Just when the undercurrent was surging in Chen City and the spearhead was alluding to Zhao State, in Handan City, hundreds of miles away, the monarchs and ministers of Zhao State did not know anything about it for the time being.

Zhao Dan is in a very good mood today.

The papermaking technique that was ordered a few years ago finally began to make a breakthrough with the efforts of the craftsmen of Zhao State for several years.

A piece of paper that looked relatively yellow and was a little rough was placed in front of Zhao Dan.

Papermaking, known as one of the "Four Great Inventions of China", has played a great role in the progress of civilization in China and even in the whole world.

In front of Zhao Dan stood two papermaking craftsmen, who came to introduce Zhao Dan to papermaking.

Since ancient times, the working people of China have known how to raise silkworms and reel silk. In today's Warring States period, the handicraft industry of making silk cotton from secondary cocoons has become quite popular.

At this time, the method of working people to deal with the cocoon is called the bleaching method, and the basic points of the operation include repeated beating to smash the silkworm clothes.

In addition, in ancient China, lime water or grass and wood gray water were commonly used to degum silk and linen, and this technology also inspired the degumming of plant fibers in papermaking.

This method of fluttering and degumming has played a great role in the process of papermaking for the craftsmen of Zhao Kingdom.

The piece of paper in front of Zhao Dan was obtained by these craftsmen of Zhao Guo through Zhao Dan's introduction, combined with the above methods, after repeating the experiment for several years and improving countless steps.

According to the craftsmen, this paper is made of bark, hemp, cloth, fishing nets and other raw materials, and is finally made by frustration, pounding, frying, and baking.

This kind of paper is easy to find raw materials, and it is very cheap, and the quality is much higher than that of silk paper.

This is actually the "Cai Hou Paper" created by Cai Lun in history.

It takes about four steps to make this paper.

The first is the separation of raw materials, which is to degum the raw materials in the lye solution by soaking or cooking, and disperse them into fibrous forms.

The second is pulping, which is to cut off the fiber by cutting and pounding, and make the fiber broom, and become pulp.

The third is copying, that is, the pulp is soaked into a slurry, and then the pulp is scooped with a paper grazer (mat), so that the pulp is interwoven into a thin sheet of wet paper on the paper grab.

The fourth is drying, that is, drying or drying the wet paper, and removing it to become the paper, and it is done.

After listening to the introduction, Zhao Dan couldn't wait to pick up the brush, began to wave ink on the paper, and wrote down the eight characters of "merit in the contemporary, benefit in the future".

After writing in one breath, Zhao Dan took two steps back slightly, and looked at the first "calligraphy work" after his crossing.

Well, it needs to be improved......

Zhao Dan coughed, withdrew his plan to give this calligraphy work to the two Zhao masters in front of him, and smiled at the two people: "So, this paper is made by the two of you?" ”

The one who was older among the two craftsmen and already had some gray temples hurriedly said: "Back to the king, this paper is made of the wisdom of everyone, and the ministers dare not be greedy for merit. ”

"Good." Zhao Dan laughed: "Since this is the case, then you will go back in a while and present a list of meritorious people, and all meritorious people will be given a knighthood and a bounty of 1,000." If you and other leaders are meritorious, you will be given two knights, a bounty of 10,000 yuan, and another wine, food, and silk cloth! ”

The two craftsmen were overjoyed when they heard this, and immediately knelt down and bowed: "Thank you, King! ”

You must know that the status of craftsmen in this era is actually not high, and it is a little higher than that of merchants in the "Shinong Industry and Commerce", and when they are recruited to accompany the army, they also make some siege equipment such as trebuchets or repair armor bows and arrows, and there are few opportunities to make meritorious contributions to the battlefield, and the possibility of obtaining a knighthood is low and low.

Now that Zhao Dan is opening his mouth, he is a knighthood and money, and even wine, food and cloth are given, which is simply an unimaginable good thing for craftsmen.

Zhao Dan smiled and helped the two craftsmen up, patted his shoulder and encouraged: "Work hard, there are still many things to be handed over to you in the future, as long as you can make it, then these merits and rewards will definitely not be less!" By the way, remember that the most urgent task at the moment is to make this kind of paper on a large scale, the more the better! ”

Sending away two craftsmen who had been thanking him, Han Fei, who had been by his side, couldn't help but say: "King, the minister has a word, I don't know if I should say it." ”

Zhao Dan turned his head and glanced at Han Fei, and said with a smile: "Say." ”

Han Fei said: "The king seems to be too generous and over-rewarding for such craftsmen. ”

"The reward is too heavy?" When Zhao Dan heard this, he couldn't help laughing, took the paper in front of him in his hand, and gestured to Han Fei: "Han Shizhong, it seems that you still don't understand the importance of this papermaking technique." ”

What is the most important thing in the entire history of mankind?

It's knowledge!

The advent of papermaking and the spread of paper brought the possibility of spreading this knowledge.

"Zhuangzi Tianxia" once said: "Benefiting many people, its books are five cars." So later generations used "learning rich five cars" to describe a person who is very knowledgeable.

So the question is, how many words are there in the book of the five carriages in the five carriages of Xuefu?

This can actually be calculated.

Generally, bamboo slips are about 25.5 cm long, about 5 cm wide, and about 1.5 cm thick, that is to say, the volume of a bamboo slip is about 1912.5 cubic centimeters, and a bamboo slip generally has only more than 30 characters, up to 49 characters.

In this era, the volume of the car was almost 2 meters long, 1.5 meters wide, and about 0.4 meters deep, that is, the volume was about 1,200,000 cubic centimeters.

If you calculate this way, you can put 627.45 bamboo slips all full, and if you have 5 cars, that is, less than 3,200, even if you count 50 words on a bamboo slip, it is only less than 160,000 words.

What is the concept of 160,000 words? According to the standard of online literature in the future, the number of words on the shelves of a book is more than 200,000.

That is to say, if an online reader reads an online article and reads the part on the shelf, then his reading volume has already surpassed that of the ancient Hui Shi, who is "rich in learning and five cars......

These 160,000 words require five carts to be filled with bamboo slips, but if you use the kind of books of later generations, it is just an ordinary thickness book.

This is the huge gap between paper and bamboo slips, not to mention the other advantages of paper that are easy to write and easy to carry.

With paper, the dissemination of knowledge can be greatly accelerated, which is of great significance to the development of the whole society.

In addition, the reason why these scholars are so coaxed now, one or two do not dump the monarchs, is it not because the knowledge of this era is in the hands of the scholars and the aristocratic class?

To put it bluntly, there are many official positions, but there are few scholars who have the knowledge and ability to be qualified for these official positions, so the monarchs have to condescend one by one and put on a posture of a courteous corporal.

If a large number of literati could be cultivated on a large scale as in later generations, and officials were selected through competition among these literati, then would these scholars still be dragged like this?

When the seller's market becomes a buyer's market, it is the scholars who cry and shout to hug the king's thigh.

The more Zhao Dan thought about it, the happier he became, and smiled at Han Fei, who was still a little disappreciative in front of him: "Han Shizhong, just look at it, soon, this paper will play a huge role." ”

Saying that, Zhao Dan thought of another thing.

Now that there is paper, printing should also be a good partner for papermaking, right?