By: Lia Contesso
Submitted: 2010-10-06 03:36:29 | Word Count: 508
Then, paper arrived. It was first heard about in 105, thanks to a description of a Chinese official, Ts’ai Lun, that in Chine is traditionally considered the inventor of paper. But in 1986 a grave full of paper dating back to the first half of the II century B.C. was discovered, thus anticipating the date attributed to the first fabrication of paper.
At first, for the production of paper they used the cortex of the paper mulberry, treated and filtered; for some centuries its production stayed an exclusive of China, until 610, when it started in Japan as well and, around 750, in central Asia. We will have to wait until 800 to see the paper fabrication start in Egypt; after, the Arabic populations finally brought it to Europe.
The first Italian paper-mill was instituted in Fabriano, and afterwards it spread in the whole central Europe: the following inventions, like the mobile characters press, made writing more and more easy and common; to see the first automatic press, though, we need to wait until 1798, when the French Nicholas-Louis Robert ideated it.
Since then, the paper production found cheaper and cheaper methods to reach the objective, till it arrived to the wood decortications and chemical paste, in the middle of the XIX century.
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Nowadays paper is used in the mot varied fields: though the first use we normally think of is writing, then we can think of the gifts or jewelleries papers, for example, and a quantity of other things in which paper is fundamental. Yet, the fact that for its production the wood is necessary, brings us to use it wisely and recycle any kind of paper, be them packaging, alimentary or any kind: all of the can be recycled, thus avoiding the felling of new trees for the production of new paper.
The uses of paper are many and the different kinds of paper are at least as many: for each use there’s a wide choice of different types of paper, thin (like for the shoes) or thick (think of the cardboards, or some papers for drawing), matt, shiny (some personalized papers or shops papers), rough (some kinds of papers used for writing), smooth, transparent or covering, everything for any need and taste. Some uses can even seem incredible: after the 1995 earthquake in Japan the Takatori Catholic Church has been built in cardboard, and then moved to Taiwan in 2006.
Though not considering the extreme usages like the architecture of a church, anyway paper is part of the everyday life of all of us: even though many paper sheets have been replaced by files, in the private life like in the job, paper remains anyway an irreplaceable material that, if kept with the due cares (its enemies are humidity, sun, dust and, of course, tears and folds) it can last for a long, long time.
Author Resource:-
This article was written by Lia Contesso, with support from carte paraffinate.
