A sweeping, richly detailed history that tells the fascinating story of how paper—the simple Chinese invention of two thousand years ago—wrapped itself around our world, humankind’s most momentous ideas imprinted on its surface.             The emergence of paper in the imperial court of Han China brought about a revolution in the transmission of knowledge and ideas, allowing religions, philosophies and propaganda to spread with ever greater ease. The first writing surface sufficiently cheap, portable and printable for books, pamphlets and journals to be mass-produced and distributed widely, paper opened the way for an unprecedented, ongoing dialogue between individuals and between communities across continents, oceans and time.             The Paper Trail explores how the new substance was used to solidify social and political systems that influenced China even into our own time. We see how paper made possible the spread of the then new religions of Buddhism and Manichaeism into Japan, Korea and Vietnam . . . how it enabled theologians, scientists and artists to build the vast and signally intellectual empire of the Abbasid Caliphate and embed the Koran in popular culture . . . how paper was carried along the Silk Road by merchants and missionaries, finally reaching Europe in the late thirteenth century . . . and how, once established in Europe, along with the printing press, paper played an essential role in the three great foundations of Western modernity: the Renaissance, the Reformation and the Scientific Revolution.             Here is a dramatic, comprehensively researched, vividly written story populated by holy men and scholars, warriors and poets, rulers and ordinary men and women—an essential story brilliantly told in this luminous work of history.

Product Description: Paper is older than the printing press, and even in its unprinted state it was the great network medium behind the emergence of modern civilization. In the shape of bills, banknotes and accounting books it was indispensible to the economy...read more

Product Description: Paper is older than the printing press, and even in its unprinted state it was the great network medium behind the emergence of modern civilization. In the shape of bills, banknotes and accounting books it was indispensible to the economy...read more

Product Description: Let us suppose for a moment that paper were to disappear.Would anything be lost?Everything would be lost.Paper surrounds us. Not only as books, letters and diaries, but as beer mats and birth certificates, board games and business cards, fireworks and flypaper, photographs and playing cards, tickets and tea bags...read more

Product Description: In this cultural history of paper, acclaimed paper artist Therese Weber travels to the few remaining places where traditional methods of papermaking have been preserved.

Explains how to craft handmade paper accented with silk, flowers, natural fibers, feathers, and embossed watermarks for use as unique stationary, giftwrap, and writing paper

Product Description: The Billionaire's Bargain (The Wedding Auction) [Oct 01, 2002] Mackenzie, Myrna; Romance

Product Description: First trade edition. Reproduced from the letterpress edition printed by Steve Miller. Cathleen Baker has written an extraordinary eloquent, poignant and intelligent work. In doing so, she has captured the essence of Dard Hunter, his world, and his vision...read more

Traces the history and development of papermaking, featuring entertaining anecdotes and trivia about the diverse processes and their inventors from ancient times to the present