The evolution and development of printing technology in China are described in detail.

Overview of the development of printing technology in the world Printing in Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties lasted for 379 years (AD 58 1-960), which was the early stage of block printing. According to the unearthed cultural relics and documents, the prints in the Tang Dynasty are mainly some reading materials, daily and religious articles, such as Buddhist scriptures, Buddha statues, almanac, language reference books, bills and so on. In addition to pure text books, there are books with pictures and texts. These printed materials were in great demand in the society at that time. Printing in Five Dynasties and Ten Countries (10 century) developed on the basis of the Tang Dynasty and made new breakthroughs. The Nine Confucian Classics printed and engraved by the government is a pioneering work of the printing industry. Since then, the printing scope has been greatly expanded, and it has been further used to publish sage books. The popularity of block printing laid the foundation for the golden age of printing in Song Dynasty. Attachment: Xuanzang learned from the western classic Xuanzang (AD 602-664), whose common name was Chen, who was born in Luozhou (now Henan) and became a monk at the age of thirteen. Xuanzang felt that there were many doubts about Buddhist scriptures at that time, which was caused by poor translation of Buddhist scriptures, so he decided to go west to Tianzhu (India) to seek dharma and use Sanskrit to solve the doubts. According to documents, after Xuanzang returned from his journey to the West, he printed the Buddha statue on his back paper in 658-663 AD and distributed it to monks and nuns at home. Printed matter is carried by five horses every year, and there is no surplus distribution every year. This not only shows that the printing technology in the early Tang Dynasty has reached a certain level, but also the public has a certain demand for printed materials about Buddhism. The printing of the Nine Classics refers to the following nine important Confucian classics: The Book of Changes, The Book of Songs, Zuo's Biography in the Spring and Autumn Period, Yang Gong Biography in the Spring and Autumn Period, Liang Biography in the Spring and Autumn Period, The Book of Rites, The Book of Rites and Zhou Li, with a total of 65,438 books. The publication and engraving of Nine Classics is an important event in the printing history of China. It was engraved by imperial academy at the invitation of Feng Dao (882-954), the prime minister of the late Tang Dynasty (923-936). Nine Classics must be collated and annotated before it can be published. From the third year of Changxing in the late Tang Dynasty (AD 932) to the third year of Guangshun in the late Zhou Dynasty (AD 953), the engraving of Jiu Jing lasted 2 1 year. After witnessing the printed edition of Nine Classics, Feng Dao died in the second year (AD 954), and his long-cherished wish was finally realized in his lifetime. During the Song, Yuan and Song Dynasties, engraving printing technology became more mature, and movable type printing technology was invented in the Northern Song Dynasty. In the Yuan Dynasty, Wang Zhen perfected movable type printing and made a turntable to store characters, which accelerated the speed of fetching characters. In addition to monochrome printing, there are also multi-color printing, and there are also new breakthroughs in print binding and binding. The content of printed matter in Song Dynasty expanded to all fields of Confucianism, Buddhism, Taoism and hundred schools of thought, and various publications such as literature and history, philosophy, geography, poetry, novels, plays, astrology and music appeared. In particular, more scientific and medical works have been published. In addition to the printing of books and printed matter, there is also the printing and distribution of paper money. Since the Song and Yuan Dynasties, publishing centers have spread all over the country, and the quality and variety of printing paper have surpassed those of previous dynasties, forming a printing network of official engraving, workshop engraving and private engraving. Due to the popularization and progress of printing, the printed matter in this period tended to be perfect and became a model for later generations, laying the foundation for the development of Ming and Qing Dynasties. Attachment: In Song Dynasty, movable type was stored in a big wooden cabinet with many drawers, and the characters were picked up by the word checker, put in the word pick-up tray, and then typeset. In the first year of Dade in Yuan Dynasty (A.D. 1297), when Wang Zhen was in Jingde County, Anhui Province, he personally designed and produced 30,000 wooden movable types and printed the Jingde County Annals, with more than 60,000 words in the book. In less than one month, more than 100 copies were printed, with high speed and good quality. In typesetting technology, Wang Zhen also created a rotatable word storage disk, or wheel-type word storage disk. It looks like a circular table top turntable, with a diameter of seven feet and a shaft height of more than three feet. Vegetables are divided into many squares with bamboo strips, and the squares are numbered according to the phonological order of each word and put into the squares according to the rhyme. When typesetting, two people cooperate, one reads the article and shouts numbers, the other sits between two word storage disks, turns the left and right roulette wheels, and selects the type according to the quoted numbers. Typesetters don't have to walk around to choose words, which saves manpower and time and is a great progress in typesetting technology. The earliest paper money-Jiaozi Song Dynasty, due to the development of industry and commerce and the prosperity of printing industry, paper money began to replace ancient metal money. Paper money was first used by Sichuan businessmen and then taken over by local governments. In the fourth year of Zhenzong Dazhong Xiangfu (A.D. 10 1 1), "Jiaozi" was first issued as paper money in Sichuan, with good results, and was later popularized in other regions. Although a large number of banknotes were printed and distributed in the Song Dynasty, not many physical objects remained. Only the jiaozi rubbings printed in the northern song dynasty and the printing plates in the sub-library of the southern song dynasty can be preserved, and the printing plates are made of metal (copper). In Zhu Mo, the front of paper money can be printed, printed or decorated with wooden patterns. /kloc-The metal movable type invented in the Northern Song Dynasty in the 0/2nd century was used to print paper money. Before printing paper money, it is necessary to put copper movable type on the plate to indicate the face size and official money. Copper movable type was used in printing money in Song Dynasty, Jin Dynasty, Yuan Dynasty and Ming Dynasty. Printing in Liao Dynasty (907- 1 125) The Liao State established by the Qidan nationality reached its peak in the 10 century. They attached great importance to Buddhism and absorbed a lot of Central Plains culture. In addition to printing a large number of Buddhist scriptures, they also print Confucian classics, various historical books, poetry collections and various reference books. The most developed printing industries in Liao Dynasty were Yanjing (Beijing), Fanyang (Zhuozhou), Hebei and the north of Shanxi. At that time, there were many folk workshops in Yanjing, indicating that printing in Beijing was very prosperous at that time. The large-scale printed edition of Liao Dynasty is "Khitan Tibetan" (Liao Tibetan for short), with about 5,000 volumes. In the wooden pagoda in Yingxian County, Shanxi Province, several printed Buddhist paintings were also found, which were printed with black and white background and then drawn by hand. Printed in Jin Dynasty (A.D.111234). In the fifth year of Huizong reign in Northern Song Dynasty (A.D.115), Jin Shizu proclaimed himself emperor and formally established Daikin Kingdom. The Jin Dynasty attached great importance to printing, and established the imperial academy, which was responsible for the printing of books. According to records, there are more than 30 kinds of books printed by Jin imperial academy, including the Six Classics and Seventeen History. Jin folk printing industry is widely spread in northern areas such as Henan, Shandong, Hebei, Shanxi and Shaanxi, especially Pingyang. There are many printing workshops in Pingyang (now Linfen, Shanxi) and its vicinity, which are comparable to Jianyang in quantity and quality. The "Simitu" unearthed in Heishui City comes from Ji Jia, a famous printing workshop in Pingyang. Pingyang folk printing "synopsis of the golden chamber" is a huge project, which took more than 30 years to complete, with about 4000 volumes. This proves that a group of outstanding sculptors were concentrated in Pingyang area at that time. The Jurchen nationality in the Tripitaka believes in Buddhism as much as the Han nationality and the Qidan nationality. Buddhist scriptures are printed in temples all over the country, and some temples raise funds to print Buddhist scriptures themselves. The most famous is the gilded Tripitaka, which was carved in Tianning Temple in Hedong (southwest of Yuncheng, Shanxi) from 1 1438+073. More than 6,900 volumes of Buddhist scriptures were collected and made into scrolls. In A.D. 1933, this golden edition of Tibetan Scriptures was discovered in Guangsheng Temple in Zhao Cheng, Shanxi Province, also known as Zhao Cheng Collection. Xixia Printing (A.D. 1032- 1227) established Xixia with Tangut as the main body and lived in today's Ningxia. They believe in Buddhism and use Chinese characters as well as their own. Xixia began to engrave books after the founding of the people's Republic of China, and it was printed in large quantities. Among the government agencies, there are Paper Industry Institute and Engraving Department, which shows that Xixia government attaches great importance to printing. There are the largest number of Buddhist scriptures in Xixia printed matter, and there are calligraphy books, Confucian classics, historical books, political books, military books and almanac in non-religious works, both in Xixia and Chinese. There are not only woodcut editions, but also wooden movable-type editions and clay movable-type editions from 12 to 13 centuries, such as 199 1 Xixia movable-type edition "Lucky Coming to the Mouth" discovered in Ningxia and 1989 Xixia clay movable-type edition "Wei Mo" Printing in Ming and Qing Dynasties Printing in Ming and Qing Dynasties not only surpassed the previous generation in quantity, subject matter and origin distribution, but also the artistry of printed matter was not comparable to that of the previous generation, reaching an unprecedented level in technology. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, woodcut printing technology became more mature and illustrations increased sharply. Due to the development of multicolor overprinter, the whole works of art can be expressed in the form of printing. In history, clay type and metal type have been fully revived, and there has been a climax of large-scale printing of wood type and copper type. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the square standard printing font with horizontal flat and vertical, horizontal light and vertical weight was the symbol of printing progress. In the book binding, the northern binding and the thread binding have become the mainstream. No dynasty in history published popular books with a wide range of subjects, especially illustrated operas, novels and picture books, like the Ming and Qing Dynasties. In addition, a subset of classics and history, Buddhism and Taoism, science and technology, local chronicles, genealogy, series, books, western works and works written in various minority languages, and even Catholic reading materials have been published. Attachment: the spread of western printing to the east. At the end of Qing Dynasty, western printing technology and equipment were introduced into China, gradually replacing engraving technology. Some graphic works have been changed into lithographs. But the skill of woodcut printing continues to this day. From some prints carved by the Qing court, it can be seen that the printing skills at this time were influenced by the West in terms of techniques and contents. Printing in the West1the end of the 5th century1the beginning of the 6th century, the spread of printing had a far-reaching impact on western thought and society. It inspired the Renaissance and the Reformation. These two movements in turn further promoted the development of printing. Western scholars have pointed out that "almost every achievement in the process of modern civilization in the western world is related to the introduction and development of printing in different ways." First of all, printing can spread books widely, which means that the monopoly of the church on knowledge has been broken, thus opening the way for the development of new knowledge. On the other hand, printing promoted the development of European national literature, thus promoting the rise of nationalism. Because most of the books at that time were published in different European national languages, the vocabulary, grammar, structure, spelling and pronunciation of different national languages could be fixed by printed materials, which not only promoted the development of popular literature, but also promoted the confirmation of national consciousness in European countries. Reformation and Printing The development of printing in Europe is closely related to the Reformation. 15 17 before Martin Luther issued the statement of religious reform, a certain number of popular bibles had been published. One of the fuses of religious reform is to resist the abuse of power by the church, especially to sell the book of atonement for profit. On the other hand, printing also made the idea of religious reform widely popular in the form of pamphlets and leaflets. Therefore, when Martin Luther, a European religious reformer, mentioned printing, he thought that "it is the supreme grace of God that makes the gospel spread". References:

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