Wood Block Printing
The earliest example of woodblock printing was discovered in 1974 in china, housed in a Tang tomb located in modern day Xi’an. It was a single sheet taken from the dharani sutra, a Buddhist text written in Sanskrit. The sheet was dated back to approximately 650 to 670 AD, the time combined with the sheet being found in a Tang style tomb, long with the fact that modern day Xi’an was once the Tang capitol of Chang’an puts the piece firmly in the period of the Tang Dynasty.
A similar copy of the of the Buddhist dharani sutra was discovered earlier in 1966, this one in Korea, yet the print bore distinct Chinese markings, that dated to the later time of no earlier than 704. This put the print in around the time of the latter half of the Tang dynasty, and the reign of China’s only empress regent Wu Zetian (690-705), who prompted the expansion of Buddhism, coinciding with the Koreans adopting the practice of Buddhism from china some time during the reign of the Tang dynasty. |
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Movable Type
The development and invention of movable type is credited to the Chinese during the time of the Song Dynasty. The process was first described in recorded print by Song scholarly official Shen Kuo, who in his Dream Pool Essays, credits the pioneering of reusable type to an obscure artist by the name of Bi Sheng. Kuo describes Bi in his essays as being the one of the first to experiment with wood type characters, and their reuse, yet the practice would not become of practical use until a scholarly official of the Yuan dynasty by the name of wang Zhen perfected Bi’s earlier models into his own, making clay and wood type characters of reuse. However not until the time of the Ming Dynasty (1439-1513), would the printed works of Hua Sui allow the Chinese to develop metal (mostly bronze) reusable type characters, followed later by Quing dynasty (1644-1912) official Xu Zhiding whom would develop vitreous enamel type printing in 1718.
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Japanese Sci Fi
With china’s expanded trade many of their customs and technologies were adopted by other countries. The Japanese adopted Chinese printing and movable type in order to create their own printed works. Such works include the Tale of Urashima Taro the earliest found novel involving time travel, and the Tale of the bamboo Cutter. The first historically recorded UFO sighting, and adopted later into what is considered the first science fiction novel. |
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Imperial Exams
While in the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD), the recruiting of government officials through a system formal recommendations was the only real method of filling political or government jobs, they also had an Imperial Academy, at which to train these new officials. However in order to train potential candidates for these official posts, the offices required its candidates to pass formal exams before acceptance. However, it was not until the Sui Dynasty (581–618) that the civil service examinations became open to all adult males, with exception to those belonging to the merchant class. The civil service system was implemented on a much larger scale during the Song Dynasty (960–1279).
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Paper Money
Paper currency was by the Chinese, and found its first use by in merchant as means of credit during the Tang Dynasty (618–907), a merchant would avoid having to carry heavy coins in deals involving large amounts of money. During the Song Dynasty (960–1279) however the central government adopted the practice, gradually reducing production of coin currency. This allowed the government to control the overflow of copper coinage in circulation. The earliest paper currency was limited to certain regions of China and could not be used outside of that area, but once paper become backed by gold and silver, the Song Dynasty government issued a nationwide paper currency, between 1265 and 1274.
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