Why Did It Take So Long For Paper To Be Widely Used For Writing?

Something that baffles me is paper was discovered in China in the 2nd century BCE. While it was used for wrapping, it wasn't widely used for writing until, apparently, the 2nd or 3rd centuries CE. Then it took until the 7th century for it to spread to India, and until the 12th century for India to use it for writing. This is more confusing when you consider it was used for writing as early as the 9th century in the Islamic world. The Europeans seemed to have adopted it for writing the fastest after it arrived in Europe in the 11th century.

Which all begs the question...why? Why did it a.) take so long for paper to diffuse from China to the rest of Eurasia, and b.) take so long for China and India to use paper for writing after discovering it, given its obvious superiority in this regard when compared to, say, papyrus or parchment or other material to write on?
 

Deleted member 97083

It was very expensive to produce back then, and didn't last as long as papyrus or parchment.
 

PhilippeO

Banned
My guess is

1) rags based paper is fairly expensive tech, so it cannot 'breakthrough' market that already saturated with other method of writing (parchment, etc)
2) very few people know writing, only scribe-priest or scribe-bureaucrats so conservatism predominant, any change would be resisted.
3) Ink, changing writing implement would also means change of ink, and changing of writing implement, so for change ink-writing surface-writing implement must change near simultaneously. otherwise change its not cost-effective. so its hinder change.
 
An issue was that it came to Europe through India and the Middle East. The trouble is, the trees in the Middle East weren't as well suited for pulp as they were in China or Europe, so the craft spread slowly.
 
How necessary did they find it for their records to survive more than a century or two?
keep in mind, some of those records would've been holy texts and royal decrees, stuff that they want to last for a long time as opposed to the 2nd century BC equivalent of "where r u?" text messages

just for the record, i'd also like the point out clay tablets, the original writing medium. no idea how expensive they'd be but they're definitely some of the longest-lasting considering they're how we know about the Epic of Gilgamesh
 
Most of the oracle bones are associated with ritual divination; you don't want to mess with the ritual, or else you might get the wrong answer.

Before printing came along, making a book was such a time-intensive and expensive process that you wanted it to last a long time. And while rag paper was cheaper than parchment, it was still far more expensive than the pulp paper we use today (which is made with a process that wasn't developed until the mid-19th century).
 
Another theory I found was that the Chinese were very protective of their methods. So while their neighbors were familiar with Chinese paper, they could not figure out how to make it.
 
Another theory I found was that the Chinese were very protective of their methods. So while their neighbors were familiar with Chinese paper, they could not figure out how to make it.

That makes sense when one considers the lengths the Chinese went to protect their silk-industry and the efforts that Byzantine monks went to in order to smuggle out silkworms and mulberry shrubs back to the Byzantine-empire.
 
Last edited:
Top