2. Chinese make paper from rags The origins of chih (Chinese word for paper) begin in ancient China. The Chinese developed a written character based language in 2700 BC. They wrote on strips of wood and bamboo. The wooden blocks and flattened bamboo took up much space and were difficult to store.  105

3. Chinese invent printing by inking carved wood blocks With the inventions of paper and ink, stamper gradually became popular during the Jin Dynasty (265- 420), which was the early form of Carved Type Printing. Block Printing first appeared in the Tang Dynasty (618-907). The text was first written on a piece of thin paper, then glued face down onto a wooden plate. The characters were carved out to make a wood- block printing plate, which was used to print the text. Wood-block printing took a long time as a new block had to be carved for every page in a book.  450