"Papermaking" was invented by Cai Lun of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and there was an allusion to why the Warring States had "talking on paper"

As a well-known idiom, the first thing that comes to mind when mentioning it is Zhao Kuo, after all, the "Idiom Dictionary" points to the allusion to Zhao Kuo, and the source points to Sima Qian's "History of Lian Po Lin XiangRu Biography". However, many people will feel strange, "papermaking" did not appear in the Eastern Han Dynasty? Why did the allusion of "talking on paper" occur in the Warring States period?

First of all, "paper" did not refer specifically to paper at the earliest

The Later Han Dynasty Book of Cai Lun's biography reads, "Since the ancient book Qi duo was compiled with bamboo Jane, the person who used the silk veil called it 'paper'. Expensive and simple, it is not convenient for people. The "silk curtain" here refers to a thin and thin silk fabric that can also be used to write words, and the "silk curtain" is also called paper.

In September 1942, archaeologists found a book in the tomb of bullet Kuchu in Changsha, Hunan Province, which is also the earliest surviving Warring States book. The complete piece is about 33 cm long and 41 cm wide, with pictures and texts, and the middle part has two sets of text in opposite directions, a group of 13 lines and a group of 8 lines. The whole book is more than 900 words, with an inner circle and a square outside, and the decoration is tight.

In addition, as early as the "Chinese Yue Language", there is a record of "Yue Wang's book of books", which shows that as early as the middle and late Spring and Autumn Period, the situation of writing characters in "缣帛" has begun to appear. However, because the "silk veil" is too expensive, it has not been widely popularized, and it is usually only used for royal and aristocratic books.

In fact, before the large-scale use of paper in the Southern and Northern Dynasties, "paper" was not a proper noun, and did not specifically refer to paper, and although "缣帛" and later "He shu" and "Fang Shu" were not paper in the traditional sense, they were also called "paper".

Secondly, the birth of "paper" predates the Eastern Han Dynasty

When it comes to "papermaking", the first thing we think of is Cai Lun of the Eastern Han Dynasty, but in fact, Cai Lun only improved the papermaking technique, and the history of "paper" is much earlier than that of the Eastern Han Dynasty. In order to commemorate the merits of Cai Lun, posterity will be Cai Lun's improved process of the paper as "Cai Hou paper".

In the "Book of Han, Foreign Relatives, And Biography of Empress Xiaocheng Zhao", there is a record of "two wrapped medicines in the Wufa Basket, the Book of Hehe", and the "He hoof" here refers to a thin and thin "dyed red paper" (otherwise, it is said that it is a small piece of silk), which is used as a substitute for silk as a writing tool.

In addition, archaeologists have excavated physical Paper from the Western Han Dynasty at the Tianshui Fangmatan site in Gansu, the Fengzhu site in Dunhuang Maquan Bay, and the Ruins of Han Hangquan Post Station in Tianshuijing, Dunhuang, which is enough to prove that before Cai Lun improved papermaking (about 170 years or so), at least the Western Han Dynasty had already appeared usable paper.

However, due to the poor quality of the early paper, it was difficult to use for writing, and the quality was improved in the late Western Han Dynasty, and Cai Lun improved the papermaking technique from the aspects of raw materials and processes, so that the quality of the paper was improved, the manufacturing cost was reduced, and the paper was gradually able to be used for writing.

Even so, limited by the production process and raw materials, the production cost of paper is still very high, resulting in the inability to become the main writing instrument, until after the Southern and Northern Dynasties, with the continuous improvement of the production process, the application range of paper can be further expanded. The large-scale use of paper will be the production of bamboo paper after the Sui and Tang dynasties.

Finally, the accurate source of "talking on paper" is not the "History"

Although the protagonist of the idiom "talking about soldiers on paper" is Zhao Kuo in the middle and late Warring States period, the allusion is derived from the "History of Lian Po Lin Xiang Xiang Li Biography" written by Sima Qian of the Western Han Dynasty, but the emergence of the idiom "talking about soldiers on paper" is actually much later than this time.

In the "History of Lian Po Lin XiangRu Lie", the whole text does not mention such words as "talking about soldiers on paper", and a sentence with a similar meaning is only Lin Xiangru's evaluation of Zhao Kuo, which writes that "the disciples can read his father's biography, but they do not know how to change", which means that Zhao Kuo is only familiar with the soldiers' books left by his father, but does not know how to change.

According to the information that can be found at present, "talking about soldiers on paper" should be said in the Qing Dynasty novelist Cao Xueqin's "Dream of the Red Chamber", which reads, "There are such poets here, but they go to talk about soldiers on paper every day." Wei Yuan, who was also a Qing Dynasty writer, wrote in the "Sacred Martial Record", "Today, when laughing at the soldiers on paper, I don't know the merits on the paper, that is, there is depth and shallowness..."

Judging from the above two paragraphs, "talking on paper" has appeared in the middle of the Qing Dynasty, but it does not seem to be associated with Zhao Kuo, but mainly refers to the fact that the literati only know how to talk about it, but do not know how to put it into practice. It was not until the late Qing Dynasty that Shen Baozhen associated "talking on paper" with Zhao Kuo, Ma Mo, Yin Hao, Fang Zhen, Zhaoyuan and other five people.

As for Zhao Kuo when we mention "talking about soldiers on paper" today, it mainly stems from the book "Five Thousand Years Up and Down" by the modern literary scholar Lin Handa, which has written many historical figures and stories in vernacular, of which the title of the fortieth story is "Zhao Kuo who talks about soldiers on paper".

As a historical popular science book, "Five Thousand Years up and Down" has been reprinted more than ten times before and after, and the impact can be described as extremely far-reaching, so that in the end, it has left people with the impression that "talking on paper" is specifically referring to Zhao Kuo. Most of the current idiom dictionaries also associate "talking on paper" with Zhao Kuo.

In summary, although Zhao Kuo of "talking on paper" was a figure in the Warring States period, and the popularity of paper was at least after the Eastern Han Dynasty, the birth of this idiom of "talking about soldiers on paper" and its connection with Zhao Kuo was actually a long evolution, and this event was undoubtedly much later than the Warring States period.

In fact, as far as the meaning of the idiom "talking about soldiers on paper" itself is concerned, it is more used to describe those who are unrealistic and exaggerated, and the "paper" here can be a carrier of all words, including silk, bamboo, paper, bells and inscriptions, rather than being too entangled in referring to "paper".