy and culture, bamboo slips and silk silk became increasingly unsuitable for writing needs. In order to create an ideal writing material, Cai Lun used bark, hemp heads, rags, and waste fish nets as raw materials based on the previous paper-making methods of waste silk and cotton. He successfully created a paper that is both light and economical. , summed up a relatively complete set of papermaking methods, which made papermaking technology make great progress. In 105 AD (the first year of Yuanxing, during the reign of Emperor Liu Zhao of the Han Dynasty), Cai Lun presented the paper he made to the imperial court and was praised by the emperor. From then on, people used this kind of paper, and the paper made by Cai Lun was known throughout the country as "Caihou paper". In 121 AD, the internal struggle for power in the Eastern Han Dynasty involved Cai Lun, and Emperor Liu Hu of Han'an ordered him to surrender. Cai Lun was ashamed to be tried, so he took a bath, put on his most beautiful clothes, and then committed suicide by taking poison. In the 8th century AD, paper was widely used in my country. In the following centuries, my country exported paper to various parts of Asia and strictly kept the secret of papermaking. In AD 751, the Tang Dynasty and the Arab Empire clashed, and the Arabs captured several Chinese paper craftsmen. It didn’t take long for the paper industry to spring up in Samarkand and Baghdad. In this way, papermaking technology gradually spread throughout the Arab world, where paper began to be widely used, and later spread to North America and Europe through Arab countries. According to historical records, the first paper mill was not built in Europe until more than 1,000 years after Cai Lun invented papermaking. Although the modern papermaking industry has been very developed, its basic principles are still the same as Cai Lun's papermaking method. Seventy-eight tenths of the raw materials for papermaking have been replaced by wood pulp, but the raw materials used to make high-grade printing paper, cigarette paper, rice paper and typing wax paper are still rags, bark, hemp heads, waste fishnets and other materials used by Cai Lun. Cai Lun has had a huge impact on the development of our country and even human society, and this impact will continue. Today, we cannot measure the role of paper in historical development in terms of quantity. It is even more difficult to predict how long human beings will use paper. Therefore, Cai Lun (and Bi Sheng, another named inventor of the four great inventions) should occupy the first or almost the first position in the list of people who have had a huge impact on China and the course of human history. /business/79/2006-3/17/0631711064956745.htm