A word, write with a pen, but in the blink of an eye. But if you carve with a knife, the best carver, do your best for a day, and you can't engrave a hundred words. Just comparing efficiency, pen writing is better than knife carving. However, the sages chose the method of carving the ink with the knife to inherit the classics, which seemed to take a hundred times the effort, and the result was only one word, but in fact it fully reflected the wisdom of sharpening the knife and cutting wood.
Seeing all things, who can avoid the washing of time. If there is no engraving printing, only handwriting, even if you copy thousands of words a day, a lifetime of hard work, how many books can you have? And how many years can the book be circulated? What's more, there are inevitably a thousand strange typos and omissions in the copy! The engraving layout does require a lot of labor and materials in the early stage, but once the engraving is completed, once it is printed, it is ten million times more efficient than hand-copying.
In the history of human civilization, as the only ancient civilization with uninterrupted cultural traditions, China has recorded almost all the important events and cultural forms that have occurred in history in history. The reason for this is that a perfect and unified language is an important foundation. Papermaking and printing, known as the four great inventions, as well as the printing and publishing industries developed thereby, play a decisive role in the use, preservation and accumulation of classic culture with words as the carrier. If there is no engraving printing, only a limited number of manuscripts, how can my Chinese Huanghuang classics be widely distributed; If there is no engraving printing, how will it open up the wisdom of the people and inherit the Taoist system of China for hundreds of generations; If there is no engraving printing, how can it continue to praise the loyal martyrs and degrade the traitors for thousands of years.
Shen Kuo said in "Mengxi Writings": "The Tang people have not yet flourished in printing books. In the fourth year of Song Kaibao (971), Song Taizu Gaopin and Zhang Congxin went to Yizhou (now Chengdu) to engrave all 5,048 volumes of the "Tripitaka Sutra", with 130,000 engravings, and thirteen years later in the eighth year of Taizong's Taiping Rejuvenation (983) edition was completed. As a result, engraving printing developed to its heyday, freeing a large amount of manual labor from boring copying.
If you observe the complete process of engraving printing, I believe it is not difficult for you to see that it integrates the steps of proofing, proofreading, engraving, brushing, and binding, which can be subdivided into dozens of processes. Such a complex inheritance technique first reflects the harmonious regularity.
(1) The harmony and beauty of engraving printing
If we say that the cultural development of about 3,000 years since ancient times has created the indispensable prerequisites for the invention of printing, such as standardized writing, engraving technology, and graphic transfer. In the Sui and Tang dynasties, under the social atmosphere of national unification, political enlightenment and cultural prosperity, people had a large demand for books, and engraving printing was about to emerge.
In the middle and late Tang Dynasty, engraving plates were commonly used to print Buddha statues, mantras, vows and almanacs. The earliest surviving dated engraving print is the Diamond Sutra (stolen from Dunhuang by the British, now in the British Museum) printed in the ninth year of the reign of Emperor Yizong of the Tang Dynasty (868). In the fourth year of Tang Changqing (824), Yuan Zhi wrote a preface to Bai Juyi's poetry collection, saying: "... Cowboys and horses are all talking. As for the writing of the mold, it is sold in the market...""The mold" is "molding". It can be seen that by the beginning of the ninth century, the application of printing had expanded from Buddhist mantras to poetry that the people liked to read.
During the Five Dynasties period, not only the people were prevalent in engraving, but the government also printed Confucian books on a large scale. It is a pity that these scriptures have gone through many "book misfortunes", and finally it is difficult to survive. In the Song Dynasty, engraving printing was more developed and the technology was perfected. The Song edition of the book, which is finely calibrated, well-engraved and printed with excellent paper and ink, shows the Song people's pursuit of the ultimate aesthetic - integrating elements such as symmetry, proportion, and color matching into the layout, layout, font, binding and other links, and the ubiquitous artistic connotation, interpreting the perfect harmony of internal rhyme and appearance. Later generations have never forgotten the Song edition, so that it has won the name of "one page of the Song edition, one or two gold", and has been regarded as an unprecedented model of the book by literati and collectors throughout the ages. To the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, the official carving, the family carving, the workshop carving reflect each other, flourish in the world, the engraved books, incalculable, throughout the scriptures, history, children, set four parts.
As one of the most important technological inventions of the ancient Chinese, engraving printing embodies several excellent traditional crafts such as papermaking, ink making, engraving, and copying. It pioneered information reproduction technology and provided the most convenient method for cultural dissemination and civilization exchange.
(2) The beauty of hand-written samples
Writing is the first process of engraving, which is transcribed on rice paper by a good calligrapher with a brush, mainly in Kai and Song. The early works of Chinese engraving, from the Tang Dynasty, the Song Dynasty, the Yuan Dynasty, and the early Ming Dynasty, are all italicized inscriptions. It was not until Ming Zhengde and Jiajing that the "Song characters" appeared. Its writing technique follows the six-stroke song recipe passed down from master to apprentice through the ages: "Horizontal, vertical, dotted like melon seeds, skimmed like a knife, hooked like a soap thorn, and pinched like a spade." ”
The reason why the Song version of the book has become a classic is not only because of its age and scarce stock, but also because its font is dignified and generous, and the rhyme between the characters is smooth, and the compilation of the whole text is in the same vein as the calligraphy art of the Song Dynasty. In the late Song Dynasty, in the long-term running-in and exploration, the writers and engravers gradually summed up some experience and skills, revealing the characteristics of italic industrialization in the form of strokes, that is, the "transitional imitation of Song style" from italics to Song style. Thus was born the Song Dynasty printing style, which is not deliberate, immature place to leave a simple and natural charm, compared with the later generations of mature imitation Song style, obviously more natural, let people read refreshing, and then love it. Its end is clean and neat, square and sparse; Its dense places are slender and linked, dynamic and fluent; Its ancient clumsiness is thin and hard and steady, and it has a rhyme; Its elegance is beautiful and charming, and the cloth is appropriate; Its chic place is coherent and uningenious.
Clear the canal to revitalize the water, and modern font design should be traced back to the source. Exploring the most beautiful cultural essence from ancient fonts is also the tacit consensus of contemporary designers. In the true sense of the past, it is necessary to absorb the nutrition of traditional engravings and explore the inspiration of calligraphy art.
(3) The woodcarving knife is exquisite
If the carving workshop has strong financial resources and can invite a famous writer to handwrite the plate, this kind of overall writing and one-way layout has a flowing calligraphy charm. That is, the so-called "writing engraving" is a fine product in the ancient book engraving, which makes people have a volume in their hands, and it is comfortable and pleasing to the eye.
The engraving process is the core of the entire engraving printing technology, and the process is a bit like carving a seal, but there are more words engraved. The engraver pastes the neatly copied manuscript on a smooth wooden board of a certain thickness, and the thin and almost transparent manuscript paper is attached to the front of the board, and the characters become inverted, and the strokes are clearly legible. This is where the heads of carving knives of different shapes and sizes come in handy. The essentials of engraving are to first carve a thin line next to the perimeter of each handwriting, which is called "hair knife" in the jargon. Then the part that needs to be blank in the middle of the inner and outer lines is shoveled out, and this kind of unpleasant engraving is called "picking a knife". The carved characters should protrude about 1/8 inch, and then use a chisel with a semi-circular blade to dig out all the excess parts, which is called "punching". After the initial engraving, it is necessary to use a small straight-edged carving knife to trim carefully, so that the line pattern of the relief is clear and eye-catching, which is called "pulling the line". Finally, the extra part is planed along the sidebar around the plate, so that the whole engraving process is completed.
In the process of engraving the plate, it is generally proofread four times. The first two were on paper, and the last two were on the plate. If there is a mistake on the plate, or if a line is accidentally broken, it can be repaired. For minor mistakes, a chiseled blade is used to dig a groove and a small piece of wedge-shaped wood is gently inserted. If there is a mistake in a large area, it is necessary to dig it out and insert it into a block of the same size, and the block that is replaced afterwards must first polish the surface and then re-engrave.
Every excellent carving master has to pay hard sweat to practice difficult knife skills; You have to go through the tempering of time to master the rhythm of your heart; Only in this way can we practice the top secret skills of "engraving rivers and lakes".
(4) The beauty of the board brush
The actual operation procedure of "brushing first and then printing" in the printing process lets people know that the actual meaning of the word "printing" in Chinese should be "brushing", so the protection and inheritance of this set of traditional crafts has its specific and micro cultural significance.
Engraving printing began with monochrome printing, but in the fifth dynasty, some people used pens to add different colors to the outline of illustration ink printing to increase the visual effect. In the sixth year of Yuan to Yuan (1340), Gangneung Zifu Temple engraved the unheard monk Diamond Sutra annotation, the scriptures are red, and the annotation is black, which is the earliest color printing in the existing ancient books.
Around the thirty-third year of Wanli in the Ming Dynasty (1602-1606), Huizhou had the technique of splitting and setting plates. That is, different colors are overprinted with different editions, that is, they are divided into editions and colors. In the sixth year of the Apocalypse (1626), Wu Faxiang, a native of Jiangning, engraved a color overprint of "Luo Xuan Becomes an Ancient Notebook" in Nanjing. This technique is based on the color of the original color painting, through sketching and edition, one or several colors are carved on several small plates, and then in accordance with the principle of "from light to dark, from light to thick", color by color, and finally complete the work. This kind of color separation printing plate is similar to "gluttony" (i.e., stacking food on a plate), so the Ming Dynasty called this printing method "饾版" printing.
Zheng Zhenduo's "Preface to the Reprint of the Ten Bamboo Zhai Notes" once commented that the engraving printing "is as quiet as the bright water of the sunset, or as clear and open as the clear autumn sky, or as beautiful as the small scenery of the fist stone in the cloud forest, or delicate and delicate like the decoration of heavenly architecture, elegant and far-reaching, gentle and generous, expressing reality or inadequacy, and with the characteristics of classical beauty." The emergence of block printing has raised the ancient printing technology of the mainland to a new level, and is known as the "miracle work" of block printing.
(5) The elegance of the signed envelope
As the last step of engraving printing, the binding part involves the most steps. This is because the structure of traditional thread-bound books is very complex, and just recognizing the complicated names such as book jackets, bookmarks, covers, covers, title pages, lining pages, book brains, book backs, book roots, book corners, etc., is enough to make laymen dizzy. Moreover, in addition to the most common thread-bound books, in the history of printing, there are a variety of binding methods such as scroll binding, warp folding, whirlwind binding, butterfly binding, and bag back binding, all of which were popular for a while.
The familiar thread-bound books began in the Song Dynasty, prevailed in the middle of the Ming Dynasty, and flourished in the early Qing Dynasty. This form of binding, easy to read, not easy to break, in the mainland book traditional binding technology is the most progressive, so it has been popular for hundreds of years. Nowadays, "thread-bound books" have become another name for ancient books in mainland China. On its source, it is developed from the end of the Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty prevailing bag back, so the folding method is the same as the bag back, the heart of the edition is also outward, and there are holes in the book brain and add paper twist to fix, the book jacket has a ring cylinder, and the buckle skin type two categories, the book clothes are folded into the same size as the page, a book coat is placed before and after, and the book is sewn into a book with two silk threads on the book brain. After this operation, the book has taken shape, with a vertical inscription affixed to the upper left corner of the navy blue cover, and the title and volume of the book written on it to identify the book. This sign is the head of the ancient book thread-bound book, the ancients have always attached great importance to it, all written with a brush, and even more in pursuit of the exquisite elegance of the art of calligraphy, it is to invite celebrities and famous artists to write, which is enough to entertain people.
As the saying goes: A book has a garment, just as a person has a garment. Ancient books are generally stored in envelopes after they are completed, which not only ensures the life of the books, but also provides convenience for arranging shelves. According to the traditional viewing habits, the green cloth or brocade silk letter cover is very compatible with the ancient books, one is simple, one is elegant, and it is unique and reflects each other.
At this point, a quiet and elegant atmosphere quietly emanates from between the pages, flipping through the paper, warm and fragrant, such as the fragrance of the orchid, such as the light of the tea, such as the clothes of the flowing clouds, such as the piano of the aftertaste, and mellow for a long time. From the beginning of the eyes, to the gradual deep heart, pleased with the form and nourished by God. Both opening the volume is beneficial, but the volume sighs: spring is at the end of the pen, and art is in the engraving! Looking back at the ingenuity, engraving and printing has been working for a long time: template, delicate and clear; Writing samples, round and well; On the board, the words are clear and wonderful; Engraving, handsome and meticulous; Printing, all in one go. It really is: a set of engravings, thousands of scrolls, illuminating the road of knowledge and cultivating the temperament of the times.
We used to be in a hurry, only looking for the direction of the future, but gradually leaving the past far away. Fortunately, today you can still see this carved text through the ages, horizontal, vertical, hook, mention, point, fold, apostrophe, pinch, each stroke is chrome carved the bones of Han culture, they will be scattered in the long river of time in the pearl and jade gathering, a long 5,000-year-old civilization, brilliant Chinese culture.
About author:Zhang Ming is the deputy secretary-general of Yangzhou Literary and Art Critics Association, working for an electric power company.
Welcome to join the Rare Books Learning and Exchange Community