Become a feudal king from today

"Your Highness, I have found a way to prevent Your Highness from copying books in the future. Read"

Seeing Zhao Xu, Mi Wen said anxiously, as if he was afraid of being robbed of his credit.

Hearing this, Zhao Xu suddenly remembered that there was one thing he had yet to do.

But now that Mi Wen was present, he decided to listen to what Mi Wen had to say first.

"What can I do? Let me tell you." Zhao Xu sat down on the stone bench in the front yard. His feet were a little sore from running around.

"Your Highness, does he know that there is a printing method that engraves calligraphy and painting on a wooden board? Just carve the words in the book on a wooden board, and the wooden board can continuously print the words on the paper." Mi Wen's eyebrows were dancing.

Zhao Xurang was appointed as the head of the Propaganda Department, and he immediately got busy.

At this time, he discovered that the Publicity Department needed to post a lot of notices, and there would be a lot of repeated text.

If you copy it, it will take a lot of time.

Especially for the newspaper office mentioned by King Yan, if they copied page by page, they would not be able to deliver the newspaper in time the next day.

After thinking hard, he suddenly remembered that when he was in the capital, some dandy boys once said that erotic pictures were carved on wooden boards and then printed.

So he walked around Yancheng and found that there were indeed merchants doing this business.

Hearing this, Zhao Xu nodded slightly, "Yes, it seems that you have thought deeply about it. What you are talking about is called engraving printing. However, this kind of printing has great shortcomings. It is time-consuming and labor-intensive, and it is not easy to store a large number of books." It’s convenient, and the slogans need to be changed frequently. The engravings are useless after use. To put it simply, they are too rigid.”

After a pause, he said: "In two days, I will take you to see the real printing technique."

"Real printing?" Mi Wen was stunned.

Now, he could finally understand why the officials and generals of Yanzhou were like well-behaved students in front of King Yan.

Because King Yan is always reminding them how ignorant they are.

"Yes, Your Highness." Mi Wen suddenly became excited again.

Only by following King Yan like this can he learn a lot.

Mi Wen left, and Zhao Xu went to the study, wrote and drew on a piece of paper, and then sent it to the workshop.

On the morning of the third day, Mi Wen arrived as promised.

He waved to Mi Wen and took Mi Wen to the workshop.

Today's Fang District and Bingzhan Division have been completely separated.

The War Department is equivalent to a military factory, while the workshops are run by trading houses.

Anything for civilian use is developed here.

The printing technology Mi Wen mentioned was the craft he had forgotten.

When he arrived at the workshop, Zhao Xu met Yang He.

After bowing, Yang He said a few words in a smooth tone, and then led the two of them to a small room in the northeast corner.

At this moment, the craftsmen in the workshop are casting metal cube blocks one by one, and the standard font of Dasong Kingdom is engraved on these metal blocks.

This is the typeface of movable type printing that Zhao Xu wants to show Mi Wen.

Next, he will ask the trading company to build a new workshop in the workshop area.

This workshop will be handed over directly to Mi Wen’s Publicity Department.

However, this workshop will not use the old wooden molds and clay mold movable types, but will use more advanced type printing.

After all, the typefaces of original movable type printing were easily damaged and had a short service life.

This improved version of movable type printing originated in the contemporary fifteenth century.

Once launched, printers at the time made a lot of money.

Because type allows them to save materials and increase the speed of printing.

If his estimate is correct, type printing technology can allow a movable type plate to print five hundred sheets of paper every day, which is definitely enough for the current Propaganda Department.

Even with ten movable type workshops, five thousand newspapers could be printed in a day.

Mi Wen circled around the densely carved movable type.

Now he finally understood why King Yan said that the woodblock printing he taught was slow and very rigid.

At this moment, the scene in front of him would surprise anyone who saw it.

Craftsmen not only have a large number of typefaces on hand, but also come in various specifications.

Some fonts are large and some are small, so that characters of different sizes can be printed on the same piece of paper according to requirements.

"Your Highness, I am really ignorant. I didn't expect that there is such a magical printing technology in the world. In my opinion, this thing is good news for the poor people in the world!!" Mi Wen looked excited.

The readers of Dasong, like contemporary readers, are a little noble in their hearts.

Therefore, although he was surprised that King Yan could create so many weird things and earn a lot of money through trade.

I was impressed in my heart, but not in reverence.

But this movable type printing was different. He could see the great value of this printing technology.

With this, there is no need for scholars to copy books at all.

They would be able to have the ability to rub books in large numbers, thus making books cheap.

As a boy from a poor family, he experienced the hardship of not having money to buy books.

Zhao Xu smiled, and Mi Wen's reaction was not what he expected. He said, "I know what you mean, but if you want ordinary people in Yanzhou to afford books, in addition to printing, you also need to Something is missing."

"What is it?" Mi Wen suddenly became nervous, as if she was afraid that a beautiful dream would suddenly be shattered.

"This thing is paper. Without paper, how to print books? Paper is not cheap, and the price of books cannot be lowered either." Zhao Xu said.

In addition to printing technology and ink, printing also requires qualified paper.

While Zhao Xu asked Yang He to build a printing workshop, he did not neglect the construction of the papermaking workshop.

From ancient times to the present, the core of papermaking technology has basically remained the same.

The quality of paper produced by the ancients was equally good.

Rice paper is a unique skill in contemporary my country.

Therefore, the technology of papermaking is not the problem, the problem is how to improve the efficiency of papermaking.

Simply put, papermaking is divided into four papermaking processes: degumming, pulping, sheet making, and drying.

Degumming is to use steaming and soaking to fiberize the vegetation in the alkali solution.

The subsequent beating is to beat the fibers into paste. This process is the most complicated and labor-intensive.

The third step of paper making is to use a screen to scoop out the paper pulp and form a thin layer on the screen, which is wet paper.

Finally, just put these wet papers in the sun to dry.

Therefore, today, the craftsmen in the paper mill can only beat the grass and trees into pulp manually or by using animal power.

This is the biggest problem.

However, with the steam engine, the most laborious problem in the papermaking process would no longer be a problem.

When he asked Yang He to make movable type, he asked Yang He to buy a private papermaking mill.

At present, everything in the paper mill has been moved to the workshop area. In an independent workshop, paper is made according to the old method for the time being.

Once the steam engine arrived, the paper production capacity of this workshop would increase dramatically.

The foundation of education has been laid firmly.