China is one of the four ancient countries in the world, and its historical civilization has a long history. As we all know, our country has a history of more than five thousand years. In this long history, China has many inventions ahead of other countries, the most famous of which are the four major inventions.
The four major inventions are known to everyone, and today we are talking about one of the four major inventions, papermaking. The founder of papermaking may not be known to many people, but according to historical records, his character is not bad, but he has invented countless things, among which papermaking has made China ahead of the millennium.
Life was difficult, and he entered the palace as a eunuch
This incident occurred during the Eastern Han Dynasty, the family of a person surnamed Cai. Originally, the living conditions were still very good in a society dominated by agriculture, but the Cai family was mainly engaged in business, and the family's economic situation could be seen.
The Cai family has a son named Cai Lun, who has been particularly mischievous since he was a child. The Cai family has a blacksmith shop, and usually gives others some agricultural tools to earn money, and Cai Lun is very interested in this.
When the master blacksmith was typing, he stood by and watched, and he had to see every step clearly. After Cai Lun was a little older, he began to draw some things himself and let the blacksmith master make them.
Cai Lun generally invents some small things, and basically plays mainly, and the practicality is not great. However, Cai Lun's intelligence and brain imagination still make parents feel very praised.
Children of this age are playing outside, but he is at home researching and making some strange things. After three years, the family's business went wrong, the blacksmith shops closed, and the family road began to fall.
When Cai Lun was fifteen years old, his family was already poor and had eaten at any time. At this time, Cai Lun actually had a strange idea, that is, to enter the palace as a eunuch.
The family strongly opposed this matter, for the simple reason that Cai Lun became a eunuch and had no fertility, and the Cai family would not be the only one at that time. But the legs were on Cai Lun's body, and he did not listen to his parents and ran to the palace to register.
In order to be promoted to please the queen
Cai Lun passed through the net and became a eunuch. Cai Lun originally thought that when he entered the palace and became a eunuch, he could eat and drink without worry. But what Cai Lun did not expect was that eunuchs were divided into many ranks.
Like Cai Lun, who had just entered the palace, he first had to have an old eunuch to take him, that is, his first master, and then to see what level of his master was. Among the eunuchs were the chief eunuch, the second chief steward, and the eunuch attendant who each led a eunuch.
If Cai Lun's master is the grand master, then he will definitely be cultivated by the master as a future successor. But Cai Lun's master was not at the level of a general manager, not even a waiter, just an ordinary eunuch.
Although his master status was not prominent and he had no power, this old eunuch, because of his advanced age and no children, was particularly kind to Cai Lun. The old eunuch taught Cai Lun everything he knew, and told Cai Lun that if he wanted to get ahead, he had to choose a good master.
The old eunuch meant that ordinary eunuchs did chores and did the same for a lifetime. However, at the level of a waiter, basically the royal family that serves the concubine or the prince, the general manager basically has to be the emperor and the empress.
As long as your master's status is noble, then you have a high status among eunuchs. For example, if the concubine who is also a waiter is deeply favored by the emperor, then you are superior to other waiters.
As time passed, Cai Lun grew up day by day, and he began to understand the words of the old eunuch. Once the old eunuch offended a waiter, and this eunuch waiter was the old eunuch, and eventually the old eunuch became disabled.
Cai Lun looked at the old eunuch's suffering, but he did not have the ability to change, from this moment on, Cai Lun decided that he must get ahead, be a superior person, and not be bullied by others.
Cai Lun began to think about what skills he had to attract these royals, or what he could do for them. When Cai Lunsi came and went, he would make some strange things, but it was better to make some fun things to make these people happy.
Cai Lun said just do it, and he began to make some simple toys out of some wood to play with the princes and princesses. Soon Cai Lun became famous, and the children were noisy and wanted to find Cai Lun to make them toys.
After a long time, Cai Lun's affairs were known to some concubines. These concubines saw that Cai Lun was really smart and did a lot of novel things. The concubines also began, asking Cai Lun to make something for them, and soon Cai Lun's affairs were known to the empress.
The empress was also amused by Cai Lun's novelty, and soon he became a red man by the queen's side. But Cai Lun was not satisfied with the status quo, he wanted more power, so he participated in the palace fight.
Cai Lun's intrigue and trickery
The empress's surname was Dou, and one of her difficulties was that she could not have children. This also means that she can't give birth to a dragon child to the emperor, the mother is expensive, and Empress Dou will definitely fall out of favor after a long time, so she is in a very dangerous situation now.
After Cai Lun learned of this, he began to have an affair with Empress Dou. He told Empress Dou that if some favored concubines were pregnant, he could find a way to make them abort and thus stabilize Empress Dou's position.
Empress Dou saw that Cai Lun was so sensible, and immediately agreed. In the next few years, Cai Lun had several concubines aborted, and even some concubines died because of it. Cai Lun also gave Empress Dou a trick to change the tanuki for the prince.
He returned the children of other concubines to Empress Dou, and also made the children crown princes, stabilizing Empress Dou's harem status. Fulfilling the empress's wishes, Cai Lun's position soared and became the head of the eunuchs.
As soon as Cai Lun had power in his hands, he revealed his evil face, and he often persecuted some eunuchs and palace women, and eliminated some people who did not have long eyes for the empress. It can be said that Cai Lun is evil, and the eunuchs are afraid of him.
However, the good times did not last long, and Empress Dou unfortunately died. After the new empress took office, Cai Lun inquired about the new empress's hobbies in order to stabilize her position. Through the narration of others, Cai Lun knew that the new empress liked paper.
But paper was a luxury at the time, and he didn't have that much money to please the new queen. So Cai Lun began to wonder if he could invent a kind of cheaper paper. When all was said and done, Cai Lun began to read some related books and asked some craftsmen for relevant information.
In the end, Cai Lun decided to use bamboo as a raw material and go through some processes to make paper. Cai Lun got some bamboo, and in the mansion where he lived, he found some clever palace women and eunuchs to participate in the manufacturing process.
Cai Lun studied for several months, and finally made the paper. Although it is not as expensive as paper smooth, it does not affect normal use, and most importantly, it is cheap. Cai Lun won the favor of the new empress with his ingenuity and continued to run amok in the harem.