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"The Great Man of the Song Renzong Era" by Tang Bo
During the Northern Song Dynasty, there were many craftsmen in large countries, and the highlights of scientific and technological innovation were frequent. Among the four major inventions, printing, compass, and gunpowder were all upgraded in the Song Dynasty. Among them, the printing technology, from engraving to movable type, is self-evident for the world-class significance of cultural dissemination. The inventor of movable type printing, Bi Sheng, was a small person a thousand years ago, but he was a big person who influenced a thousand years.
There are few records of Bi Sheng. The Northern Song Dynasty scientist Shen Kuo described the principle of movable type printing in the Mengxi Pen Talk, in which Bi Sheng was mentioned twice: "In the celebration calendar, there is a cloth bi sheng and a trap plate" "(Bi) Sheng died, and its seal is yu Qun cong obtained, and it is still a treasure." In just a few words, several important information was revealed: Bi Sheng was a flat-headed commoner who lived during the Song Renzong period and invented movable type printing during the Qing calendar. After Bi Sheng's death, Shen Kuo's nephew got his movable type board and collected it as an heirloom.
So, what profession is Bi Sheng engaged in? What about family history? What was his motivation for inventing movable type printing? What kind of opportunity did Shen Kuo learn about Bi Sheng's movable type board?
From engraving printing to movable type printing
Before the invention of printing, hand-copied books were one of the important ways of cultural dissemination, and even developed into an industry called "maid books". During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, driven by the Hundred Sons and Hundreds of Families, the right and ability to read and write extended from the aristocratic class to the scholar class and even the commoner class, and the scholar class began to copy books during the study tour in order to realize their ideals. During the Two Han Dynasties, the shijia clan was deeply influenced by the idea of scripture, and the Shuxiang Mendi was formed. They have economic strength, their desire to read is even stronger, and they can no longer meet the actual needs of copying books by themselves, so they are willing to pay for people to copy books, and this private copying atmosphere is becoming more and more common. The disadvantages of copying books are obvious, not only time-consuming and laborious, but also easy to copy wrong. What reversed the trend of "copying books" was the emergence of engraving and printing.
Engraving printing has greatly accelerated the reproduction speed of books. Yuan Shu once wrote a preface to the "Bai's Changqing Collection": "In the past twenty years, there have been no books on the walls of the forbidden provinces, temples, and postal waiting, and princes, concubines, cow boys, and horses. As for the writing of The Mole, the street sells it in the market, or it is held to hand over wine and tea, and it is everywhere. "In the Northern Song Dynasty, engraving and printing books became more popular, and the number was amazing.
However, the defects of engraving printing are also obvious. Printing a book, carving so many boards, the engravers are laborious and quite hard. A board, if there is a word wrong, or to change, then the whole board is invalid. If a book is no longer printed, the whole board will be invalidated, cannot be reused, and the storage occupies a place, resulting in huge waste. For example, the "Great Tibetan Classic" engraved in the early years of the Northern Song Dynasty, a total of more than 5,000 volumes, a total of 130,000 plates were engraved, and it took twelve years.
Movable type printing can come into being in the Northern Song Dynasty, completing the historical positioning of Bi Sheng, and it is inseparable from the social environment of "Jigu Right Text". Song Taizu aspired that "the prime minister must use a reader". Song Taizong also once said: "I am not as good as him, but I like to read, and I see the success or failure of ancient and modern times." "Song Zhenzong wrote "Persuasion Poems". Song Renzong was more famous for his rule of literature, organizing the compilation of the New Book of Tang and the History of the New Five Dynasties, and made great progress in poetry, ancient literature and science. The emperors of the Northern Song Dynasty advocated shangwen and suppressed martial arts, which naturally led to the formation of a social consensus of shame for not learning and not having skills.
The Northern Song Dynasty considered the inclusion of intellectuals and the expansion of the ruling base, and greatly increased the number of jinshi, with an average annual enrollment of fourteen times that of the Tang Dynasty. Studies have shown that the economic treatment of officials in the Northern Song Dynasty was equivalent to ten times that of the Han Dynasty and more than twice that of the Tang Dynasty. Such a high income gives them the conditions to get rid of the "rice sorghum plot" and focus on reading, writing and cultural dissemination. The decision-making level of the Northern Song Dynasty also attached importance to the book business. A large number of ancient books scattered among the people were collected, and the Zhaowen Museum, the History Museum, and the Jixian Academy were formed to carry out book management and research, especially the ChongwenYuan, which is a government-run library, has a collection of more than 80,000 volumes and a wide range of disciplines.
For scientific and technological talents and scientific and technological inventions, the decision-making level of the Northern Song Dynasty is welcome. Feng Jisheng entered the method of making gunpowder and was rewarded by the emperor. Gao Xuan built eight wagons of ships and was praised by the government. Shen Kuo studied astronomical almanacs amateurs, and the imperial court simply transferred him to be the Celestial Supervisor, who was specifically responsible for observing celestial phenomena and compiling almanacs, so that professional people could do professional things. This incentive orientation has brought historic opportunities for technological iteration and industrial upgrading. Bi Sheng unconsciously stood at the cusp of the times.
Bi Sheng's career mystery
As for Bi Sheng's own work, there is no record of the documents passed down from generation to generation and the excavated documents, but it has made Chinese and foreign scholars hotly discussed. The modern scholar Wang Guowei said that Bi Sheng was a forge. The French sinologist Julian said that Bi Sheng was a blacksmith. The Encyclopædia Britannica says that Bi Sheng was an alchemist. The History of the Song Dynasty published by the Beijing Publishing House says that Bi Sheng was an engraving worker in Hangzhou. The 1981 film Bi Sheng said that Bi Sheng was the owner of a bookstore in Hangzhou. Who is more reliable?
In "Mengxi Pen Talk", Shen Kuo told such a story:
During the reign of Emperor Zhenzong of Song, there was a jianghu warlock named Wang Jie, who committed an offence and was sent to Shamen Island. This warlock has the art of alchemy. There was an old blacksmith named Bi Sheng, who had helped Wang Jie in the palace to do alchemy. Bi Sheng later recalled: "Wang Jie's alchemy is to use a stove to refine and let others blow the wind through the wall, probably because he does not want people to know the doorway here." The gold was actually made of iron. When it first came out, it was still black, and when it was more than a hundred taels, it was made into a gold cake. Each pie is divided into eight pieces. People often say 'crow gold', which refers to this. ”
Bi Sheng mentioned here is a forger, but this old forge Bi Sheng is not Bi Sheng who invented movable type printing. The old blacksmith was too old to be invented in the field of scientific research more than thirty years later. Moreover, the work of the forge is not directly related to engraving and printing. Wang Guowei may have been confused, and Julian and the Encyclopædia Britannica adopted Wang Guowei's point of view, and will be wrong.
In the record of "Mengxi Pen Talk", Bi Sheng invented the clay movable type typesetting printing, the technology is more complicated, the invention process is difficult, if he is a forger or engraver, shouldering the heavy responsibility of supporting the family, where is the time and spare money to engage in research? Even if it is invented, it is difficult to have any social impact.
In contrast, the setting of Bi Sheng's profession in the movie "Bi Sheng" is speculative, but it is not unreasonable. Bi Sheng's original motivation for inventing movable type printing was probably a defect in improving engraving printing technology. If you don't have the personal experience of publishing books and are not familiar with the technology of engraving and printing, how can you think of inventing movable type printing? From the perspective of the identity of the bookstore owner, the industry engaged in is directly related to the engraving of books, has sufficient financial strength and spare time, can mobilize engravers and printers to participate together, has a certain scale of production to transform the results of invention, and indeed has the practical need to carry out this scientific and technological research.
The Mengxi Pen Talk describes the principles of movable type printing
Regarding the principle of movable type printing developed by Bi Sheng, "Mengxi Pen Talk" made an account. Bi Sheng's method was to use glue clay to engrave the words. The thickness of the word is the same as the edge of the copper coin. Each word is made into a word mold, grilled with fire, and let it become hard. First, set up an iron plate, mixed with pine resin, wax, and paper ash, make a potion, and cover it. When you want to print, take an iron frame and put it on the iron plate, and then arrange the fonts in a dense way. Fill a frame with iron, act as a plate, and bake over a fire. When the above agent begins to melt, press it on the surface with a plate. As a result, the molds on the board were as flat as whetstones.
When printing, two iron plates are usually made, one is being printed and the other is a typeface; this one has just been printed, and the other is ready. The two pieces are used alternately to improve work efficiency. Each word has several character molds, such as "zhi" and "also", which are commonly used words, which often appear many times in a board, and generally have more than twenty word molds. When the font is not used, it is labeled with a slip of paper and sorted according to the rhyme. Strange words are baked as soon as they are encountered, and they can be made quickly.
Shen Kuo frankly said that if you print two or three copies, it is not as efficient as engraving, but if you want to print dozens of copies, or even hundreds of thousands, movable type printing is much faster than engraving printing.
Before inventing movable type printing, Bi Sheng was familiar with engraving printing. The engravings are all carved from wooden boards, but when Bi Sheng invented movable type printing, why did he use clay movable type instead of a simpler wooden movable type?
Shen Kuo explained it this way: Because the grain of the wood is sparse and dense, it will become uneven when it is wet. The mold of wooden movable type is easily adhered to the potion, and once it is lined up in the iron frame, it is not easy to take it off. Using mud to burn word molds, these problems are solved. After a typography is over, bake with fire to melt the potion, and then wipe it with your hand, and the mold will fall off on its own and will not be stained by the potion.
When "movable type" meets good times
Just as Bi Sheng could not invent movable type printing out of thin air, Shen Kuo could not understand Bi Sheng's scientific and technological achievements out of thin air. Although Shen Kuo did not mention his relationship with Bi Sheng in the Mengxi Pen Talk, nor did he pay attention to Bi Sheng's personal deeds, the relationship between the two of them was by no means just recorded and recorded.
Many experts speculate that Shen Kuo not only knows Bi Sheng, but also has a close relationship, perhaps the Bi family and the Shen family are relatives or close neighbors. After Bi Sheng's death, his movable type skills were acquired by Shen Kuo's nephew. This incident can also show that the relationship between Shen Kuo and Bi Sheng is not ordinary. At least, Bi Sheng has lived in Hangzhou for a long time, and Shen Kuo is a hangzhou native. Regardless of the relationship between the two, Shen Kuo was meritorious. Fortunately, he wrote this passage in "Mengxi Pen Talk", so that Bi Sheng's clay movable type printing technique could be passed on to future generations.
In 1965, Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, unearthed a Buddhist sutra entitled "Buddha's Sayings on the Immeasurable Life". Experts speculate that it is a movable type print in the second year of Chongning (1103) of the Northern Song Dynasty, and it is also the earliest movable type printed copy found so far. When it was published, Bi Sheng had been dead for half a century.
To be fair, the clay movable type invented by Bi Sheng, although it looks bulky and primitive, but the basic principle is similar to modern printing technology. Later, wooden movable type and copper movable type have been unveiled, so that the material selection surface of movable type printing is larger and the printing efficiency is higher. Therefore, the evaluation of Bi Sheng in the anecdote has two sentences: he is not only an innovator of engraving and printing, but also a pioneer of the invention of modern movable type printing.
However, Bi Sheng's technological innovations were not rapidly translated into the productive forces of the whole society, and at that time, some large works were still printed in engravings. Because clay movable type, as a new technology, is not mature enough. Many people are reluctant to pay for immature technology, but have returned to the era of "copying books".
Bi Sheng failed to gain the attention of the emperor and the pursuit of the scholar group, but continued to be unknown. After decades of silence, movable type printing has been transformed and gradually spread around the world. In the ancient Chinese map of science and technology, Bi Sheng has its historical positioning. He used his brain and hands to tell how a hard-working and intelligent common man left a name in history, he wrote history with a unique craftsman spirit, and he himself became a wave in this history. (This article is excerpted from "The Great Men of the Song Renzong Era")
Source: Yangcheng Evening News