Cai Lun was a eunuch during the Eastern Han Dynasty.
Xue Tao, a prostitute during the Tang Dynasty.
2 humble characters, stemming from the persistent pursuit of power or love, sprouted a powerful creativity.
One improved papermaking, and the other invented Xue Taoji. In different eras, the writing instruments that have come to the same destination have amazed China and even the world, adding a strong and colorful stroke in the world of human civilization.
The last suicide, a monk, can't tell the regrets of the world, but the blessings of the future generations.
01 The temptation of power gave birth to Cai Hou paper
Cai Lun is a child of an authentic farmer. At the age of 15, he entered the palace as a eunuch, from the small Yellow Gate, the Yellow Gate Waiter, the Zhongchang Waiter, the Shang Fang Ling, and the Longting Marquis, step by step, to the peak of power.
He went through 5 dynasties, created the miracle of eunuchs in the long river of history, improved the papermaking technique that benefited mankind, but ended in suicide, which made people lament.
Although Cai Lun's ancestors have been farmers for generations, he is extremely intelligent, diligent and studious, very self-motivated, and judges the hour and the situation, and works in power.
Emperor Zhang of the Eastern Han Dynasty was very ill at a young age, only 33 years old, when the former harem was divided into three factions and fought over the issue of heirs. Cai Lun stood out in this fight.
He and Empress Dowager Dou falsely accused Song Guiren of committing suicide on the grounds of "embracing evil and flattering the Way", and the crown prince was demoted to the position of King of Qinghe, forcing Liang Guiren to die, and inheriting her young son Liu Zhao. In this way, the other two opponents were easily defeated. Since then, Cai Lun has become a red person around Empress Dou.
After the death of Emperor Zhang of Han, Emperor He of Han ascended the throne. A few years later, Emperor He's Empress Yin was deposed due to witchcraft, and Deng Suigui was promoted to empress, and Cai Lun applied to appoint himself shangfang ling, following Empress Deng.
In order to satisfy Deng Hou's hobby of painting poetry, Cai Lun began his research. He made paper from bark, hemp heads, rags, and old nets, replacing the bulky bamboo and expensive silk.
Compared with Western Han paper, the material replaces hemp with bark, the cost is lower, and the pulp is made of grass ash water instead of lime water, and the paper is more flexible and popular, known as "Caihou paper". No one thought that the great invention of human beings, papermaking, had been successfully improved in this way.
But in the year after the papermaking, Cai Lun's fate changed dramatically. Because Han and Emperor died. Two years later, Empress Deng's younger son also died prematurely. The former crown prince's son Liu Hu (劉祜) became emperor, the Emperor an of Han, ascended to the throne. Liu Hu (劉祜) was the grandson of The Song Guiren, who was killed by Empress Dou.
In sensitive and difficult times, Cai Lun worked harder and harder to protect himself, and the good policies for governing the country were also continuously provided to Empress Deng, who was actually in power. In the crisis, Cai Lun once again created a miracle, was named the Marquis of Longting, and became a servant of Changle.
However, after Empress Deng returned to the west, Emperor An of Han pro-government, and asked Cai Lun to confront him against the court lieutenant for framing his grandmother. Instead of being humiliated, it was better to cut himself off, and in 121 AD, Cai Lun committed suicide by taking poison.
The history of mankind rolls forward, and the merits and demerits are left to posterity to comment, but Cai Lun's improvement of the craft of papermaking is a great contribution to the benefit of mankind.
02 Affectionate and inspiring, creating Xue Tao's note
The same amazing creativity was also born in Xue Tao, a prostitute in the Middle Tang Dynasty. Xue Tao's father, Xue Yun, was a Sichuan official. After his father's death, Xue Tao became a prostitute due to the compulsion of life.
She is beautiful as a flower, full of talent, proficient in rhyme, especially good at poetry. Together with Li Jilan, Liu Caichun and Yu Xuanji, she is known as the four outstanding female poets of the Tang Dynasty.
At the age of 42, Xue Tao encountered Yuan Shu, who was less than 30 years old, like a moth to a fire, Xue Tao ran to Yuan Shu and fell in love. More than a year later, Yuan Shu left.
In 821 of the first year of Changqing, because Yuan Shu was appointed as Tongzhou, Xue Tao sent a self-created crimson note, the famous Xue Tao note, which became the inscription of this fruitless love.
Xue Tao's notes occupy an important position in the history of China's note-making.
According to legend, Xue Tao used the water of Chengdu Huanhua Creek, the skin of the wood hibiscus, and the juice of the hibiscus flower as raw materials, pounded the petals into mud and then added water to extract the dye, added the gum, smeared on the paper, used the absorbent hemp paper with the color sticker paper, and then sprinkled the small petals on the small note to make a color note.
Compared with the dull yellow paper at that time, the color and pattern of the small note are more delicate and bright, and it is sought after by the world.
Unfortunately, no matter how much thought is finally put into the East Water, Yuan Lang is sentimental and unkind, he wrote "Send to Xue Tao" for Xue Tao, and also wrote "Gift to Liu Caichun" for Liu Caichun.
Xue Tao looked forward to it and thought about it, but Yuan Shu was merciful everywhere and never returned to Xue Tao's side. Like the fate of the other 2 of the four talented women in the Tang Dynasty, Xue Tao changed her red dress and changed her robe and never married.
That page of the book, the people in the book are sentimental and thoughtful, and the outsiders are more tearful and regretful, after all, it is the old time in the world, the smoke and ink of that year.