Chapter 9 Section 2 Production Methods of Books

The production method of books, or called the production method of books, is the same as the production materials of books. It has gone through several different stages before and after, and the methods and methods have also been very different.The method of making books is not to use woodblock printing or movable type printing from the beginning.The emergence of printing technology has great epoch-making significance in the development of book history, so we should draw a line with the emergence of printed books, and describe the production methods of books in two paragraphs. The printing of books in our country started in the Tang Dynasty, developed in the Five Dynasties, flourished in the Song Dynasty, next to the Liao, Jin, and Xixia, and continued in the Yuan, Ming, and Qing Dynasties.But before the Tang Dynasty, the production methods of books in our country probably depended on the materials used to make books. There were different methods such as knife carving, casting, and pen writing.

The oracle bone inscriptions, one of the early books, can be seen from the existing oracle bone inscriptions, and the characters on them are all carved with knives.Why not carve it with a knife?It probably depends on the texture of the material.We know that bones have a certain hardness, but the ability to eat ink is not very strong. If you write with a pen, it may not be preserved for a long time, so you have to use a knife to carve it.There may be another reason for carving with a knife, and that is that the strokes carved with a knife are slender and well-proportioned.If you write with a pen, it is still a question of whether there are such thin pens at that time.A piece of tortoise shell or a piece of animal bone does not have much plane.After removing the divination cracks formed during divination, there is very little space left for writing. If the nib is a bit thick, it is impossible to write at all.This is probably one of the reasons for using knife engraving.The handwriting carved with a knife can not only last for a long time, but also have an even stroke, adapt to the only vacant plane of the oracle bone, and have a certain degree of hardness, so most of the oracle bone documents we see are carved with a knife.Some are very finely carved, like the oracle bones of the Western Zhou Dynasty unearthed in the Zhouyuan area of ​​Shaanxi, whose handwriting can only be seen clearly with a magnifying glass five times.

The inscriptions on the bronzes of the early book No. 2, as far as we know, have two forms of writing: one is a raised positive pattern, and the other is a concave negative pattern.The two textures are different, and the way they are made is also different.The recessed Yinwen characters are easier to understand, that is, on the pre-designed and manufactured bronzes, if you want to engrave documents or events on it, you can ask someone to engrave it at any time.It is much more convenient and free to use a knife to directly engrave Yinwen characters on bronze ware than to cast characters on bronze ware.Casting characters on bronze wares requires careful planning in advance.Some of them probably didn't want to be used as utensils when designing, but wanted to cast characters, focusing on the meaning of characters.For example, the punishment tripods cast by the states of Zheng and Jin were for the purpose of announcing laws and telling the whole country.The inscriptions on such bronze objects must be carefully considered when making casting molds.A document, an event, how many words there are in total, how to lay it out, and even the 锼 [sou search] 锓 [jian Jian] of each word must be carefully designed and produced.Moreover, the handwriting of the positive and negative patterns on the inner wall of the mold must be concave or convex inverse characters, and only the raised or concave positive or negative patterns are cast.This involves the question of how to get the reverse characters of Yin and Yang patterns on the inner wall of the mold.It is naturally the thinking of our modern people to write and paste double ticks on the front and then correct them.Whether the ancients did this is not certain.Based on the resemblance of commonly used imaginary characters in bronze inscriptions, some people in the archaeological circle speculate that the inverted Yin and Yang characters on the inner wall of the bronze casting mold may be extruded out of the positive and negative characters made in advance one by one.This kind of speculation is very bold. If this kind of speculation can be established, it shows that our ancestors knew the principle of making movable type long ago.Of course, this kind of movable type is not for typesetting and printing, but for casting bronze inscriptions.

The third type of early books is stone documents.Since the Zhou and Qin Dynasties in my country, there have been a vast number of stone documents carved and written in the form of jade pieces, stone pieces, stone drums, cliffs, steles, steles, and postcards.To sum up, as far as we know, there are only two ways to attach characters to stone materials: one is writing, and the other is carving with a knife.The writer can be found in Houma League Book. The letters of alliance unearthed in 1965 at the site of the Jin Kingdom in the late Spring and Autumn Period in Houma, Shanxi were all written in vermilion or ink on jade or stone flakes.Among them, the largest one is 32 cm long and 3.8 cm wide, with a regular shape on the top and bottom.Why this kind of letter of alliance should be written with a pen instead of engraved with a knife is not clear.Perhaps because Hou Ma's League Letter is a product of drastic social changes.In ancient China, when it was necessary to swear an alliance, it was always urgent and out of righteous indignation.And the alliance letter must be in duplicate, one is kept as evidence and hidden in the alliance mansion for inspection; the other is sunk at the bottom of the river or buried underground to show that it will never betray the alliance.The matter is urgent, and two more copies are required. It may not be suitable for cutting with a knife, so handwriting is used.But this is just speculation, not a scientific conclusion.Except for Hou Mameng's book, all stone documents handed down from generation to generation, including cliff carvings, steles, tablets, Confucian stone scriptures, Buddhist stone scriptures, and Taoist stone scriptures carved in the past dynasties, are all carved with knives.These stone documents carved with knives are different from Houma's alliance book, which must be hidden in the alliance mansion, and the other must be sunk at the bottom of the river or buried in the ground. Stone, exposed to wind and sun is a common occurrence.In this case, if you write on the stone with a pen instead of a knife, the handwriting will become blurred or even disappear after a long time or after being washed by rain.Therefore, most of the ancient stone documents were carved with knives.

With the development of books, especially with the appearance and development of regular books, the previous materials such as oracle bones, bronzes, jade, and stones no longer meet the needs, and bamboo and wood are widely used as materials for making books.This material is different from the oracle bones, bronzes, and stones of the past. How to attach characters to the bamboo and wood slips is a major issue in the production method of books.A large number of bamboo and wooden slips have been unearthed throughout the years, which proves that the bamboo and wooden slips are all written with pens.In the past, there was a so-called "knife and pen official", saying that bamboo and wood bamboo slips were carved with a knife, which is completely a misunderstanding.In fact, the knives, pens, ink, and inkstone must be prepared before writing on the bamboo slips.The functions of pen, ink and inkstone are self-evident and everyone knows it.There are only different opinions about the purpose of the knife in the past.One way of saying is that the knife is the pen, which is used to carve characters on the bamboo and wood slips.This has long been overturned by the facts.There is another saying that breaks down the purpose of the knife.We all know that present pupils, even including junior high school students, go to school every day, and in the pencil case they carry in their school bags, pencils, penknife and rubber must be included.The purpose is to erase the typo with an eraser when a typo is written, and then change it to the correct word.During the period when bamboo and wooden bamboo slips were in vogue, the reason why it was necessary to prepare knives, brushes, ink, and inkstones at the same time was that each had its own purpose.The use of the knife is similar to the eraser used by elementary and middle school students today.When a typo was written on the bamboo and wood slips, it was scraped off with a knife in time, and then the correct text was written.In the past, people interpreted the continuous reading of "knife and pen" as knife and pen, and then said that the bamboo and wood bamboo slips were carved with a knife, which is completely groundless.In fact, bamboo and wood bamboo slips are all written with pens.

While bamboo and wooden bamboo slips were popular, the silk in silk fabrics was also one of the materials for making books.Books made of this material cannot be cast or carved like oracle bones, bronzes, and jade, but can only be written with a pen.The reason is very simple. It is unimaginable to use a knife to carve characters on silk.Similarly, it is unimaginable to print words on silk like paper books printed in later generations.Therefore, silk scripts can only be written with a pen, and it is impossible to attach words to them by other methods.In fact, the silk scripts unearthed all the time are indeed written with a pen.

After paper replaced bamboo and wood slips and silk and became the common material for making books, it not only changed the disadvantages of heavy bamboo and wood slips and expensive silk, but also because paper was easier to ink than bamboo and wood slips and silk, so from the Eastern Han Dynasty to the Five Dynasties for thousands of years. For a long time, paper books were mostly copied with a pen.And because paper has special ink-absorbing ability and softness, it has taken on the task of printing books since the Tang Dynasty.The engraving and printing of books developed slowly over the five dynasties, and reached its peak in the Song Dynasty, marking an epoch-making change in the production method of books, and human civilization has also entered a new historical period.

my country's use of block printing to print books probably began in the Tang Dynasty.This can be confirmed no matter from literature records or physical preservation.However, the beginning of book printing does not mean that woodblock printing technology was invented in the Tang Dynasty. On the contrary, it means that this technology should have appeared before the Tang Dynasty.When the entire book can be printed, it should be a further development of this technology.But for a long time, Chinese and foreign ancient and modern scholars who participated in the discussion of the invention of Chinese woodblock printing have mostly demonstrated the invention of woodblock printing from the beginning of book printing. in conclusion.The earliest ones are the invention theory of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the invention theory of Xianhe (326-334 AD) in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the invention theory of the Six Dynasties (222-584 AD), the invention theory of the Sui Dynasty (581-617 AD), and the invention theory of the Tang Dynasty (618-906 AD). Year) invention theory; the later ones include the Five Dynasties (AD 907-959) invention theory, and the Northern Song Dynasty (AD 960-1126) invention theory.The era spans thousands of years.Some of these statements cannot be established due to insufficient evidence, and some of them are evidenced by extant objects, but they do not conform to the natural law of the development of things, so they cannot be established.Fortunately, we are not discussing the invention of printing here. What we pay attention to is that the use of this technology to produce books is an endless history in the Tang Dynasty.

In the Ming Dynasty, there was a historian named Shao Jingbang (1491-1565 A.D.), who wrote a historical work called "Hongjianlu".In the fourth and sixth volumes of "Hongjianlu", it is recorded that Tang Taizong Li Shimin's eldest grandson, the empress of Luoyang, died unfortunately at the age of 36. Tang Taizong was very sad.When the court ladies presented the 10 chapters of "Nv Ze" compiled by the empress during her lifetime to the emperor, Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty touched the things and sighed, "After reading this book, it will be handed down to future generations, so that Zi can practice it." The word "line" refers to engraving and printing.This is the earliest known record of printed books.Empress Changsun died in June of the tenth year of Zhenguan (AD 636), and the publication of "Nv Ze" should be in the second half of this year or a little later.It shows that in the first half of the 7th century, China already knew how to use woodblock printing to produce books.And the first books produced were by women.

Feng Zhi's "Yunxian Sanlu" records that "Xuanzang printed the statue of Samantabhadra on Huifeng paper and gave it to four people, and every year there was nothing left for five packs."We know that Tang Xuanzang set off to India to learn Buddhist scriptures in the third year of Zhenguan (629 AD), and returned to China in the 19th year of Zhenguan (645 AD), and it took 17 years before and after.In another 19 years, that is, the first year of Linde (664 AD), Tang Xuanzang passed away in Nirvana.Therefore, he used Huifeng paper to print the image of Samantabhadra Bodhisattva and gave it to the four congregations. It should be between the nineteenth year of Zhenguan when he returned to the country and the first year of Linde when he passed away.This happened just over 10 years after the engraving and printing of Empress Changsun's "Nv Zhe", which shows that in the first half of the 7th century, China not only knew how to engrave and print books, but also knew how to engrave and print Buddhist paintings.

Since then, there have been many records of engraved and printed almanacs, calligraphy books, rhyme books, anthologies, Taoist books, Yin and Yang miscellaneous notes and other books of the Tang Dynasty.There are not only one or two real objects handed down in the world.For example, in the ninth year of Emperor Yizong of Tang Dynasty (868 A.D.), Wang Jie (jie Jie) carved the "Diamond Sutra" for parents to pray for blessings, the almanac carved by Fan Shangjia in Xichuan Chengdu Prefecture, and the seal of Bian Jiayan in Longchifang, Chengdu County, Chengdu Prefecture. The Sanskrit "Dharani Sutras and Mantras" sold are all woodblock prints that still exist today.In particular, the "Diamond Sutra", which was taken away by Stein and is now stored in the Eastern Department of the British Library, can be said to be the earliest and most complete and quite mature printed matter in the world.It is made of seven sheets of paper glued together, with a total length of 15.2 feet and is intact.At the beginning of the volume, there is a painting of Shakyamuni Buddha sitting on a lotus pedestal, speaking to the elder Subhuti and other monks.The beauty is solemn and lifelike.The font of the scriptures is dignified and dignified, and the knife technique is steady.The printing paper is excellent and the ink color is pure.Simple and generous, pleasing to the eye.It shows that by the middle of the 9th century, my country's woodblock printing technology has entered a fairly mature period. After entering the Five Dynasties, the method of engraving and printing books was officially adopted by the government, and it was used to print Confucian classics.From the third year of Changxing in the Later Tang Dynasty (932 AD) to the third year of Guangshun in the Later Zhou Dynasty (953 AD), the four different dynasties in the Central Plains, Tang, Jin, Han, and Zhou, were successively established by Guozijian in 22 years. The collation and engraving of the "Nine Classics" were successfully completed.This is the first time that Confucian classics have been produced by engraving and printing.In other words, the first version of the Confucian classics was published by the Guozijian during the Five Dynasties period, and the name Jianben began here.At the same time, "Five Classics", "Nine Classics" and "Classic Interpretation" explaining Confucian classics were also engraved and printed successively.He Ning, a native of Xuchang, Yunzhou (now Dongping County, Shandong Province), ignored the criticism of others, presided over the engraving and printing of his own anthology, creating a precedent for "self-printed editions" in the history of edition studies.Wu Zhaoyi, the prime minister of Later Shu, not only presided over the engraving of the "Shu Stone Classic", but also presided over the engraving and printing of the "Nine Classics", and also asked his disciples Ju [gou Gou] Zhongzheng and Sun Fengji to preside over the engraving and printing of "Wen Xuan", "Beginners", "Bai Shi Liu Tie" and so on.More Buddhist scriptures and paintings were engraved and printed by local governments and folks, and some works of Taoism were also engraved and printed.The entire production method of books is on the eve of a comprehensive reform. After entering the Song Dynasty, woodblock printing became the mainstream method of book production.The number of engraved books in the Northern and Southern Song Dynasties, the wide range of engraving, the large scale, the wide circulation, and the fine print are all unprecedented and a model for future generations.From the central halls, courtyards, corridors, divisions, bureaus, and prisons, down to the local governments, prefectures, armies, and counties, the tea and salt divisions, appeasement divisions, criminal punishment divisions, transshipment divisions, ministerial warehouses, and schools in each prefecture , state school, military school, county house, county school, school palace, 頖〔pan hope〕 palace, school house, county school, county house, various academies, private houses, family schools, book sheds, bookstores, bookstores, books Temples, Taoist temples, ancestral halls, etc. all over the country competed to engrave books, forming an extensive book engraving network, which brought an unprecedented climax of book production.After the Song and Song Dynasties, through the Yuan, Ming, and Qing Dynasties, next to Liao, Jin, and Xixia, most books were produced by engraving and printing, leaving a very rich cultural classics for today. Printing books with engraving blocks has incomparable advantages over copying books by hand.As long as you engrave a set of plates, you can print as many as you want.But this kind of technology must be a set of plates for each kind of book, and each set of plates can only print one kind of book.It can only increase in number of parts, but cannot generate new ones in number of species.If you want to make a new one, you can only carve another set of plates.This is obviously costly and time-consuming.This inherent weakness was fully exposed when the engraving and printing of books in the Song Dynasty was fully developed.Can this weakness be overcome, so that it can save labor and cost, and can be arbitrarily regenerated?This was a new topic for book producers at that time.During the Qingli period of the Northern Song Dynasty (AD 1041-1048), commoner Bi Sheng successfully solved this problem with his genius and practice, which was the invention of movable type printing (Figure 5). Regarding Bi Sheng's invention of clay movable type printing calligraphy, Shen Kuo in the Northern Song Dynasty has detailed records in Volume 18 of his book "Mengxi Bi Tan".Shen Kuo said: Books printed on plates were not yet popular in the Tang Dynasty.Since King Fengying began to print the Five Classics, all the classics have been printed in black and white.In the Qing calendar, Bi Sheng, a commoner, was also a trap.The method is to engrave characters with clay, which is as thin as the lips of money.Each word is a seal, and the fire makes it strong.First set up an iron plate, and cover it with turpentine wax and paper ash.If you want to print, put an iron fan on the iron plate, which is densely covered with characters and prints, and the iron fan is a board.Hold it on the fire, and when the medicine is slightly melted, press the surface with a flat plate, and the characters will be as flat as a stone.If only three or two copies are printed, it will not be easy.If hundreds of thousands of copies are printed, it will be extremely fast.Two iron plates are often made, one plate is printed, and the other plate has already printed characters. After the printing is completed, the second plate is ready, and they can be used interchangeably.Each word has a number of seals, such as 'zhi', 'ye', etc., each word has more than 20 seals, in case there are repetitions in a board.If not in use, post it on paper, each rhyme is a post, and store it in a wooden grid.If there are odd characters that are unprepared, they can be engraved and burned with grass fire, and they can be completed in an instant.Those who do not use wood as their foundation will have density in art and science, but it will be uneven when exposed to water; it is not advisable to stick to medicine.It's not like burnt earth, after using it, fire it again, let the medicine melt, brush it with your hands, and the seal will fall off by itself, and it will not be stained.Sheng died, and his seal was obtained by the rest of the people, and it has been preserved to this day. This record clearly explains the making, typesetting, storage of commonly used characters, temporary production of raw characters, storage methods when not in use, and the reasons for not using wood to make characters.From this, we can realize that the clay movable type printing calligraphy invented by Bi Sheng, except for being slightly primitive and simple, almost all the basic principles related to modern typesetting and printing were available at that time.This is another major innovation in book production methods, flashing the earliest spark of modern book production methods, about 400 years before German Gutenberg printed books with movable type.It is a pity that there is no record of what books Bi Sheng typesetting with this kind of clay type.The real thing is no longer circulated.However, according to the principle of Bi Shengni movable typesetting and printing books, imitating clay movable type and using it to practice book printing is a generation.In the fourth year of Shaoxi in the Southern Song Dynasty (1193 A.D.), Zhou Bida imitated clay movable type in Tanzhou (Changsha, Hunan) according to the records in Shen Kuo's "Mengxi Bi Tan", and used it to print his own "Yutang Miscellaneous Notes". Eight things.This is the earliest known record of printing books with movable clay type.On the eve of the establishment of the Ding Ding in the Yuan Dynasty, Yao Shu, Kublai Khan’s advisor, taught his disciple Yang Gu in Hui County, Henan Province. According to Shen Kuo’s records, he also imitated clay movable type, and typesetting books such as "Primary School", "Jinsilu" and "Jingshi Lunshuo" , It is used to turn the people into customs and improve the cultural level of the people.Until the 10th year of Daoguang in the Qing Dynasty (AD 1830), Li Yao, a Suzhou native, still imitated clay movable type and used it to print books such as "Southern Xinjiang Interpretation and History Survey" and "Correcting and Supplementing Four Kinds of Jinshi Cases".In the twenty-fourth year of Daoguang (AD 1844), Zhai Jinsheng and his family in Jingxian County, Anhui Province, after 30 years of hard work, imitated more than 100,000 clay movable types, and used them to typeprint their own collection "Clay Plate Trial Printing First Edition" , genealogy "Shuidong Zhai Family Genealogy", and his friend Huang Juezi's collection "Xianping Bookstore First Collection" and other books. Inspired by the principle of clay movable type, wooden movable type, which was abandoned by Bi Sheng, was successfully trial-produced by Wang Zhen in the early Yuan Dynasty.At the same time, the wheel picking method was also created.Wang Zhen used the wooden movable type he created to typeset the "Jingde County Chronicles" which he presided over the compilation.20 years later than Wang Zhen, Ma Chengde, an official of Fenghua Prefecture, Zhejiang Province, also presided over the production of more than 100,000 wooden movable type during his tenure, and used it to print books such as "University Yanyi".At the same time, wooden movable type in minority languages ​​was also manufactured, such as Uighur and Xixia wooden movable type.Up to now, there are still Buddhist scriptures printed with wooden movable type in Western Xia Dynasty.The Xinjiang Museum, the Dunhuang Art Research Institute and the Chinese History Museum also have collections of Uighur wooden movable type.The Uyghur language is different from Chinese in that the letter composition of each phrase is different, and the length of the phrase is also different, so the length of the wooden movable type formed is also different.The typesetting technology of this kind of wooden movable type of different lengths is much more complicated than that of wooden movable type with Chinese characters of the same size.But at that time, the Uighurs, who were praised by Kublai Khan as divine and handsome, were able to solve such complex typesetting technical problems.This is a major contribution made by the ethnic minorities in China to the development of Chinese book history. By the Ming Dynasty, the areas where wooden movable type was used to print books had spread to Suzhou, Hangzhou, Nanjing, Fuzhou, Sichuan, Yunnan and other places.There are more than 100 kinds of books printed with wooden movable type in the Ming Dynasty.In the eleventh year of Chongzhen (1638 A.D.), due to the needs of the situation, the Dibao issued by the imperial court, also known as the Chaobao, was also typesetting with wooden movable type.This can be said to be the first of its kind for newspaper typography.In the Qing Dynasty, wooden movable type has been popular all over the country.From the inner government to the government offices at all levels, academies, bookstores, bookstores, etc., most of them have wooden movable type.Hebei, Shandong, Henan, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Sichuan, Fujian, Guangdong, Shaanxi, Gansu and other provinces have all printed books with wooden movable type.In the thirty-eighth year of Qianlong in the Qing Dynasty (AD 1773), he ordered the posthumous writings of the world to return the secret books of the inner government, collated and compiled the lost books found in "Yongle Dadian", and opened a library to compile "Siku Quanshu".It was originally planned to select those who are extremely rare and qualified for mirror examination, and to publish and circulate them first.But the project was too big, so he adopted Jin Jian's suggestion and engraved more than 250,000 wooden movable types of various sizes for printing the above-mentioned rare book.Emperor Qianlong thought it was indecent to call movable type, so he named it "Juzhen".And because this project was carried out in the Hall of Martial Arts, the books of the same specification printed with these batches of wooden movable type are called "The Hall of Martial Arts Collected Treasures Series", which contains a total of 134 kinds of books.This is the largest wood movable type book printing project in the history of our country. Metal movable type, including copper movable type, tin movable type, lead movable type, etc.Among them, copper movable type is widely used, and the earliest known book printing activity with copper movable type was at the end of the 15th century, that is, during the Hongzhi period of the Ming Dynasty.At that time, books printed with copper movable type appeared in Wuxi, Changzhou and Suzhou in Jiangsu.The most famous ones are Huajia and Anjia in Wuxi.In the third year of Hongzhi (1490 A.D.), Hua Sui printed 50 volumes of "Zouyi of Song Dynasty Officials" with copper movable type.Because copper characters are uncomfortable with ink, the ink color of the printed book leaves is extremely uneven, but it is the earliest existing book in my country that was typesetting with copper movable type, so it is very precious.It is known that Huasui has successively printed 15 kinds of books with copper movable type in the name of Huitongguan.Hua Sui's uncle, Hua Jue (Cheng Cheng), typesetting Lu You's "Weinan Anthology" and "Jiannan Poetry Draft" in the fifteenth year of Hongzhi (AD 1502).Hua Jian, Hua Sui's nephew, and Hua Jing, Hua Jian's son, also used copper movable type to typesetting "Cai Zhonglang Collection", "Bai Shi Anthology", "Yuan Shi Changqing Anthology" and so on.In addition to Fahrenheit in Wuxi, Anguo Guipo Museum also uses copper movable type to print books.Anguo, with the word Mintai, is a wealthy man in Wuxi, known as "An Million".There are more than 10 kinds of books that he typeset with copper movable type.Among them, Zhengde's "Dongguang County Chronicles" is the earliest local historical chronicles printed in copper movable type in China.In addition, Jianyang Bookseller in Fujian also typesetting Mozi with movable copper type.In the Qing Dynasty, Lin Chunqi, a native of Fujian, began to engrave copper movable type at the age of 18. It took 21 years and consumed 200,000 taels of silver to make more than 400,000 large and small copper movable types. Seven kinds of books, including Yin Lun, Shiben Yin and the military series "Secretary of Water and Land Offensive and Defensive Strategy".Of course, the largest scale is the "Integrated Ancient and Modern Books" printed in copper movable type in the fourth year of Yongzheng (AD 1726), with a total of 10,000 volumes and 40 volumes of catalogues.It is divided into six series with 32 codes and 6109 volumes.Rich in content and clearly distinguished, it is one of the famous large-scale books in my country.This copper movable type book printing activity constituted the largest metal movable type printing project in the history of our country. Tin movable type has been recorded in the writings of the people of the Yuan Dynasty, but it has not been practiced.In the 30th year of Daoguang in the Qing Dynasty (1850 A.D.), there was a bookseller surnamed Tang in Foshan Town, Guangdong Province, who invested 10,000 yuan to cast more than 200,000 tin movable type.And in the first year of Xianfeng (AD 1851), Ma Duanlin's "Ben Wen Tong Kao" 348 volumes were typesetting with this set of tin movable type.Lead movable type has been recorded by people in the Ming and Qing dynasties, but I don't know what books were printed. The use of movable type to print books appeared very early in our country, but its development was very slow.However, it is a new thing after all. It has incomparable superiority compared with engraving and printing books, and it represents the direction of the book production method. It also embarked on the common road of typography in the world.Today, new methods such as laser phototypesetting and computer printing continue to emerge, book production methods are facing a great revolution, and human civilization is about to enter a new historical period.