1 00:00:05,720 --> 00:00:07,960 Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name 2 00:00:08,000 --> 00:00:11,240 Speaker 1: is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and it's Saturday. 3 00:00:11,280 --> 00:00:13,320 Speaker 1: Time to go into the vault for a classic episode 4 00:00:13,320 --> 00:00:15,920 Speaker 1: of the show. This one is part two of our 5 00:00:15,960 --> 00:00:19,320 Speaker 1: series on the invention of the book. It originally aired. 6 00:00:19,440 --> 00:00:23,799 Speaker 1: May I say let's get right into chapter well, I 7 00:00:23,800 --> 00:00:30,320 Speaker 1: would say chapter one, Volume two, Chapter one. Welcome to 8 00:00:30,360 --> 00:00:33,480 Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind, production of My Heart Radio. 9 00:00:39,720 --> 00:00:41,600 Speaker 1: Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My 10 00:00:41,680 --> 00:00:44,760 Speaker 1: name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and we're 11 00:00:44,800 --> 00:00:47,440 Speaker 1: back with part two of our talk about the invention 12 00:00:47,640 --> 00:00:49,760 Speaker 1: of the book. Now, if you didn't listen to the 13 00:00:49,840 --> 00:00:52,159 Speaker 1: last episode, you should probably go back and listen to 14 00:00:52,200 --> 00:00:54,360 Speaker 1: that one first. That was the Invention of the Book 15 00:00:54,440 --> 00:00:58,480 Speaker 1: Part one, where we talked about what constitutes a book conceptually, 16 00:00:58,680 --> 00:01:01,160 Speaker 1: what are the earliest things that might be thought of 17 00:01:01,200 --> 00:01:04,520 Speaker 1: to count as a book in the archaeological record. We 18 00:01:04,560 --> 00:01:08,360 Speaker 1: talked about various materials on which ancient writings were printed, 19 00:01:08,600 --> 00:01:12,640 Speaker 1: you know, from hard surfaces and steals into things like 20 00:01:12,959 --> 00:01:16,960 Speaker 1: papyrus and and parchment and vellum. But today we wanted 21 00:01:17,000 --> 00:01:18,720 Speaker 1: to come back and talk a little bit more about 22 00:01:18,760 --> 00:01:21,399 Speaker 1: the overall form of books, and I thought a great 23 00:01:21,400 --> 00:01:23,880 Speaker 1: place to start with here would be one of the 24 00:01:23,920 --> 00:01:27,360 Speaker 1: most significant transitions in the history of books, and that 25 00:01:27,480 --> 00:01:31,880 Speaker 1: is the transition between the scroll and the codex. And 26 00:01:32,400 --> 00:01:34,320 Speaker 1: just to put you in the right frame of mind 27 00:01:34,360 --> 00:01:36,760 Speaker 1: for this, have you ever thought about how, once upon 28 00:01:36,760 --> 00:01:40,920 Speaker 1: a time you had to rewind books? Oh? Absolutely, when 29 00:01:40,920 --> 00:01:44,720 Speaker 1: you think about the way a scroll works, and indeed 30 00:01:44,720 --> 00:01:49,120 Speaker 1: how you know some electronic versions of documents work as well, 31 00:01:49,120 --> 00:01:51,960 Speaker 1: where you want is scrolling through the document. Uh. It 32 00:01:52,200 --> 00:01:54,120 Speaker 1: is like very much like say that the ribbon in 33 00:01:54,160 --> 00:01:56,640 Speaker 1: a VCR tape. It is a thing that has a 34 00:01:56,680 --> 00:01:59,440 Speaker 1: beginning in an end and uh, and if you were 35 00:01:59,480 --> 00:02:01,200 Speaker 1: to jump round in it, you were going to have 36 00:02:01,200 --> 00:02:04,000 Speaker 1: to scroll through it. You know. I know there must 37 00:02:04,080 --> 00:02:07,160 Speaker 1: be some writing attesting to this in the ancient world. 38 00:02:07,200 --> 00:02:09,760 Speaker 1: But I just wonder if you had, like an ancient library, 39 00:02:10,080 --> 00:02:13,280 Speaker 1: did you have the like the video store problem of 40 00:02:13,320 --> 00:02:15,959 Speaker 1: the person who checked out the scroll before you didn't 41 00:02:15,960 --> 00:02:18,280 Speaker 1: rewind it and you have to take it back from 42 00:02:18,320 --> 00:02:21,240 Speaker 1: the end to the beginning, Yeah, or those like poorly 43 00:02:21,320 --> 00:02:24,720 Speaker 1: wound or something. Yeah. I mean, I guess it's always 44 00:02:24,720 --> 00:02:28,520 Speaker 1: the case with with books and books are are precious objects, 45 00:02:28,520 --> 00:02:31,160 Speaker 1: and then we're even more precious in the past book scrolls, 46 00:02:31,200 --> 00:02:34,480 Speaker 1: whatever you know, you want to refer to this compiled 47 00:02:35,200 --> 00:02:39,000 Speaker 1: form of written knowledge. And yeah, it's something that's communal 48 00:02:39,040 --> 00:02:42,359 Speaker 1: in nature. You don't want the person before you mistreating it, right. So, 49 00:02:42,360 --> 00:02:45,080 Speaker 1: so this world where you had to rewind books, this 50 00:02:45,160 --> 00:02:47,440 Speaker 1: was of course the world of the scroll, which was 51 00:02:47,520 --> 00:02:51,040 Speaker 1: the most prominent physical form of the book throughout you know, 52 00:02:51,120 --> 00:02:55,760 Speaker 1: much of the Mediterranean World, North Africa, Europe, the Middle East, UM. 53 00:02:55,800 --> 00:02:58,760 Speaker 1: And unlike the codex model that we're familiar with today. 54 00:02:58,840 --> 00:03:01,440 Speaker 1: Remember again the codex basically like the books we know 55 00:03:01,600 --> 00:03:04,600 Speaker 1: today where there uh, there's a spine where the pages 56 00:03:04,639 --> 00:03:07,080 Speaker 1: are attached and you can leave through the pages to 57 00:03:07,120 --> 00:03:11,160 Speaker 1: read the text. Uh. The scroll was essentially one really 58 00:03:11,280 --> 00:03:16,320 Speaker 1: long page that was made by attaching successive sheets of material, 59 00:03:16,560 --> 00:03:20,640 Speaker 1: usually would be papyrus or parchment in to end with 60 00:03:20,680 --> 00:03:23,640 Speaker 1: either glue or with stitching. You could sew them together. 61 00:03:24,160 --> 00:03:26,120 Speaker 1: And then to read a scroll, of course, as you 62 00:03:26,160 --> 00:03:28,840 Speaker 1: would make your way through, you would unroll the the 63 00:03:29,000 --> 00:03:32,560 Speaker 1: long sheet from from a from a winding stick on 64 00:03:32,560 --> 00:03:34,320 Speaker 1: one end, and then you would roll it up on 65 00:03:34,360 --> 00:03:37,640 Speaker 1: the other one, and a scroll could unravel either vertically 66 00:03:37,760 --> 00:03:40,080 Speaker 1: or horizontally. In the direction of the rolling for a 67 00:03:40,120 --> 00:03:43,720 Speaker 1: particular document often depended on what language was being written, 68 00:03:44,080 --> 00:03:49,040 Speaker 1: like was the script naturally oriented vertically or horizontally. Last time, 69 00:03:49,120 --> 00:03:52,360 Speaker 1: in the previous episode, I mentioned the book the book 70 00:03:52,440 --> 00:03:55,120 Speaker 1: The Life Story of a Technology by Nicole Howard, which 71 00:03:55,160 --> 00:03:57,880 Speaker 1: we were using as one of our references, and Howard 72 00:03:58,000 --> 00:04:02,520 Speaker 1: draws attention to a number of basic practical limitations of 73 00:04:02,520 --> 00:04:05,120 Speaker 1: the scroll, some of which I had never considered before, 74 00:04:05,160 --> 00:04:07,960 Speaker 1: but I thought these were really interesting in helping us 75 00:04:08,040 --> 00:04:10,760 Speaker 1: think about what would cause the transition from the scroll 76 00:04:10,800 --> 00:04:14,520 Speaker 1: to the codex over time. So even with scrolls, you 77 00:04:14,600 --> 00:04:17,760 Speaker 1: might think that the idea of pages having pages in 78 00:04:17,800 --> 00:04:20,560 Speaker 1: a document, you know, these sort of like blocked out 79 00:04:20,680 --> 00:04:24,080 Speaker 1: sections of the text, that that would emerge with the 80 00:04:24,120 --> 00:04:27,200 Speaker 1: codex because it's natural to leaf through the pages. But 81 00:04:27,440 --> 00:04:29,760 Speaker 1: Howard points out that there was sometimes a need for 82 00:04:29,839 --> 00:04:33,479 Speaker 1: something like the concept of a page even in a scroll, 83 00:04:33,640 --> 00:04:36,320 Speaker 1: because just imagine trying to read a scroll. Imagine you 84 00:04:36,360 --> 00:04:40,240 Speaker 1: are writing in a script that flows horizontally like English, 85 00:04:40,279 --> 00:04:42,920 Speaker 1: it goes from left to right, and you're working with 86 00:04:42,960 --> 00:04:47,320 Speaker 1: a scroll that unravels horizontally. Do you write one line 87 00:04:47,400 --> 00:04:50,120 Speaker 1: that goes the entire fifty feet or whatever of the 88 00:04:50,320 --> 00:04:53,719 Speaker 1: entire scroll, and then back up, rewind the entire thing, 89 00:04:53,800 --> 00:04:56,120 Speaker 1: and then start on the second line. I mean, that's 90 00:04:56,160 --> 00:05:00,880 Speaker 1: obviously impractical. So instead, Howard writes that sometimes scribes would 91 00:05:01,000 --> 00:05:05,000 Speaker 1: mark off columns of text of some manageable length, maybe 92 00:05:05,000 --> 00:05:07,680 Speaker 1: a few inches wide, and then once the column was 93 00:05:07,720 --> 00:05:09,760 Speaker 1: filled down to the bottom, you would start at the 94 00:05:09,800 --> 00:05:12,720 Speaker 1: top of a new column. Basically, these would be pages 95 00:05:12,839 --> 00:05:14,880 Speaker 1: just like in a book, except you would roll and 96 00:05:15,000 --> 00:05:18,000 Speaker 1: unroll them instead of leafing through them. But she also 97 00:05:18,080 --> 00:05:21,160 Speaker 1: points out a really obvious disadvantage of the scroll. And 98 00:05:21,240 --> 00:05:24,120 Speaker 1: this is in addition to the need to rewind your 99 00:05:24,200 --> 00:05:26,480 Speaker 1: when you're done with the scroll, it is going to 100 00:05:26,560 --> 00:05:30,320 Speaker 1: be really tedious to jump to places in the middle 101 00:05:30,480 --> 00:05:34,839 Speaker 1: or end of a document to reference something. So imagine it's, 102 00:05:34,960 --> 00:05:36,800 Speaker 1: you know, the Bible, and you want to reference a 103 00:05:36,880 --> 00:05:40,800 Speaker 1: particular verse. Early books might might not even have had 104 00:05:40,839 --> 00:05:43,560 Speaker 1: page numbers like foldable you know, codex books might not 105 00:05:43,640 --> 00:05:47,800 Speaker 1: have had page numbers on the pages. But imagine it, 106 00:05:47,880 --> 00:05:50,839 Speaker 1: even without page numbers to refer to, it's just going 107 00:05:50,880 --> 00:05:54,000 Speaker 1: to be so much easier to leaf through and find 108 00:05:54,040 --> 00:05:56,720 Speaker 1: a later passage in a codex than it is going 109 00:05:56,760 --> 00:05:59,880 Speaker 1: to be to roll through and find a later passage 110 00:05:59,880 --> 00:06:02,920 Speaker 1: in the scroll, mostly due to the ease of page 111 00:06:02,920 --> 00:06:05,680 Speaker 1: flipping as a mechanical action as opposed to the rolling 112 00:06:05,720 --> 00:06:08,680 Speaker 1: and unrolling action. This is interesting. It makes me think 113 00:06:08,680 --> 00:06:12,440 Speaker 1: of the books once again because for for my own money, well, 114 00:06:12,440 --> 00:06:15,320 Speaker 1: first of all, I want to say that sometimes I'll 115 00:06:15,400 --> 00:06:18,120 Speaker 1: use e books when researching this podcast, and in those 116 00:06:18,160 --> 00:06:22,120 Speaker 1: cases I'll use a browser based um like Kindle Reader, 117 00:06:22,480 --> 00:06:24,560 Speaker 1: which allows me to jump around a lot and do 118 00:06:24,640 --> 00:06:28,360 Speaker 1: word searches and so forth. That is a little more flexible. 119 00:06:28,560 --> 00:06:32,039 Speaker 1: But for for my more personal reading, if I'm reading 120 00:06:32,040 --> 00:06:35,360 Speaker 1: a novel um in the book form, I'll use my Kindle. 121 00:06:35,720 --> 00:06:38,680 Speaker 1: And when I'm using the Kindle, I have the experience 122 00:06:39,000 --> 00:06:41,240 Speaker 1: that is more like a scroll, where I find that 123 00:06:41,279 --> 00:06:45,000 Speaker 1: I'm generally going just straight through it and if I 124 00:06:45,080 --> 00:06:47,960 Speaker 1: jump around, I risk losing my spot. And part of 125 00:06:47,960 --> 00:06:49,360 Speaker 1: that maybe I just don't know how to use the 126 00:06:49,400 --> 00:06:51,760 Speaker 1: Kindle properly. You know, it might be a little user 127 00:06:51,880 --> 00:06:54,200 Speaker 1: error on my part, But for the most part, I 128 00:06:54,200 --> 00:06:55,960 Speaker 1: feel like I've just got to keep going. I can't 129 00:06:56,120 --> 00:06:58,560 Speaker 1: jump around, I can't go back and if it is 130 00:06:58,600 --> 00:07:02,480 Speaker 1: a book that I know has like a glossary at 131 00:07:02,480 --> 00:07:05,520 Speaker 1: the end or some sort of encyclopedia related to the world, 132 00:07:05,720 --> 00:07:09,720 Speaker 1: something like saying, our Scott Baker book. Uh, then I'm 133 00:07:09,760 --> 00:07:11,560 Speaker 1: just not going to get that in an in an 134 00:07:11,600 --> 00:07:14,240 Speaker 1: electronic form, I'm going to get the hard copy so 135 00:07:14,360 --> 00:07:16,400 Speaker 1: I can flip around, so I could go to the 136 00:07:16,440 --> 00:07:19,680 Speaker 1: back and look up characters or places or wars and 137 00:07:19,720 --> 00:07:23,400 Speaker 1: see how they relate to the spot that I'm reading in. Yeah, 138 00:07:23,440 --> 00:07:26,240 Speaker 1: my experience is exactly like yours. I find that. If 139 00:07:26,400 --> 00:07:29,120 Speaker 1: it's so when I'm talking about an e book, if 140 00:07:29,120 --> 00:07:31,400 Speaker 1: it's a book I'm using for a reference, I really 141 00:07:31,600 --> 00:07:33,920 Speaker 1: only want to read it on a desktop so that 142 00:07:33,960 --> 00:07:36,440 Speaker 1: I can like use the mouse to navigate with the 143 00:07:36,480 --> 00:07:39,440 Speaker 1: slider and use the search function easily and all that. 144 00:07:39,960 --> 00:07:42,280 Speaker 1: If it's a book that I'm just reading for pleasure, 145 00:07:42,320 --> 00:07:45,320 Speaker 1: I'd rather read it like on my phone, uh, where 146 00:07:45,360 --> 00:07:47,320 Speaker 1: I can just leave through the pages one at a time. 147 00:07:47,360 --> 00:07:49,840 Speaker 1: But yeah, in in that format it is tedious to 148 00:07:49,880 --> 00:07:52,800 Speaker 1: try to flip back and forth too. In notes or whatever. 149 00:07:53,160 --> 00:07:55,200 Speaker 1: You know, I have to dragon dungeons and dragons a 150 00:07:55,200 --> 00:07:57,120 Speaker 1: little bit here. I don't know to what extent this 151 00:07:57,200 --> 00:08:00,000 Speaker 1: was intentional. But one thing that you see in Dungeons 152 00:08:00,000 --> 00:08:02,840 Speaker 1: and Dragons with spell books and spell scrolls is that 153 00:08:02,920 --> 00:08:05,640 Speaker 1: a spell book is something you reference, is something like 154 00:08:05,680 --> 00:08:08,480 Speaker 1: your your wizard character carries around or picks up and 155 00:08:08,560 --> 00:08:12,600 Speaker 1: learns new spells from. But a spell scroll is this 156 00:08:12,600 --> 00:08:16,160 Speaker 1: this more like magical text that is consumed as you 157 00:08:16,200 --> 00:08:19,280 Speaker 1: read it. To read the scroll is to is to 158 00:08:19,480 --> 00:08:22,920 Speaker 1: cast the spell that is contained in the magical writing 159 00:08:23,000 --> 00:08:25,680 Speaker 1: in the scroll itself, and then afterwards it is gone. 160 00:08:26,120 --> 00:08:28,560 Speaker 1: That's very interesting. I mean, that seems to reflect some 161 00:08:28,680 --> 00:08:31,880 Speaker 1: kind of knowledge about the differences of these two formats, 162 00:08:32,440 --> 00:08:35,640 Speaker 1: and it does make you wonder about the different psychological 163 00:08:35,679 --> 00:08:39,079 Speaker 1: effects of reading cultures based on a scroll versus reading 164 00:08:39,120 --> 00:08:42,559 Speaker 1: cultures based on a on a codex. Right, yeah, I 165 00:08:42,600 --> 00:08:45,280 Speaker 1: can't help but wonder how it alters the metaphor of 166 00:08:45,360 --> 00:08:48,400 Speaker 1: internal narrative, you know, to have to flip rather than 167 00:08:48,440 --> 00:08:51,360 Speaker 1: to scroll. Now. Now, granted, I imagine literacy was you know, 168 00:08:51,400 --> 00:08:54,679 Speaker 1: not widespread enough for the technological metaphor to be that meaningful, 169 00:08:55,000 --> 00:08:58,760 Speaker 1: you know, to the majority of the population in ancient times. 170 00:08:58,800 --> 00:09:02,000 Speaker 1: But interesting to think about. I also think it's interesting 171 00:09:02,040 --> 00:09:05,560 Speaker 1: to think about personal reading, like the reading that you know, 172 00:09:05,640 --> 00:09:09,760 Speaker 1: someone does on their own in a quiet room, as 173 00:09:09,880 --> 00:09:14,079 Speaker 1: inherently invoking an internal narrative or voice, as opposed to 174 00:09:14,480 --> 00:09:17,679 Speaker 1: the external narrative voice that you would get through say, 175 00:09:17,960 --> 00:09:22,120 Speaker 1: communal storytelling or communal singing, you know, these other modes 176 00:09:22,240 --> 00:09:26,000 Speaker 1: of sharing a story or a text with other people. 177 00:09:26,480 --> 00:09:28,960 Speaker 1: Uh It Also, you know, it makes me wonder about 178 00:09:29,000 --> 00:09:32,680 Speaker 1: how the the format the scroll versus the codex would 179 00:09:32,720 --> 00:09:36,800 Speaker 1: cause people to think differently about what books were for. 180 00:09:37,480 --> 00:09:40,400 Speaker 1: Like if a scroll based culture, I wonder, would be 181 00:09:40,480 --> 00:09:43,640 Speaker 1: more likely to suggest that you should read through an 182 00:09:43,840 --> 00:09:46,800 Speaker 1: entire book at once in order, rather than using it 183 00:09:46,840 --> 00:09:50,920 Speaker 1: as something to consult isolated sections from. On one hand, 184 00:09:50,960 --> 00:09:52,520 Speaker 1: you know, I wonder that, and that is kind of 185 00:09:52,559 --> 00:09:56,840 Speaker 1: a common sensical uh bit of induction from the idea 186 00:09:56,880 --> 00:09:58,679 Speaker 1: of a scroll. But honestly, then again, I would say, 187 00:09:58,720 --> 00:10:01,160 Speaker 1: I don't necessarily see a lot of direct evidence of this, 188 00:10:01,280 --> 00:10:04,520 Speaker 1: Like it does seem like ancient religious texts and scroll 189 00:10:04,600 --> 00:10:08,200 Speaker 1: cultures were pretty thoroughly consulted for isolated quotes in a 190 00:10:08,600 --> 00:10:10,920 Speaker 1: in a piecemeal fashion. I mean, I think about like 191 00:10:10,960 --> 00:10:14,360 Speaker 1: the rabbinical tradition and Judaism, which was very scroll based 192 00:10:14,400 --> 00:10:18,040 Speaker 1: at the time. But then again I don't know, Like, um, 193 00:10:18,240 --> 00:10:21,600 Speaker 1: I wonder here's another thing. Does a scroll culture maybe 194 00:10:21,600 --> 00:10:26,160 Speaker 1: place more emphasis on the memorization of books and narratives 195 00:10:26,200 --> 00:10:29,840 Speaker 1: that you read? Maybe so? And and I also can't 196 00:10:29,840 --> 00:10:31,679 Speaker 1: help but think maybe part of this is just we 197 00:10:31,720 --> 00:10:35,000 Speaker 1: are we are not scroll based individuals. Are Is this 198 00:10:35,080 --> 00:10:37,840 Speaker 1: not a scroll based culture? So of course we we 199 00:10:38,040 --> 00:10:41,800 Speaker 1: see like we imagine the regular use of scrolls as 200 00:10:41,840 --> 00:10:45,000 Speaker 1: being somewhat alien and clumsy. But I guess if one 201 00:10:45,120 --> 00:10:47,000 Speaker 1: is versed in the use of scrolls, if one is 202 00:10:47,040 --> 00:10:49,840 Speaker 1: accustomed to it, you know, obviously you're gonna have uh, 203 00:10:49,920 --> 00:10:53,040 Speaker 1: you know, more flexibility and using one totally. I I 204 00:10:53,080 --> 00:10:57,120 Speaker 1: do get the impression that that it is generally just easier, 205 00:10:57,480 --> 00:11:00,440 Speaker 1: you know, like you like, there are strict if shouldntcy 206 00:11:00,520 --> 00:11:02,960 Speaker 1: advantages to the code X over the scroll, but that 207 00:11:03,080 --> 00:11:06,319 Speaker 1: those are magnified by being unfamiliar with how to use 208 00:11:06,360 --> 00:11:09,480 Speaker 1: the scroll. Yeah. I think that's fair. But then so 209 00:11:09,520 --> 00:11:11,400 Speaker 1: I want to go back to another thing Nicole Howard 210 00:11:11,400 --> 00:11:14,160 Speaker 1: talks about, which I hadn't really thought about much, but 211 00:11:14,360 --> 00:11:17,960 Speaker 1: this is interesting as well. So to read a scroll, 212 00:11:18,240 --> 00:11:21,760 Speaker 1: you often needed to use either both hands at the 213 00:11:21,800 --> 00:11:24,920 Speaker 1: same time, or you needed to set it on a 214 00:11:24,960 --> 00:11:27,959 Speaker 1: desk with a with a pair of weights to hold 215 00:11:28,040 --> 00:11:31,480 Speaker 1: the open section down and keep it from rolling around. 216 00:11:31,960 --> 00:11:34,600 Speaker 1: So uh so, like think of the ease with which 217 00:11:34,640 --> 00:11:37,320 Speaker 1: you can hold a book, a codex book open in 218 00:11:37,400 --> 00:11:40,840 Speaker 1: one hand and write down notes or copy text with 219 00:11:40,920 --> 00:11:43,360 Speaker 1: the other hand. Or with some books, you know, if 220 00:11:43,400 --> 00:11:45,439 Speaker 1: it's a very nicely bound book and it's got the 221 00:11:45,520 --> 00:11:47,559 Speaker 1: right balance of weight and everything, you don't even need 222 00:11:47,640 --> 00:11:49,199 Speaker 1: one hand. You can just set it down on a 223 00:11:49,280 --> 00:11:51,560 Speaker 1: desk and leave it open, or put it on a 224 00:11:51,600 --> 00:11:54,920 Speaker 1: reading stand and it stays open to your place. Scrolls 225 00:11:54,920 --> 00:11:58,360 Speaker 1: were usually nowhere near this convenient. And uh and I 226 00:11:58,440 --> 00:12:02,960 Speaker 1: think we've often talked about the underappreciated evolutionary advantage of 227 00:12:03,000 --> 00:12:07,000 Speaker 1: technologies or methods that allow free hands while in use. 228 00:12:07,320 --> 00:12:10,679 Speaker 1: I think this is very clearly a case of that. Yeah, 229 00:12:10,720 --> 00:12:12,280 Speaker 1: I mean, certainly when you get into the use of 230 00:12:12,320 --> 00:12:16,120 Speaker 1: these various grommores, uh, these these sacred books, you know, 231 00:12:16,200 --> 00:12:19,600 Speaker 1: they're they're often intended to be taken with you. You 232 00:12:19,640 --> 00:12:21,959 Speaker 1: know a lot of times they are. They are handy 233 00:12:21,960 --> 00:12:25,280 Speaker 1: travel volumes of important texts then may be carried on 234 00:12:25,320 --> 00:12:29,040 Speaker 1: your person, as opposed to you know, left in the scriptorium. 235 00:12:29,080 --> 00:12:32,120 Speaker 1: And I mean, if we're going to use a biological analogy, obviously, 236 00:12:32,200 --> 00:12:36,319 Speaker 1: books are things much like genes that get reproduced through copying, 237 00:12:36,880 --> 00:12:38,959 Speaker 1: and so in a way, you could almost think of 238 00:12:39,280 --> 00:12:42,200 Speaker 1: books that are easier to copy as having a kind 239 00:12:42,240 --> 00:12:45,840 Speaker 1: of sexual selection advantage, right, Like it's easier for them 240 00:12:45,880 --> 00:12:48,960 Speaker 1: to reproduce. If a book is easier to make a 241 00:12:48,960 --> 00:12:51,240 Speaker 1: copy of because you can hold it in one hand 242 00:12:51,320 --> 00:12:53,840 Speaker 1: or set it down easily while you copy it onto 243 00:12:53,840 --> 00:12:56,520 Speaker 1: another sheet. I mean, I wonder if that literally results 244 00:12:56,520 --> 00:13:00,600 Speaker 1: in just more copies of those types of books getting made. Yeah, 245 00:13:00,640 --> 00:13:02,960 Speaker 1: I mean it's I know, it ultimately makes it more readable. 246 00:13:03,000 --> 00:13:05,160 Speaker 1: And like we said in the last episode, a book 247 00:13:05,640 --> 00:13:08,199 Speaker 1: that is not read or cannot be read in some 248 00:13:08,240 --> 00:13:10,280 Speaker 1: ways isn't a book like it is because so much 249 00:13:10,280 --> 00:13:13,959 Speaker 1: of it is about the transference of information and not 250 00:13:14,040 --> 00:13:18,520 Speaker 1: just the collection of information. Yeah, totally. So here's another 251 00:13:18,559 --> 00:13:21,880 Speaker 1: interesting issue Howard raises. When you're pulling a book like 252 00:13:21,920 --> 00:13:23,840 Speaker 1: we have today off the shelf, do you have a 253 00:13:23,840 --> 00:13:27,240 Speaker 1: hard time figuring out which book to grab? I mean 254 00:13:27,320 --> 00:13:29,680 Speaker 1: usually no, right, because the titles are right there on 255 00:13:29,720 --> 00:13:32,800 Speaker 1: the spine. It's totally easy to find what you're looking for, right, 256 00:13:32,840 --> 00:13:35,160 Speaker 1: And even if the spine does not have the title, 257 00:13:35,240 --> 00:13:37,640 Speaker 1: or the spine has been taped over, etcetera. You just 258 00:13:37,679 --> 00:13:39,920 Speaker 1: flip it open. You go right to the title page, 259 00:13:39,920 --> 00:13:42,400 Speaker 1: the copyright page. You can find all the information you 260 00:13:42,440 --> 00:13:46,560 Speaker 1: need right. The issue of identifying documents quickly from within 261 00:13:46,600 --> 00:13:50,040 Speaker 1: a large collection was nowhere near this easy and scroll 262 00:13:50,120 --> 00:13:54,120 Speaker 1: based cultures of the ancient world, Howard writes, quote readers 263 00:13:54,120 --> 00:13:57,760 Speaker 1: of scrolls dealt with the problem of identification by applying 264 00:13:57,920 --> 00:14:02,320 Speaker 1: small tags to the upper edges of scrolls. In Greek, 265 00:14:02,440 --> 00:14:05,079 Speaker 1: these were called silly boss, which is where we get 266 00:14:05,120 --> 00:14:08,320 Speaker 1: the term syllabus uh and she goes on, while the 267 00:14:08,440 --> 00:14:11,520 Speaker 1: Romans referred to them as titulus, which is where we 268 00:14:11,559 --> 00:14:15,200 Speaker 1: get the term title. Tags made it easier to organize 269 00:14:15,240 --> 00:14:18,920 Speaker 1: and identify scrolls, but there remained the problem of storage. 270 00:14:19,320 --> 00:14:23,840 Speaker 1: Being rounded, they did not lend themselves to meet stacking. Instead, 271 00:14:24,000 --> 00:14:27,560 Speaker 1: scrolls were placed in groups in a stone or wooden jar, 272 00:14:27,880 --> 00:14:31,720 Speaker 1: known in Greek as a biblioteca. And there's a great 273 00:14:31,920 --> 00:14:35,040 Speaker 1: piece of terminology like etymology there. Think of how this 274 00:14:35,280 --> 00:14:39,200 Speaker 1: jar library, this jar that had scrolls, and it influenced 275 00:14:39,200 --> 00:14:42,240 Speaker 1: the names for library buildings in the Romance languages today. 276 00:14:42,280 --> 00:14:46,160 Speaker 1: You know, the Spanish word for a library is biblioteca. Yeah, 277 00:14:46,400 --> 00:14:49,360 Speaker 1: though there's a funny, perhaps false etymology that always followed 278 00:14:49,360 --> 00:14:51,880 Speaker 1: from that in my head, which is also the Spanish 279 00:14:51,920 --> 00:14:55,200 Speaker 1: word disco taca for discotheq, which makes me think it's 280 00:14:55,280 --> 00:14:59,400 Speaker 1: like the disc library. That probably doesn't quite work out, right. 281 00:15:00,160 --> 00:15:03,520 Speaker 1: But Howard also acknowledges that bookmaking in the ancient world 282 00:15:03,600 --> 00:15:06,360 Speaker 1: was not a uniform industry, right. It wasn't like they had, 283 00:15:06,360 --> 00:15:09,360 Speaker 1: you know, factories that would uh that would print all 284 00:15:09,400 --> 00:15:13,200 Speaker 1: these books in this exactly similar way. For many centuries, 285 00:15:13,200 --> 00:15:16,960 Speaker 1: scrolls were the standard, but you would find weird exceptions 286 00:15:17,000 --> 00:15:20,120 Speaker 1: here and there. And she cites the examples of books 287 00:15:20,160 --> 00:15:23,520 Speaker 1: made out of papyrus and parchment that were stored not 288 00:15:23,640 --> 00:15:27,560 Speaker 1: in scrolls but by folding like a map, or folding 289 00:15:27,640 --> 00:15:31,600 Speaker 1: in an accordion style. And while this format was unusual 290 00:15:31,640 --> 00:15:35,280 Speaker 1: at the time, that accordion style fold may well have 291 00:15:35,400 --> 00:15:39,080 Speaker 1: set an important precedent because the accordion style fold, if 292 00:15:39,080 --> 00:15:42,240 Speaker 1: you think about it, would have actually allowed for finding 293 00:15:42,280 --> 00:15:45,400 Speaker 1: a place in a document more easily with a flipping 294 00:15:45,480 --> 00:15:49,080 Speaker 1: motion through the folded sections, rather than the tedious rolling 295 00:15:49,120 --> 00:15:51,720 Speaker 1: and unrolling of a scroll. And of course we still 296 00:15:51,720 --> 00:15:55,240 Speaker 1: see this form all the time, not only with maps 297 00:15:55,680 --> 00:15:59,680 Speaker 1: um but also with menus and more importantly brochures. Oh 298 00:15:59,760 --> 00:16:04,240 Speaker 1: tooele though, just trying to imagine, I like those big 299 00:16:04,320 --> 00:16:06,080 Speaker 1: maps that fold down, and you've got to find the 300 00:16:06,160 --> 00:16:08,240 Speaker 1: right way to fold it back or you'll be putting 301 00:16:08,240 --> 00:16:10,880 Speaker 1: the wrong direction. Creases in when you try to, Yeah, 302 00:16:11,120 --> 00:16:13,240 Speaker 1: and it'll be it won't be flat, it'll be like 303 00:16:13,280 --> 00:16:15,880 Speaker 1: a little a little puffy, and then it doesn't actually 304 00:16:16,040 --> 00:16:18,800 Speaker 1: go back where you're still in your maps. Imagine trying 305 00:16:18,840 --> 00:16:21,800 Speaker 1: to map fold your edition of Moby Dick. That sounds 306 00:16:21,840 --> 00:16:25,520 Speaker 1: like a nightmare. But so where does the actual codex 307 00:16:25,600 --> 00:16:28,800 Speaker 1: come in? Remember the codex format again is the book 308 00:16:28,840 --> 00:16:31,320 Speaker 1: that's still in use today and involves stacks of pages 309 00:16:31,360 --> 00:16:35,120 Speaker 1: folded inward fastened into spine, which you read by leafing 310 00:16:35,160 --> 00:16:37,680 Speaker 1: through one page to the next. We mentioned in the 311 00:16:37,760 --> 00:16:40,560 Speaker 1: last episode that it seems like the codex started to 312 00:16:40,560 --> 00:16:44,280 Speaker 1: be produced in the Roman world around the first century. 313 00:16:44,920 --> 00:16:48,720 Speaker 1: Nicole Howard points to a very important predecessor technology though, 314 00:16:49,040 --> 00:16:52,040 Speaker 1: which likely gave rise to the codex, and this is 315 00:16:52,040 --> 00:16:55,680 Speaker 1: a technology known as the diptic. So the easiest way 316 00:16:55,720 --> 00:16:59,280 Speaker 1: to imagine a diptic is to picture a hardback book 317 00:16:59,320 --> 00:17:02,760 Speaker 1: cover with out any pages inside it. So a diptic 318 00:17:02,760 --> 00:17:06,400 Speaker 1: would usually consist of two solid flaps made out of 319 00:17:06,480 --> 00:17:09,760 Speaker 1: something hard like would usually like she she says, often 320 00:17:09,840 --> 00:17:13,240 Speaker 1: ebony or box would, and they would be attached at 321 00:17:13,240 --> 00:17:15,600 Speaker 1: the edges with some kind of hinge, so you could 322 00:17:15,640 --> 00:17:19,040 Speaker 1: sew them together with with string or thread or with 323 00:17:19,160 --> 00:17:21,840 Speaker 1: leather straps, and this would allow them to open and 324 00:17:21,880 --> 00:17:24,640 Speaker 1: close like the cover of a book. And the diptic 325 00:17:24,800 --> 00:17:29,160 Speaker 1: was used generally as a temporary storage space for information. 326 00:17:29,720 --> 00:17:33,040 Speaker 1: So the inside surfaces of these flaps that open and 327 00:17:33,119 --> 00:17:36,680 Speaker 1: closed would be coated with wax, and then writing could 328 00:17:36,760 --> 00:17:39,879 Speaker 1: be scratched into the wax with a sharp implement or 329 00:17:40,000 --> 00:17:42,879 Speaker 1: with a stylus, and then the wax surface could be 330 00:17:42,920 --> 00:17:46,960 Speaker 1: reused simply by rubbing out the indentations or scratches bearing 331 00:17:46,960 --> 00:17:50,119 Speaker 1: the writing, essentially erasing the board and preparing it to 332 00:17:50,240 --> 00:17:52,600 Speaker 1: record new information again. And these could be used for 333 00:17:52,640 --> 00:17:56,240 Speaker 1: all kinds of things, for taking notes about something, for 334 00:17:56,400 --> 00:17:59,400 Speaker 1: sending a message to someone. It was a general purpose, 335 00:17:59,520 --> 00:18:03,720 Speaker 1: reuse able writing surface. But then there comes in a mystery, 336 00:18:03,760 --> 00:18:06,800 Speaker 1: so we know that there was this diptic device, But 337 00:18:06,960 --> 00:18:11,440 Speaker 1: we don't know who or when it first occurred to too, 338 00:18:11,480 --> 00:18:15,959 Speaker 1: simply so pages of parchment or papyrus in between the 339 00:18:16,000 --> 00:18:19,120 Speaker 1: flaps of the diptic. We don't know who came up 340 00:18:19,119 --> 00:18:21,880 Speaker 1: with this idea, where it first emerged. We know we 341 00:18:21,880 --> 00:18:25,439 Speaker 1: we think it probably happened first in the first century CE, 342 00:18:26,160 --> 00:18:30,360 Speaker 1: because we have some archaeological evidence of code codessees from 343 00:18:30,359 --> 00:18:34,200 Speaker 1: within the first century and the Latin poet Marshal who 344 00:18:34,200 --> 00:18:37,800 Speaker 1: lived from thirty eight to one oh four c mentions 345 00:18:37,880 --> 00:18:41,119 Speaker 1: this invention. He talks about it in some verses that 346 00:18:41,160 --> 00:18:44,160 Speaker 1: he wrote and published in the eighties, I believe, between 347 00:18:44,200 --> 00:18:47,200 Speaker 1: the years like eighty four and eighty six, talking about 348 00:18:47,200 --> 00:18:51,280 Speaker 1: how awesome these new parchment codices are, and he tells 349 00:18:51,320 --> 00:18:55,840 Speaker 1: you specifically in his poem where you can buy them, 350 00:18:55,880 --> 00:18:57,800 Speaker 1: which I like because poems of today that you know, 351 00:18:57,840 --> 00:19:01,480 Speaker 1: they don't usually just like include free advertisements for shops 352 00:19:01,520 --> 00:19:04,760 Speaker 1: for things, um, which is a shame. They should, they 353 00:19:04,760 --> 00:19:07,960 Speaker 1: should really monetize that right exactly So, I found a 354 00:19:08,000 --> 00:19:11,240 Speaker 1: translation that was cited in a in a BBC article 355 00:19:11,359 --> 00:19:14,240 Speaker 1: by a writer named Keith Houston or Houston that I'm 356 00:19:14,240 --> 00:19:17,560 Speaker 1: gonna refer back to in a minute. But this translation 357 00:19:17,640 --> 00:19:21,440 Speaker 1: of the section from Marshals Versus goes, you who long 358 00:19:21,600 --> 00:19:24,560 Speaker 1: for my little books to be with you everywhere, and 359 00:19:24,600 --> 00:19:28,120 Speaker 1: want to have companions for a long journey by these ones, 360 00:19:28,160 --> 00:19:32,800 Speaker 1: which parchment confines within small pages, give your scroll cases 361 00:19:32,840 --> 00:19:37,160 Speaker 1: to the great authors. One hand can hold me, which 362 00:19:37,200 --> 00:19:39,560 Speaker 1: is great. You know. He's like, oh, it's so sad 363 00:19:39,600 --> 00:19:41,800 Speaker 1: you can't travel with my books because they're on scrolls. 364 00:19:41,800 --> 00:19:43,880 Speaker 1: Well you can now take them with you on take 365 00:19:43,920 --> 00:19:46,440 Speaker 1: me with you on the road. And then yeah, all 366 00:19:46,440 --> 00:19:49,280 Speaker 1: the all those you know, the homers and whatever. You 367 00:19:49,320 --> 00:19:51,199 Speaker 1: can cram them into a scroll, stick them in a 368 00:19:51,280 --> 00:19:55,040 Speaker 1: jar somewhere. That's fine. Now, this is great. It's like saying, 369 00:19:55,119 --> 00:19:57,639 Speaker 1: you know, my my books, you know, and this in 370 00:19:57,640 --> 00:19:59,800 Speaker 1: the work. I'm one of the great authors. But my 371 00:20:00,040 --> 00:20:02,960 Speaker 1: work will be a part of your life, right, uh. Yeah. 372 00:20:03,000 --> 00:20:05,280 Speaker 1: And then he goes on to say, oh, by the way, 373 00:20:05,320 --> 00:20:07,240 Speaker 1: here's where you can get them, so that you are 374 00:20:07,240 --> 00:20:09,640 Speaker 1: not ignorant of where I am on sale, and don't 375 00:20:09,640 --> 00:20:12,399 Speaker 1: wonder aimlessly through the whole city. I will be your 376 00:20:12,440 --> 00:20:15,439 Speaker 1: guide and you will be certain. Look for secundus, the 377 00:20:15,560 --> 00:20:19,679 Speaker 1: freedomen of learned Locnsus behind the threshold of the Temple 378 00:20:19,720 --> 00:20:22,679 Speaker 1: of Peace and the Forum of Palace. So there you go. 379 00:20:22,880 --> 00:20:25,520 Speaker 1: I mean, look him right up. But it doesn't make 380 00:20:25,560 --> 00:20:28,639 Speaker 1: me wonder like how recent of an invention this was, 381 00:20:28,680 --> 00:20:31,240 Speaker 1: Like it was there only one shop in the Roman 382 00:20:31,280 --> 00:20:34,560 Speaker 1: Empire selling selling the code X at this time or 383 00:20:34,640 --> 00:20:37,560 Speaker 1: was it like, you know, did people generally sort of 384 00:20:37,600 --> 00:20:39,480 Speaker 1: know what they are but he was trying to spread 385 00:20:39,520 --> 00:20:41,800 Speaker 1: the word or I don't know, it's not quite clear. 386 00:20:42,200 --> 00:20:43,679 Speaker 1: I mean it could have been in a in a 387 00:20:43,760 --> 00:20:46,960 Speaker 1: sense kind of like the like the early days of 388 00:20:47,080 --> 00:20:50,000 Speaker 1: like the iPhone or the iPad. Right, maybe you couldn't 389 00:20:50,000 --> 00:20:52,000 Speaker 1: get him everywhere, had to go to that apple store, right, 390 00:20:52,160 --> 00:20:57,280 Speaker 1: this was the Secundus had the apple store of the day. Yeah, 391 00:20:57,320 --> 00:20:59,600 Speaker 1: look up Secundus and then you can take me everywhere. 392 00:21:00,200 --> 00:21:02,480 Speaker 1: I love it. So so, even though Marshall thought that 393 00:21:02,520 --> 00:21:07,280 Speaker 1: the parchment codex was great, it did not immediately take off. Instead, 394 00:21:07,400 --> 00:21:10,639 Speaker 1: for hundreds of years, books within the Roman Empire in 395 00:21:10,680 --> 00:21:15,360 Speaker 1: the Mediterranean region would remain this mix of codessease and scrolls, 396 00:21:15,400 --> 00:21:20,600 Speaker 1: with cod dissease slowly gathering greater popularity over the decades. 397 00:21:20,640 --> 00:21:25,000 Speaker 1: I've seems some sources assert that the codssease became mainstream, 398 00:21:25,080 --> 00:21:28,840 Speaker 1: and maybe like the third or fourth centuries, Howard says 399 00:21:28,880 --> 00:21:31,280 Speaker 1: that it wasn't really until the fifth century that the 400 00:21:31,320 --> 00:21:35,680 Speaker 1: Codex became extremely common commonplace. But whenever you date the 401 00:21:35,760 --> 00:21:40,240 Speaker 1: accomplishment of the Codex takeover, it's clear that it wasn't overnight. 402 00:21:40,280 --> 00:21:44,400 Speaker 1: It was a long, slow march. And there's another really 403 00:21:44,440 --> 00:21:46,800 Speaker 1: interesting thing that I learned. I was reading an article 404 00:21:47,320 --> 00:21:50,040 Speaker 1: for the BBC by by this author, Keith Houston or 405 00:21:50,040 --> 00:21:53,240 Speaker 1: Houston who the author of a book called the book 406 00:21:53,440 --> 00:21:56,320 Speaker 1: a cover to cover exploration of the most powerful object 407 00:21:56,359 --> 00:21:59,680 Speaker 1: of our time. And he points out an interesting cultural 408 00:21:59,720 --> 00:22:03,879 Speaker 1: train and that emerges that ties book technology to specific 409 00:22:04,000 --> 00:22:08,879 Speaker 1: religious groups. He writes, quote, Rome's pagan majority, along with 410 00:22:08,920 --> 00:22:12,359 Speaker 1: the Jewish population of the ancient world, preferred the familiar 411 00:22:12,400 --> 00:22:16,520 Speaker 1: form of the scroll. The Empire's fast growing Christian congregation, 412 00:22:16,600 --> 00:22:21,439 Speaker 1: on the other hand, enthusiastically churned out paged books containing Gospels, 413 00:22:21,720 --> 00:22:25,600 Speaker 1: commentaries and esoteric wisdom. And since I've read this in 414 00:22:25,680 --> 00:22:28,560 Speaker 1: several other sources that there seemed to be this this 415 00:22:29,080 --> 00:22:33,960 Speaker 1: preference for the Codex. Specifically, I mean among Christians generally, 416 00:22:33,960 --> 00:22:37,080 Speaker 1: but specifically I believe among the Christians of North Africa, 417 00:22:37,720 --> 00:22:40,320 Speaker 1: and it's interesting to wonder. I don't know if there's 418 00:22:40,320 --> 00:22:43,160 Speaker 1: an answer for why, in particular the Codex took off 419 00:22:43,520 --> 00:22:47,960 Speaker 1: with Christians within the region and and only more slowly 420 00:22:48,040 --> 00:22:50,639 Speaker 1: spread to the other religious groups. I mean, one one 421 00:22:50,680 --> 00:22:52,480 Speaker 1: can only assume that it just had to do with 422 00:22:52,560 --> 00:22:57,199 Speaker 1: the advantages of codices and how they particularly applied to 423 00:22:57,240 --> 00:23:01,920 Speaker 1: those groups. I mean, maybe it's the mobility for instance. Right, So, yeah, 424 00:23:01,960 --> 00:23:04,159 Speaker 1: we know several things about them. They're there, may be 425 00:23:04,320 --> 00:23:07,719 Speaker 1: easier to leave through quickly and reference things. They're easier, 426 00:23:07,720 --> 00:23:10,800 Speaker 1: they're smaller and more compact that you can take them, 427 00:23:10,840 --> 00:23:13,760 Speaker 1: you carry them around more easily. I mean, when I 428 00:23:13,800 --> 00:23:17,040 Speaker 1: think about some of the great early uh codessease in 429 00:23:17,240 --> 00:23:19,679 Speaker 1: in the archaeological record, a lot of them that come 430 00:23:19,760 --> 00:23:22,920 Speaker 1: to mind our Christian documents, you know, like the books 431 00:23:22,960 --> 00:23:26,320 Speaker 1: of the Nagamadi Library and stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, 432 00:23:26,359 --> 00:23:28,160 Speaker 1: I mean, and also you could get into the fact 433 00:23:28,240 --> 00:23:31,359 Speaker 1: that that perhaps they're easier to secret away. That could 434 00:23:31,359 --> 00:23:33,880 Speaker 1: be possible as well. Yeah. Alright, on that note, we're 435 00:23:33,880 --> 00:23:35,520 Speaker 1: going to take a break, but when we come back, 436 00:23:35,720 --> 00:23:43,560 Speaker 1: we will dive into the world of Mesoamerican codices. Thank alright, 437 00:23:43,600 --> 00:23:47,719 Speaker 1: we're back. So you're probably some of you are probably wondering, well, 438 00:23:47,720 --> 00:23:49,560 Speaker 1: what about the codices from other parts of the world. 439 00:23:49,600 --> 00:23:52,320 Speaker 1: In fact, some of the more famous codices from elsewhere 440 00:23:52,320 --> 00:23:55,960 Speaker 1: in the world are, for instance, the Mayan Codices. And 441 00:23:56,200 --> 00:23:59,320 Speaker 1: despite the name, you know that these were these were 442 00:23:59,400 --> 00:24:05,000 Speaker 1: not uh codices in the strictest sense of the word. Um. 443 00:24:05,200 --> 00:24:10,199 Speaker 1: These were typically long folded sheets um that were there 444 00:24:10,240 --> 00:24:13,479 Speaker 1: were more in keeping with that that accordion style system 445 00:24:13,520 --> 00:24:16,560 Speaker 1: we were talking about earlier and uh. And so yeah, 446 00:24:16,560 --> 00:24:18,399 Speaker 1: if you're being very strict about the definition of a 447 00:24:18,440 --> 00:24:21,560 Speaker 1: codex is as you know, having whole flipping pages front 448 00:24:21,560 --> 00:24:24,640 Speaker 1: and back. Uh, this is not going to fit that description. 449 00:24:24,680 --> 00:24:28,480 Speaker 1: But they are incredible works and they reveal a great 450 00:24:28,560 --> 00:24:32,200 Speaker 1: deal about say, Mayan culture. Now I've seen them referred 451 00:24:32,240 --> 00:24:36,359 Speaker 1: to as screenfold codices and uh and uh. And some 452 00:24:36,440 --> 00:24:39,920 Speaker 1: writers such as Victor Wolfgang von Hagen, author of UM 453 00:24:40,280 --> 00:24:44,040 Speaker 1: ninety three's Paper and Civilization, they are very firm on 454 00:24:44,080 --> 00:24:47,360 Speaker 1: the position that these were definitely books that you shouldn't 455 00:24:47,800 --> 00:24:50,119 Speaker 1: you shouldn't try and like skirt them out of the 456 00:24:50,160 --> 00:24:53,439 Speaker 1: you know, the way of the book uh categorization, like 457 00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:56,480 Speaker 1: these were books to be very clear. Oh yeah, I 458 00:24:56,480 --> 00:24:58,520 Speaker 1: mean I think we're in general going with the bigger 459 00:24:58,520 --> 00:25:00,880 Speaker 1: definition of the book and scroll or books as well 460 00:25:00,960 --> 00:25:04,200 Speaker 1: for us. Yeah. So I was reading more about these 461 00:25:04,640 --> 00:25:07,960 Speaker 1: um about Mayan codeseas, in particular in the construction of 462 00:25:08,000 --> 00:25:11,920 Speaker 1: the Codex in Classic and post Classic period Maya civilization 463 00:25:12,000 --> 00:25:16,520 Speaker 1: by Dr Thomas J. Tobin of Duquesne University, which incidentally 464 00:25:17,000 --> 00:25:19,560 Speaker 1: I learned today Werner Herzog attended school there in the 465 00:25:19,640 --> 00:25:24,120 Speaker 1: nineteen sixties. Everything comes back to Herzog though there there 466 00:25:24,119 --> 00:25:26,040 Speaker 1: again we have a we do have a South American 467 00:25:26,040 --> 00:25:28,840 Speaker 1: connection there with Herzog, of course, but at any rate. 468 00:25:28,960 --> 00:25:32,880 Speaker 1: Um Tobin points out that the Romans were making advancements 469 00:25:32,880 --> 00:25:34,920 Speaker 1: in what we think of as the Codex between one 470 00:25:34,960 --> 00:25:37,959 Speaker 1: hundred and seven hundred see as we were previously discussioning, 471 00:25:38,240 --> 00:25:41,800 Speaker 1: but that that's during that same time period the Mayan 472 00:25:41,880 --> 00:25:46,200 Speaker 1: civilization in meso America was making advances in their own 473 00:25:46,280 --> 00:25:49,960 Speaker 1: recording of information on paper. He writes that the Maya 474 00:25:50,000 --> 00:25:53,880 Speaker 1: developed paper pretty early in the millennium. Based on archaeological evidence, 475 00:25:53,920 --> 00:25:58,560 Speaker 1: they were making bark paper in the early fifth century. See. Basically, 476 00:25:58,600 --> 00:26:02,399 Speaker 1: the idea is that they were already using bark cloth tunics, 477 00:26:02,680 --> 00:26:06,160 Speaker 1: and from that developed huon a writing surface that could 478 00:26:06,160 --> 00:26:09,760 Speaker 1: be used to record information. Now, the cloth in question 479 00:26:09,880 --> 00:26:12,000 Speaker 1: was apparently a kind of tappa cloth, and it was 480 00:26:12,320 --> 00:26:14,840 Speaker 1: made from not the outer bark but the inner bark 481 00:26:14,880 --> 00:26:19,040 Speaker 1: of certain trees. And this evolved into papermaking over time, 482 00:26:19,040 --> 00:26:22,719 Speaker 1: and the result is apparently somewhat superior to papyrus by 483 00:26:22,760 --> 00:26:27,160 Speaker 1: many estimations. Yeah. Interesting, uh, this is especially interesting. Here's 484 00:26:27,160 --> 00:26:30,359 Speaker 1: a quote from from Tobin. In this right up quote, 485 00:26:30,400 --> 00:26:33,639 Speaker 1: the Maya developed paper screen fold codices as a direct 486 00:26:33,680 --> 00:26:38,240 Speaker 1: step beyond carving information into stone buildings and steely, unlike 487 00:26:38,280 --> 00:26:41,840 Speaker 1: Western papermaking, which took a more circuitous route to reach 488 00:26:41,880 --> 00:26:46,240 Speaker 1: its final form single sheets, papyrus rolls, and then leafed codices. 489 00:26:46,800 --> 00:26:49,480 Speaker 1: So I found that that interesting. Decided that again the 490 00:26:49,480 --> 00:26:53,720 Speaker 1: Maya make a a direct jump from seemingly from carving 491 00:26:53,720 --> 00:26:58,000 Speaker 1: into stone to using these codices. Huh. Yeah. Now. One 492 00:26:58,040 --> 00:27:00,840 Speaker 1: of the great tragedies here, of course, is that despite 493 00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:04,720 Speaker 1: records of thousands of Mayan codices and the inventories of 494 00:27:04,760 --> 00:27:08,000 Speaker 1: Spanish conquistors who made contact with the Mayans in the 495 00:27:08,040 --> 00:27:12,200 Speaker 1: sixteenth century, the vast majority of these codices were destroyed 496 00:27:12,800 --> 00:27:15,880 Speaker 1: later due to their either either they were seen as 497 00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:18,639 Speaker 1: being satanic in nature, being you know, just you know, 498 00:27:19,359 --> 00:27:22,120 Speaker 1: there's something dangerous about them, or they were just seen 499 00:27:22,160 --> 00:27:25,000 Speaker 1: as useless, just you know, garbage to be disposed of, 500 00:27:25,320 --> 00:27:29,919 Speaker 1: and so most of them were disposed of. Um, but 501 00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:33,000 Speaker 1: I think, what are the source I was reading here? 502 00:27:33,240 --> 00:27:36,000 Speaker 1: They were like they're like four complete codices of the 503 00:27:36,040 --> 00:27:38,800 Speaker 1: Maya's left in the world, and that's it, you know, 504 00:27:38,880 --> 00:27:42,280 Speaker 1: just this vast wealth of information, these libraries and information 505 00:27:42,520 --> 00:27:45,600 Speaker 1: are just lost to us. Just just one more horror 506 00:27:45,640 --> 00:27:49,960 Speaker 1: of the subjugation of the Maya people by European invaders. Um. Yeah, 507 00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:53,720 Speaker 1: that kind of destruction of knowledge is just like such 508 00:27:53,760 --> 00:27:58,160 Speaker 1: a blasphemy. Yeah. So like just you know, without getting 509 00:27:58,160 --> 00:28:00,320 Speaker 1: into the just sort of the larger horror of that 510 00:28:00,359 --> 00:28:04,240 Speaker 1: whole situation, just in terms of trying to understand how 511 00:28:04,560 --> 00:28:07,320 Speaker 1: the Mayan's made paper, you know, what was what what 512 00:28:07,359 --> 00:28:10,719 Speaker 1: was their original papermaking process, it becomes difficult because then 513 00:28:10,800 --> 00:28:12,840 Speaker 1: researchers have to, you know, they have to try and 514 00:28:12,920 --> 00:28:16,680 Speaker 1: reconstruct their methods based on you know, the few remaining codicies, 515 00:28:16,720 --> 00:28:19,840 Speaker 1: but also a lot of secondary evidence looking to modern 516 00:28:19,880 --> 00:28:22,320 Speaker 1: traditions in that part of the world, and sort of 517 00:28:22,520 --> 00:28:25,320 Speaker 1: you know, backtracking from that and then of course engaging 518 00:28:25,359 --> 00:28:28,800 Speaker 1: in a lot of experimentation. So Tobin himself tries this 519 00:28:28,840 --> 00:28:31,280 Speaker 1: out in this paper, uh, you know, trying to create 520 00:28:31,359 --> 00:28:35,080 Speaker 1: his own Mayan paper and ultimately his own Mayan UH codex. 521 00:28:35,600 --> 00:28:38,360 Speaker 1: As best we can tell, it was probably an intricate 522 00:28:38,400 --> 00:28:41,520 Speaker 1: process that by necessity lines up with some of the 523 00:28:41,600 --> 00:28:46,120 Speaker 1: steps used in other paking papermaking processes. Likewise, there is 524 00:28:46,120 --> 00:28:49,360 Speaker 1: some guesswork involved in the evolution of the craft, how 525 00:28:49,360 --> 00:28:52,480 Speaker 1: it developed from that. You know that the garment craft 526 00:28:52,600 --> 00:28:55,960 Speaker 1: that we already mentioned, we ultimately you know, know more 527 00:28:56,120 --> 00:29:00,480 Speaker 1: with certainty about say Egyptian and Chinese papermaking. But you know, 528 00:29:00,520 --> 00:29:03,120 Speaker 1: it's it's really a shame because the Mayan technology was 529 00:29:03,160 --> 00:29:07,320 Speaker 1: pretty advanced, uh, and it hasn't received as much attention, 530 00:29:07,400 --> 00:29:11,200 Speaker 1: in part due to the cultural destruction. I certainly recommend 531 00:29:11,200 --> 00:29:14,120 Speaker 1: anyone out there to to to when you get a chance, 532 00:29:14,360 --> 00:29:16,720 Speaker 1: look up the Mayan codices and look at some of 533 00:29:16,760 --> 00:29:19,880 Speaker 1: the examples of the surviving codices the photographs of them, 534 00:29:19,920 --> 00:29:23,200 Speaker 1: because they are really fascinating with all of the you know, 535 00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:26,800 Speaker 1: the Mayan writing and glyphs inside of it. Uh, They're 536 00:29:26,800 --> 00:29:28,680 Speaker 1: beautiful to behold, and you and some of the pictures 537 00:29:28,680 --> 00:29:31,200 Speaker 1: you get a real good sense of the folds that 538 00:29:31,240 --> 00:29:35,360 Speaker 1: are involved here. Yeah. Well, especially the symphasis on paper 539 00:29:36,520 --> 00:29:40,280 Speaker 1: brings me back to the materials on which writing is 540 00:29:40,360 --> 00:29:43,680 Speaker 1: preserved and how fundamental that is to the history of 541 00:29:43,720 --> 00:29:46,480 Speaker 1: book technology. Because you know, we talked about in the 542 00:29:46,560 --> 00:29:50,360 Speaker 1: previous episode about the various advantages of parchment and vellum 543 00:29:50,440 --> 00:29:54,960 Speaker 1: versus papyrus. But basically everything we're talking about in the 544 00:29:55,000 --> 00:29:59,120 Speaker 1: ancient world is going to be relatively difficult to produce 545 00:29:59,320 --> 00:30:01,800 Speaker 1: and you're to have a more limited supply of it 546 00:30:02,000 --> 00:30:05,720 Speaker 1: than we would have of, say, say paper today. So 547 00:30:05,720 --> 00:30:08,520 Speaker 1: maybe we should go back and look at another branch 548 00:30:08,600 --> 00:30:10,520 Speaker 1: on the paper tree here and and look at the 549 00:30:10,600 --> 00:30:13,440 Speaker 1: Chinese origins of paper. Yeah yeah, this is this is 550 00:30:13,440 --> 00:30:17,240 Speaker 1: an area that we know a lot more about. Um So, yeah, 551 00:30:17,240 --> 00:30:20,240 Speaker 1: previously we touched on the Chinese origins of paper, uh 552 00:30:20,280 --> 00:30:22,680 Speaker 1: in roughly, I think we said one oh five CE, 553 00:30:23,240 --> 00:30:26,600 Speaker 1: and this is nearly a thousand years ahead of the Europeans. 554 00:30:26,720 --> 00:30:29,280 Speaker 1: I think there's some dispute about the dating of the 555 00:30:29,280 --> 00:30:32,040 Speaker 1: originary paper in China. Yeah, yeah, and we'll we'll get 556 00:30:32,080 --> 00:30:34,800 Speaker 1: into some of that here. Traditionally, credit for the invention 557 00:30:34,840 --> 00:30:38,600 Speaker 1: of paper is given to one Psiloon who was an 558 00:30:38,600 --> 00:30:42,560 Speaker 1: imperial eunuch, and he is said to have created paper 559 00:30:42,760 --> 00:30:47,120 Speaker 1: or g h which Andrew Robinson in sevent d Inventions 560 00:30:47,120 --> 00:30:50,920 Speaker 1: of the Ancient World says was defined in contemporary dictionaries 561 00:30:51,000 --> 00:30:55,880 Speaker 1: as quote a matt of refuse fibers from tree bark, imperimnants, 562 00:30:56,080 --> 00:31:00,280 Speaker 1: cloth rags, and old fishing nets. Yeah. To compliment at this, 563 00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:02,680 Speaker 1: I was reading a section in Howard about the production 564 00:31:02,720 --> 00:31:05,880 Speaker 1: of paper here in China, and she says, the Chinese 565 00:31:05,880 --> 00:31:09,960 Speaker 1: originally used silk fiber to make paper. Uh. And obviously 566 00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:11,800 Speaker 1: this would have made a paper of a high quality, 567 00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:14,920 Speaker 1: but this was going to be very expensive, and over 568 00:31:14,960 --> 00:31:18,080 Speaker 1: time this was replaced with hemp fiber, which was cheaper, 569 00:31:18,120 --> 00:31:21,720 Speaker 1: and then after that replaced with the sort of melange 570 00:31:21,800 --> 00:31:24,160 Speaker 1: of things you're talking about it, she says, quote a 571 00:31:24,200 --> 00:31:28,080 Speaker 1: combination of bark, scraps of rags that had been discarded 572 00:31:28,360 --> 00:31:31,920 Speaker 1: and bast fiber. And remember we mentioned bast fiber in 573 00:31:31,960 --> 00:31:35,440 Speaker 1: the last episode. It's the vascular tissue of a plant 574 00:31:35,800 --> 00:31:39,520 Speaker 1: that the plant uses to transport vital organic compounds produced 575 00:31:39,520 --> 00:31:43,280 Speaker 1: by photosynthesis from one place to another within the plant's body. 576 00:31:43,720 --> 00:31:45,920 Speaker 1: So it's kind of like a plant's arteries. You can 577 00:31:45,960 --> 00:31:50,520 Speaker 1: imagine ropes and ancient paper made out of plant arteries. Yeah, 578 00:31:50,840 --> 00:31:54,040 Speaker 1: kind of the scaffolding for the paper. Right. But so, 579 00:31:54,120 --> 00:31:56,120 Speaker 1: the process for this was that you would put all 580 00:31:56,160 --> 00:31:59,360 Speaker 1: these various fibrous materials into a big vat of water, 581 00:31:59,800 --> 00:32:02,240 Speaker 1: and then you would soak them through until they became 582 00:32:02,280 --> 00:32:05,080 Speaker 1: a kind of pulp or paste, and then you would 583 00:32:05,120 --> 00:32:08,880 Speaker 1: do your best to mix up and thoroughly emulsify the paste, 584 00:32:08,960 --> 00:32:11,480 Speaker 1: and then you would press it flat to squeeze the 585 00:32:11,480 --> 00:32:13,880 Speaker 1: water out, and then when it dried, you would have 586 00:32:14,000 --> 00:32:17,400 Speaker 1: a crude form of paper. Um. And just thinking about 587 00:32:17,400 --> 00:32:19,600 Speaker 1: the roll of the water here, I I couldn't help 588 00:32:19,600 --> 00:32:23,240 Speaker 1: but be reminded of our recent episode on soap, and 589 00:32:23,280 --> 00:32:26,760 Speaker 1: it just makes me appreciate again how much usually just 590 00:32:26,840 --> 00:32:31,760 Speaker 1: passes by us unnoticed regarding the deep connections between chemistry 591 00:32:31,800 --> 00:32:35,160 Speaker 1: and the more human subjects like history and culture and literature, 592 00:32:35,600 --> 00:32:39,520 Speaker 1: Like how the molecular properties of water are so deeply 593 00:32:39,720 --> 00:32:42,920 Speaker 1: entwined in life and history and everything we know because 594 00:32:42,920 --> 00:32:45,520 Speaker 1: of these polar opposite charges across the length of the 595 00:32:45,520 --> 00:32:49,400 Speaker 1: water molecule, the potency of those charges to dissolve and 596 00:32:49,560 --> 00:32:52,880 Speaker 1: ingest the corn ucopia of the material world. Water is, 597 00:32:52,920 --> 00:32:56,360 Speaker 1: of course, the defining substance of all cells and life processes. 598 00:32:56,400 --> 00:32:58,680 Speaker 1: Remember that quota we talked about on the soap episode 599 00:32:58,720 --> 00:33:03,400 Speaker 1: The Hungarian by oh chemist Albert sent Gurgi, who said 600 00:33:03,480 --> 00:33:06,080 Speaker 1: that quote, life could leave the ocean when it learned 601 00:33:06,080 --> 00:33:08,720 Speaker 1: to grow a skin bag in which to take the 602 00:33:08,760 --> 00:33:11,719 Speaker 1: water with it. We're still living in water, having the 603 00:33:11,720 --> 00:33:15,160 Speaker 1: water now inside. Yeah, and then we'll continue to to 604 00:33:15,560 --> 00:33:19,400 Speaker 1: stress here just how important water is to this advance 605 00:33:19,840 --> 00:33:23,680 Speaker 1: of paper and ultimately bookmaking technology. It's enough to make 606 00:33:23,720 --> 00:33:27,320 Speaker 1: you wonder if you had, say a desert world like um, 607 00:33:27,360 --> 00:33:29,640 Speaker 1: I don't know, like like tattooing in Star Wars, right, 608 00:33:30,080 --> 00:33:33,240 Speaker 1: Like could a world like that? Um, Like, what with 609 00:33:33,360 --> 00:33:35,640 Speaker 1: the world like that, what would be the chances of 610 00:33:35,800 --> 00:33:40,400 Speaker 1: sentient life forms developing paper that is that that functions 611 00:33:40,400 --> 00:33:42,240 Speaker 1: in the same way our paper was. It seems like 612 00:33:42,240 --> 00:33:44,600 Speaker 1: they might even have to have like a different material 613 00:33:45,160 --> 00:33:48,400 Speaker 1: um solution to the same problem. Well, yeah, I mean 614 00:33:49,120 --> 00:33:50,800 Speaker 1: for the same reasons you would have a hard time 615 00:33:50,840 --> 00:33:53,800 Speaker 1: imagining paper, you would have a hard time imagining life 616 00:33:53,840 --> 00:33:56,560 Speaker 1: forms at all, just because like it's the same reason 617 00:33:56,600 --> 00:33:59,320 Speaker 1: that water is the substance of life on Earth and 618 00:33:59,400 --> 00:34:02,000 Speaker 1: the step utter of all life and technology. It's the 619 00:34:02,080 --> 00:34:04,760 Speaker 1: same reason that water is good for washing your hands 620 00:34:04,760 --> 00:34:07,200 Speaker 1: in your dishes, and now it's also the same reason 621 00:34:07,240 --> 00:34:09,560 Speaker 1: that it's used to make this pulp that we squeeze 622 00:34:09,600 --> 00:34:12,960 Speaker 1: into paper. It's just the ultimate dissolver and ingestor of 623 00:34:13,000 --> 00:34:16,040 Speaker 1: all things. Uh. Sorry, I guess that's kind of a digression. 624 00:34:16,080 --> 00:34:18,239 Speaker 1: But every now and then you just got to go 625 00:34:18,280 --> 00:34:20,439 Speaker 1: down the water hole. Oh yeah, yeah, And like I said, 626 00:34:20,440 --> 00:34:23,080 Speaker 1: we'll keep going down in the water hole in this episode. Well, 627 00:34:23,120 --> 00:34:26,279 Speaker 1: let's come back to um that idea of China, the 628 00:34:26,320 --> 00:34:29,440 Speaker 1: Chinese origin of paper, uh, coming in roughly one oh 629 00:34:29,440 --> 00:34:32,880 Speaker 1: five c E. Again, that's the traditional story. However, there 630 00:34:32,960 --> 00:34:37,040 Speaker 1: is archaeological evidence that indicates that a very early form 631 00:34:37,080 --> 00:34:39,160 Speaker 1: of paper might have been in use in western China 632 00:34:39,600 --> 00:34:44,200 Speaker 1: the much earlier than this, pushing the probable beginnings of 633 00:34:44,320 --> 00:34:47,520 Speaker 1: Chinese paper back to perhaps the second century b C. 634 00:34:48,239 --> 00:34:52,440 Speaker 1: In tropical south and southeastern China. Robinson even says that 635 00:34:52,520 --> 00:34:55,360 Speaker 1: it's possible it began in the sixth or fifth centuries 636 00:34:55,440 --> 00:34:58,840 Speaker 1: b C. E uh, as this is when we've dated 637 00:34:58,880 --> 00:35:02,880 Speaker 1: the washings of Himp and Linen rags too. The idea 638 00:35:03,000 --> 00:35:06,880 Speaker 1: here is that someone might have accidentally discovered paper making 639 00:35:07,080 --> 00:35:11,000 Speaker 1: while drying wet fibers on a mat, which indeed is 640 00:35:11,200 --> 00:35:15,239 Speaker 1: very central to some of the papermaking techniques that were 641 00:35:15,239 --> 00:35:17,920 Speaker 1: discussing here. And we'll continue to discussing this episode. So 642 00:35:17,960 --> 00:35:22,080 Speaker 1: if I'm understanding this right, the hypothesis is maybe somebody 643 00:35:22,239 --> 00:35:25,840 Speaker 1: was washing some old rags and hemp and stuff in 644 00:35:25,920 --> 00:35:28,759 Speaker 1: water and then left it there for a while, and 645 00:35:28,800 --> 00:35:30,960 Speaker 1: then it started to kind of mush up and turn 646 00:35:31,040 --> 00:35:33,919 Speaker 1: into this pulp in the water, and then they tried 647 00:35:33,960 --> 00:35:37,160 Speaker 1: to dry it out and it formed this this substance. 648 00:35:37,560 --> 00:35:39,520 Speaker 1: Right though, again, this would be like a big question. 649 00:35:39,719 --> 00:35:43,719 Speaker 1: It's basically saying the thing that we think people were 650 00:35:43,760 --> 00:35:47,879 Speaker 1: doing to accidentally discover paper, they were doing it far 651 00:35:48,040 --> 00:35:51,360 Speaker 1: before we're dating the discovery of paper. So there's a 652 00:35:51,360 --> 00:35:53,640 Speaker 1: certain amount of guesswork there. Did they or didn't they? 653 00:35:54,040 --> 00:35:57,560 Speaker 1: It's impossible to say. I do want to note that 654 00:35:57,760 --> 00:36:01,080 Speaker 1: there are other historians, such as A History of China 655 00:36:01,160 --> 00:36:04,640 Speaker 1: author John Key is a source I come back to 656 00:36:04,840 --> 00:36:09,040 Speaker 1: UH again and again for Chinese history related matters, and he, 657 00:36:09,320 --> 00:36:12,040 Speaker 1: for one, seems to stick to the first and second centuries. 658 00:36:12,239 --> 00:36:14,919 Speaker 1: See as the origins of paper, and I think this 659 00:36:15,000 --> 00:36:18,040 Speaker 1: is probably a matter of you know, what has proven 660 00:36:18,160 --> 00:36:22,080 Speaker 1: and recorded versus what seems possible based on additional evidence. 661 00:36:22,719 --> 00:36:26,200 Speaker 1: Uh So, I think either way, it's it's fair to 662 00:36:26,280 --> 00:36:29,400 Speaker 1: say that paper was a product of the Han dynasty, 663 00:36:29,480 --> 00:36:32,600 Speaker 1: which you know, gives us a nice a nice spread 664 00:36:32,800 --> 00:36:36,920 Speaker 1: between two O two b C and two twenty Okay, 665 00:36:37,320 --> 00:36:41,000 Speaker 1: but we do know once paper was established, uh in China, 666 00:36:41,200 --> 00:36:44,560 Speaker 1: did spread out from there? Right right, paper would have 667 00:36:44,560 --> 00:36:48,400 Speaker 1: spread from China to Korea, Vietnam and Japan, and eventually 668 00:36:48,440 --> 00:36:50,920 Speaker 1: it would follow the Silk Road out of the East 669 00:36:51,040 --> 00:36:55,279 Speaker 1: into Central Asia and then the Arab world. Um. I 670 00:36:55,360 --> 00:36:58,760 Speaker 1: was reading more about this in the books of James Burke, 671 00:36:59,040 --> 00:37:02,919 Speaker 1: specifically Connects and The Daily Universe Changed, both of which 672 00:37:02,920 --> 00:37:05,239 Speaker 1: were also television series that I know of a lot 673 00:37:05,239 --> 00:37:10,960 Speaker 1: of our listeners grew up watching as well. So more specifically, 674 00:37:11,239 --> 00:37:15,359 Speaker 1: Burke points out that, uh, the Arabs end up acquiring 675 00:37:16,280 --> 00:37:23,200 Speaker 1: paper technology when they overran um summerkand in seven, during 676 00:37:23,200 --> 00:37:25,600 Speaker 1: which they captured a Chinese workmen who had been sent 677 00:37:25,760 --> 00:37:30,520 Speaker 1: there to set up a paper manufacturing factory and samarcandas 678 00:37:30,880 --> 00:37:33,160 Speaker 1: that would be in what is Central Asia, like modern 679 00:37:33,239 --> 00:37:37,040 Speaker 1: days Pekistan. Yeah. Yeah, so like basically the Chinese had 680 00:37:37,080 --> 00:37:41,839 Speaker 1: papermaking interests there and when Arab forces overran the city, Uh, 681 00:37:41,880 --> 00:37:45,359 Speaker 1: they ended up capturing the workmen and learned about it 682 00:37:45,400 --> 00:37:48,120 Speaker 1: that way, and it took off from there. By ten 683 00:37:48,280 --> 00:37:53,920 Speaker 1: fifty for example, the Byzantine Empire was importing Arab paper now. Uh. 684 00:37:54,200 --> 00:37:56,759 Speaker 1: There are some wonderful sections in both books where Burke 685 00:37:56,840 --> 00:38:00,600 Speaker 1: talks about about paper in the Arab world in the 686 00:38:00,680 --> 00:38:04,680 Speaker 1: day the universe changed. He points out that the availability 687 00:38:04,719 --> 00:38:09,200 Speaker 1: of paper quote encourage the development of a highly literate community, 688 00:38:09,320 --> 00:38:14,600 Speaker 1: with regular postal services delivering correspondences as far away as India. 689 00:38:15,000 --> 00:38:17,200 Speaker 1: And he also points to the air abuse of paper 690 00:38:17,239 --> 00:38:21,440 Speaker 1: money which played into export and import duties. Yeah. This 691 00:38:21,520 --> 00:38:25,080 Speaker 1: already suggests a very interesting back and forth between material 692 00:38:25,120 --> 00:38:28,760 Speaker 1: economics and literary culture, like the idea of the presence 693 00:38:28,800 --> 00:38:32,880 Speaker 1: of a cheaper medium for transmitting the written word potentially 694 00:38:32,920 --> 00:38:36,840 Speaker 1: allowing a culture to become more literary just because like 695 00:38:36,920 --> 00:38:40,080 Speaker 1: it's easier to produce written materials. Yeah. I found this 696 00:38:40,160 --> 00:38:43,520 Speaker 1: to be a fascinating passage. Again, just Burke talking about 697 00:38:43,560 --> 00:38:46,239 Speaker 1: the the the the Arab world by virtue of their 698 00:38:46,239 --> 00:38:50,080 Speaker 1: paper technology. Just having this this highly literate community and 699 00:38:50,120 --> 00:38:53,840 Speaker 1: then better communication. Yeah, and of course papermaking would go 700 00:38:53,880 --> 00:38:56,880 Speaker 1: on to become an important industry in like the medieval 701 00:38:56,920 --> 00:38:59,919 Speaker 1: Islamic world, and you can you can chart the path 702 00:39:00,160 --> 00:39:03,319 Speaker 1: way that paper took through the medieval Islamic world to 703 00:39:03,520 --> 00:39:07,680 Speaker 1: medieval Europe. There was some initial resistance to to paper 704 00:39:07,719 --> 00:39:09,839 Speaker 1: in Europe. I was reading about this in Howard's book. 705 00:39:09,920 --> 00:39:13,239 Speaker 1: She says that, quote, Uh, in twelve twenty one, the 706 00:39:13,280 --> 00:39:16,880 Speaker 1: Holy Roman Emperor Frederick the second issued a decree that 707 00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:21,960 Speaker 1: invalidated any government documents written on paper, such a Muslim 708 00:39:22,040 --> 00:39:27,480 Speaker 1: tool being unwelcome in Christendom, which what an amazingly ridiculous gesture. 709 00:39:28,200 --> 00:39:31,239 Speaker 1: But she she points out that the sanction was not effective. 710 00:39:31,880 --> 00:39:34,680 Speaker 1: She says, quote, paper mills spread quickly throughout Europe, and 711 00:39:34,719 --> 00:39:37,480 Speaker 1: as mills became more efficient, costs dropped, and in the 712 00:39:37,520 --> 00:39:40,520 Speaker 1: fifteenth century, uh, to the to the point where paper 713 00:39:40,600 --> 00:39:43,440 Speaker 1: was one six the price of vellum. So it's just 714 00:39:43,480 --> 00:39:47,080 Speaker 1: like the material advantages and the cheapness of paper overcame 715 00:39:47,160 --> 00:39:52,279 Speaker 1: whatever kind of attempted bands or cultural prejudice that we're 716 00:39:52,320 --> 00:39:55,680 Speaker 1: attempting to keep paper out of Europe. Oh, yeah, absolutely, 717 00:39:55,680 --> 00:39:58,600 Speaker 1: and we'll come back to this in a bit, uh, 718 00:39:58,640 --> 00:40:02,120 Speaker 1: because it's the prejudice against the new new paper. Is uh. 719 00:40:02,320 --> 00:40:05,160 Speaker 1: Is this such a wonderful topic. But first I'd like 720 00:40:05,200 --> 00:40:07,880 Speaker 1: to go back to China for just a minute with 721 00:40:07,960 --> 00:40:11,759 Speaker 1: a word on printed books, because this was also really cool. 722 00:40:11,800 --> 00:40:13,640 Speaker 1: I was again, I was reading in keys The History 723 00:40:13,640 --> 00:40:16,799 Speaker 1: of China, which is a nice, suitably thick tone, but 724 00:40:16,920 --> 00:40:20,400 Speaker 1: concise tone, mobile mobile tone about the you know, the 725 00:40:20,719 --> 00:40:24,160 Speaker 1: epic history of China. He discusses in one part a 726 00:40:24,239 --> 00:40:27,840 Speaker 1: Buddhist book titled the Diamond Sutra, which is an old 727 00:40:28,719 --> 00:40:32,799 Speaker 1: Mayana sutra that was translated into various languages first and 728 00:40:32,840 --> 00:40:35,279 Speaker 1: I think four hundred c E. And it was so 729 00:40:35,320 --> 00:40:38,680 Speaker 1: called the diamond Sutra because for those who mastered it, 730 00:40:38,840 --> 00:40:41,799 Speaker 1: mastered its teachings. It was said to cut away all 731 00:40:41,920 --> 00:40:45,920 Speaker 1: worldly illusions like a diamond. So there's a ten dynasty 732 00:40:46,040 --> 00:40:50,800 Speaker 1: translation that was found uncovered again in nineteen hundred C. 733 00:40:51,600 --> 00:40:55,680 Speaker 1: And it was subsequently dated to May eleven, eight sixty 734 00:40:55,800 --> 00:41:00,440 Speaker 1: eight C. And it consisted of seven printed pages pasted 735 00:41:00,480 --> 00:41:04,319 Speaker 1: together to form a scroll. Now Key points out that 736 00:41:04,400 --> 00:41:08,400 Speaker 1: this is sometimes wrongfully cited as the world's first printed book, 737 00:41:08,760 --> 00:41:12,520 Speaker 1: but then he adds quote replicating images and written characters 738 00:41:12,600 --> 00:41:16,440 Speaker 1: using inked blocks carved in relief, a process not much 739 00:41:16,520 --> 00:41:20,360 Speaker 1: removed from that used for making molds for ceramics and metals, 740 00:41:20,680 --> 00:41:24,160 Speaker 1: had been practiced in China since at least the eighth century. 741 00:41:24,200 --> 00:41:27,440 Speaker 1: But it is the oldest complete printed text with a 742 00:41:27,560 --> 00:41:31,160 Speaker 1: date with a date yeah. Uh and uh again, this 743 00:41:31,239 --> 00:41:33,359 Speaker 1: is one worth looking up a picture of because it's 744 00:41:33,360 --> 00:41:36,560 Speaker 1: really beautiful to look at the the art inside, um 745 00:41:37,520 --> 00:41:40,640 Speaker 1: is just absolutely beautiful. Uh. Yes, so I was reading 746 00:41:40,640 --> 00:41:44,000 Speaker 1: others considered this to be the oldest surviving printed book 747 00:41:44,080 --> 00:41:47,359 Speaker 1: in the world, and it's it's worth noting. He makes 748 00:41:47,360 --> 00:41:49,440 Speaker 1: a Key makes a point on this. Uh. This was 749 00:41:49,640 --> 00:41:53,800 Speaker 1: seven centuries before Gutenberg. This was eleven centuries before the 750 00:41:53,840 --> 00:41:57,440 Speaker 1: printing of India's scripts. Key contends that this was quote 751 00:41:57,680 --> 00:42:01,800 Speaker 1: undoubtedly the most momentous of all Chinese inventions. As a result, 752 00:42:02,040 --> 00:42:05,440 Speaker 1: Europe and India still have dozens of languages and literatures, 753 00:42:05,480 --> 00:42:10,200 Speaker 1: but China only one. Uh. Now, he's you know, making 754 00:42:10,239 --> 00:42:14,319 Speaker 1: he's not saying that China only has one language per 755 00:42:14,320 --> 00:42:18,160 Speaker 1: se here because obviously China has numerous languages. Um. But 756 00:42:18,160 --> 00:42:21,719 Speaker 1: but just talking about the consolidated um. Uh, you know, 757 00:42:22,080 --> 00:42:26,160 Speaker 1: focus on a single literature in a single language within 758 00:42:26,400 --> 00:42:29,440 Speaker 1: Chinese history. Yeah, well, I think this would go back 759 00:42:29,440 --> 00:42:32,799 Speaker 1: to what we talked about in the Chinese typewriter episode, right, 760 00:42:32,800 --> 00:42:35,520 Speaker 1: with the idea that the h am I correct in 761 00:42:35,560 --> 00:42:39,399 Speaker 1: thinking the different spoken languages of Chinese would still use 762 00:42:39,480 --> 00:42:44,160 Speaker 1: the same written script. Yes, yes, absolutely, yeah, uh and yeah. 763 00:42:44,280 --> 00:42:46,000 Speaker 1: I will remind people if you're interested in that. If 764 00:42:46,000 --> 00:42:48,560 Speaker 1: you want more about Chinese language, go back and listen 765 00:42:48,600 --> 00:42:51,160 Speaker 1: to that. Was it one episode or two? I can't recall. 766 00:42:51,560 --> 00:42:54,200 Speaker 1: I think it was just one, one really long episode 767 00:42:54,520 --> 00:42:57,200 Speaker 1: about the Chinese typewriter. Yeah. We talked with the author 768 00:42:57,680 --> 00:43:03,200 Speaker 1: Thomas S. Mulaney, who wrote ess typewriter history. In his book, Keys, 769 00:43:03,239 --> 00:43:07,839 Speaker 1: stresses that the real infotech revolution took place mostly during 770 00:43:07,880 --> 00:43:11,239 Speaker 1: the Five Dynasty's Ten Kingdoms period, which would have been 771 00:43:11,320 --> 00:43:14,799 Speaker 1: nine oh seven to nine seventy nine. The first use 772 00:43:14,840 --> 00:43:18,200 Speaker 1: of movable type may also date to this period, he adds, 773 00:43:18,360 --> 00:43:21,640 Speaker 1: but the earliest authoritative account of it being used would 774 00:43:21,640 --> 00:43:24,880 Speaker 1: come a few decades later, in the early eleventh century. 775 00:43:25,160 --> 00:43:26,919 Speaker 1: All right, I think we need to take another break, 776 00:43:26,920 --> 00:43:29,600 Speaker 1: but when we come back, we can discuss paper making 777 00:43:29,640 --> 00:43:36,400 Speaker 1: its way to European Alright, we're back Now, earlier we 778 00:43:36,440 --> 00:43:39,680 Speaker 1: already mentioned the idea of the influx of paper making 779 00:43:39,719 --> 00:43:43,440 Speaker 1: technology into Europe through the Muslim world in the Middle Ages, 780 00:43:43,520 --> 00:43:47,680 Speaker 1: and some attempts to to stem the tide of oncoming 781 00:43:47,719 --> 00:43:51,680 Speaker 1: paper technology, but ultimately any attempts of those sorts would fail. 782 00:43:51,800 --> 00:43:55,120 Speaker 1: Paper was destined to be the writing material of choice. 783 00:43:55,600 --> 00:43:58,520 Speaker 1: That's right, and so very discussed very where he mentioned 784 00:43:58,520 --> 00:44:01,520 Speaker 1: how paper from the Arab world is going to make 785 00:44:01,560 --> 00:44:05,600 Speaker 1: its way into Europe. Now specifically it ends up spreading 786 00:44:05,920 --> 00:44:10,560 Speaker 1: through the Arab world to Moorish Spain, specifically um I 787 00:44:10,600 --> 00:44:14,960 Speaker 1: believe it's pronounced Sha Tiva, which is south of Valencia, 788 00:44:15,080 --> 00:44:17,600 Speaker 1: and this is where the more is established paper mills, 789 00:44:17,920 --> 00:44:21,480 Speaker 1: and from here the technology spread to Christian Europe. Now 790 00:44:21,480 --> 00:44:25,200 Speaker 1: an interesting note from Burke about paper making technology in 791 00:44:25,239 --> 00:44:28,280 Speaker 1: both connections and the day of the universe change. Water 792 00:44:28,400 --> 00:44:32,480 Speaker 1: powered paper milling was in effect by at least twelve eighty. 793 00:44:32,640 --> 00:44:36,120 Speaker 1: Again the power of water coming into play here where 794 00:44:36,120 --> 00:44:39,840 Speaker 1: where it was used in the Italian marshes. Basically, water 795 00:44:40,000 --> 00:44:43,280 Speaker 1: powered trip hammers were used in these factories to pound 796 00:44:43,400 --> 00:44:47,000 Speaker 1: linen that was submerged in water to produce a white pulp, 797 00:44:47,400 --> 00:44:50,520 Speaker 1: which has then spread out to dry on wire mesh 798 00:44:50,880 --> 00:44:53,719 Speaker 1: and then pressed in a screw press to squeeze the 799 00:44:53,719 --> 00:44:57,440 Speaker 1: water out, and then you would hang it up to dry. Uh, 800 00:44:57,480 --> 00:45:00,799 Speaker 1: and then here's another fund. This is a classic connections here. 801 00:45:01,520 --> 00:45:04,839 Speaker 1: Burke rights that the timing was just right on the 802 00:45:04,880 --> 00:45:08,480 Speaker 1: mesh front because again it was like a metal mesh, 803 00:45:08,560 --> 00:45:12,160 Speaker 1: and it was the work of tailor's who had far 804 00:45:12,480 --> 00:45:15,600 Speaker 1: less work to do following the Black Death. These were 805 00:45:15,800 --> 00:45:19,200 Speaker 1: craftspeople who would have previously been stitching gold and silver 806 00:45:19,280 --> 00:45:22,360 Speaker 1: threads into garments, but now in the wake of the 807 00:45:22,400 --> 00:45:26,400 Speaker 1: Black Death there was garment making was was was less 808 00:45:26,520 --> 00:45:28,360 Speaker 1: of a business. There was there was less of it 809 00:45:28,400 --> 00:45:32,080 Speaker 1: to go around, so these very crafts people were now 810 00:45:32,280 --> 00:45:35,560 Speaker 1: making these fine meshes that were so important to the 811 00:45:35,560 --> 00:45:39,360 Speaker 1: paper making process. Anyway, back to the water powered paper 812 00:45:39,400 --> 00:45:43,000 Speaker 1: factories here. By the fourteenth century, these new advancements in 813 00:45:43,000 --> 00:45:46,799 Speaker 1: in the water power technology allowed linen rags, which were 814 00:45:46,840 --> 00:45:49,880 Speaker 1: collected by rag and bone men a lot of the times, 815 00:45:50,080 --> 00:45:53,279 Speaker 1: to be pounded into cheap, durable paper, and by the 816 00:45:53,320 --> 00:45:55,319 Speaker 1: end of the fourteenth century the price of paper in 817 00:45:55,360 --> 00:45:59,600 Speaker 1: Bologna had dropped by four percent, so this was cheaper 818 00:45:59,640 --> 00:46:03,760 Speaker 1: than parchment, but parchment purist. They some of them resisted 819 00:46:03,800 --> 00:46:07,560 Speaker 1: the change, insisting that, well, parchment can last a thousand years, 820 00:46:07,560 --> 00:46:10,920 Speaker 1: but this new paper, I don't know. I mean, i'd 821 00:46:10,960 --> 00:46:17,440 Speaker 1: grant I think parchment probably is more durable than paper, right, yeah, cheaper, 822 00:46:17,880 --> 00:46:21,239 Speaker 1: you know, it's hard to argue with that. It certainly is. 823 00:46:22,000 --> 00:46:24,200 Speaker 1: Now I want to throw in a note about rag 824 00:46:24,280 --> 00:46:26,360 Speaker 1: and bone men. Now some of you might hear that, 825 00:46:26,400 --> 00:46:28,759 Speaker 1: and you might think, well, this sounds like reanimate corpses 826 00:46:29,000 --> 00:46:32,480 Speaker 1: that are doing the will of the of the papermakers. 827 00:46:32,880 --> 00:46:35,279 Speaker 1: Uh No, they were not. They were, but they were 828 00:46:35,320 --> 00:46:38,959 Speaker 1: impoverished junk dealers that traveled around England. They were also 829 00:46:39,040 --> 00:46:43,240 Speaker 1: known as bone grubbers, and they did indeed scavenge bones 830 00:46:43,719 --> 00:46:47,120 Speaker 1: as well as junk for resale. In fact, Burke Rights 831 00:46:47,120 --> 00:46:50,120 Speaker 1: and connections that the bone scavenging, uh that you know 832 00:46:50,280 --> 00:46:52,880 Speaker 1: that was previously their main gig was all about collecting 833 00:46:52,920 --> 00:46:56,439 Speaker 1: the bones for use in fertilizer. But they then came 834 00:46:56,480 --> 00:47:00,600 Speaker 1: to collect and sell old rags to the paper makers, 835 00:47:00,960 --> 00:47:03,840 Speaker 1: and it was a tradition that lasted for centuries. Linen 836 00:47:03,960 --> 00:47:08,640 Speaker 1: rags especially were excellent raw materials for high quality, durable paper. Man. 837 00:47:08,680 --> 00:47:10,480 Speaker 1: That brings to mind a couple of things. First of all, 838 00:47:10,560 --> 00:47:13,720 Speaker 1: like this, uh, the class of people who collect things 839 00:47:13,800 --> 00:47:17,200 Speaker 1: counterintuitively that they can sell to well, it makes me 840 00:47:17,239 --> 00:47:19,840 Speaker 1: think of an ancient Rome, the people who collected urine 841 00:47:20,320 --> 00:47:23,360 Speaker 1: from from city latrines in order to sell to you know, 842 00:47:23,520 --> 00:47:27,200 Speaker 1: laundries and and the various businesses that used urine for 843 00:47:27,800 --> 00:47:30,200 Speaker 1: you know, its properties at the time. I remember, I 844 00:47:30,200 --> 00:47:33,640 Speaker 1: believe it was the Emperor Vespasian who first put a 845 00:47:33,719 --> 00:47:37,040 Speaker 1: tax on urine in order to support something he wanted 846 00:47:37,080 --> 00:47:40,200 Speaker 1: to do. And that's where the phrase money has no 847 00:47:40,320 --> 00:47:43,520 Speaker 1: smell comes from. You know. Somebody was like challenging him 848 00:47:43,520 --> 00:47:46,080 Speaker 1: on this and saying, the tax on urine to raise funds, 849 00:47:46,120 --> 00:47:49,279 Speaker 1: that's disgusting, and he's like, I don't smell anything on 850 00:47:49,320 --> 00:47:53,239 Speaker 1: the money. Urine also a friend of the the alchemist, 851 00:47:53,360 --> 00:47:56,000 Speaker 1: Oh absolutely, yeah. Who was it who had the big 852 00:47:56,000 --> 00:48:00,360 Speaker 1: old out of urine experiment? Oh goodness that when we 853 00:48:00,400 --> 00:48:02,840 Speaker 1: were talking about this is when in our history the 854 00:48:02,880 --> 00:48:05,560 Speaker 1: match we got into this. Yeah, when the Invention episode 855 00:48:05,560 --> 00:48:09,520 Speaker 1: about the match. Um, I forget that the exact timetable there, 856 00:48:09,560 --> 00:48:13,200 Speaker 1: but there were some key alchemists that were experimenting with 857 00:48:13,360 --> 00:48:19,080 Speaker 1: urine and hennig brand it was at the Big Urine. Yeah, yes, yeah, yeah, 858 00:48:19,040 --> 00:48:21,000 Speaker 1: I remember that now. So yeah, if you want more 859 00:48:21,160 --> 00:48:25,040 Speaker 1: urine based content, go look up that Invention episode on 860 00:48:25,239 --> 00:48:28,200 Speaker 1: the match Stick. You know. For a brief literary digression, 861 00:48:28,239 --> 00:48:30,200 Speaker 1: I could not help but think when you were talking 862 00:48:30,280 --> 00:48:33,520 Speaker 1: about the rag and Bone Man, the rag and Bone Collectors, 863 00:48:34,120 --> 00:48:36,360 Speaker 1: I couldn't help but think about the poem The Circus 864 00:48:36,440 --> 00:48:40,040 Speaker 1: Animals Desertion by the famous Irish poet William Butler Yates 865 00:48:40,080 --> 00:48:43,280 Speaker 1: and its image of the foul rag and bone shop 866 00:48:43,320 --> 00:48:47,400 Speaker 1: of the heart. This is it's it's really interesting. So 867 00:48:47,680 --> 00:48:49,800 Speaker 1: this poem was written in the final years of yates 868 00:48:49,880 --> 00:48:53,160 Speaker 1: his life, and in the early parts of the poem 869 00:48:53,200 --> 00:48:57,560 Speaker 1: he describes a kind of poetic jealousy of his younger self, 870 00:48:57,680 --> 00:49:01,480 Speaker 1: based in the agony of feeling that the imagination and 871 00:49:01,600 --> 00:49:05,120 Speaker 1: inspiration that came so easily to him in youth have 872 00:49:05,239 --> 00:49:08,480 Speaker 1: now abandoned him, and he finds himself in old age 873 00:49:08,560 --> 00:49:13,319 Speaker 1: struggling to find something meaningful or interesting to say. Uh So, 874 00:49:13,520 --> 00:49:16,120 Speaker 1: in instant you know, if you if you ever felt 875 00:49:16,160 --> 00:49:18,359 Speaker 1: yourself in one of those writer early moods, you will 876 00:49:18,400 --> 00:49:21,920 Speaker 1: know the agony of it. Uh. Instead, he finds himself 877 00:49:22,080 --> 00:49:25,799 Speaker 1: nostalgically obsessing about the characters and themes that he had 878 00:49:25,800 --> 00:49:29,200 Speaker 1: written about in earlier poems of his, one of those 879 00:49:29,200 --> 00:49:31,920 Speaker 1: subjects being one of our favorite mythical buddies, the Irish 880 00:49:31,960 --> 00:49:37,040 Speaker 1: hero Kukulan or kuhlan uh. So he so, just to 881 00:49:37,040 --> 00:49:38,839 Speaker 1: read a couple of these lines, he's, you know, he's 882 00:49:38,960 --> 00:49:41,160 Speaker 1: musing on these things he used to write about all 883 00:49:41,200 --> 00:49:44,120 Speaker 1: the time, he says, And when the fool and blind 884 00:49:44,160 --> 00:49:48,760 Speaker 1: man stole the bread, Kukulan fought the ungovernable sea heart 885 00:49:48,880 --> 00:49:52,160 Speaker 1: mysteries there and yet when all is said, it was 886 00:49:52,239 --> 00:49:56,920 Speaker 1: the dream itself enchanted me, character isolated by a deed 887 00:49:57,200 --> 00:50:01,440 Speaker 1: to engross the present and dominate memory. Players and painted 888 00:50:01,520 --> 00:50:04,640 Speaker 1: stage took all my love, and not those things that 889 00:50:04,719 --> 00:50:08,279 Speaker 1: they were emblems of, which is an interesting admission, Like 890 00:50:08,320 --> 00:50:10,680 Speaker 1: he's saying, I think that, you know, he once believed 891 00:50:10,719 --> 00:50:14,840 Speaker 1: he was using mythical figures and stories as metaphors or 892 00:50:14,880 --> 00:50:19,719 Speaker 1: allegory to convey some underlying message about principles or politics 893 00:50:19,800 --> 00:50:23,120 Speaker 1: or whatever, but now admits that the underlying message was 894 00:50:23,160 --> 00:50:25,760 Speaker 1: always sort of a pretense, and what he really liked 895 00:50:26,200 --> 00:50:30,600 Speaker 1: were the mythical elements themselves that their face value, He 896 00:50:30,719 --> 00:50:34,000 Speaker 1: liked the heroes, he liked the settings, he liked the images. Yeah, 897 00:50:34,040 --> 00:50:35,520 Speaker 1: this is not a work of his. I was familiar 898 00:50:35,600 --> 00:50:37,920 Speaker 1: with that, but I really like that sentiment. And then 899 00:50:37,960 --> 00:50:39,319 Speaker 1: in the end of the poem, when he gets to 900 00:50:39,360 --> 00:50:41,399 Speaker 1: that image I mentioned, he asks himself like, well, where 901 00:50:41,400 --> 00:50:44,160 Speaker 1: did these images first come from? When you first you know, 902 00:50:44,160 --> 00:50:46,479 Speaker 1: when I wrote them? In the beginning and in its 903 00:50:46,480 --> 00:50:50,000 Speaker 1: concluding right lines, he writes, now that my ladder is gone, 904 00:50:50,080 --> 00:50:52,960 Speaker 1: I must lie down where all the ladders start, in 905 00:50:53,000 --> 00:50:56,919 Speaker 1: the foul rag and bone shop of the heart. Uh. 906 00:50:56,920 --> 00:50:59,160 Speaker 1: And I know this last line is interpreted by some 907 00:50:59,239 --> 00:51:02,440 Speaker 1: critics to refer to the paper on which the poem 908 00:51:02,520 --> 00:51:05,359 Speaker 1: is composed, the rag and bone shop being, of course 909 00:51:05,400 --> 00:51:07,440 Speaker 1: the place where you would buy paper, I guess, or 910 00:51:07,520 --> 00:51:09,640 Speaker 1: to you know, sell the stuff to make the paper. 911 00:51:10,440 --> 00:51:14,120 Speaker 1: And so for another weird connection between technology and literature, 912 00:51:14,920 --> 00:51:18,560 Speaker 1: I think this ending suggests to me that sometimes imagination 913 00:51:18,680 --> 00:51:21,840 Speaker 1: comes out of pure labor. He's suggesting that, you know, 914 00:51:21,920 --> 00:51:25,160 Speaker 1: the same way. Inventors are often not people dreaming up 915 00:51:25,200 --> 00:51:28,440 Speaker 1: ideal machines in the solitude of an ivory tower, but 916 00:51:28,760 --> 00:51:32,520 Speaker 1: people working with many hours of hands on experience with 917 00:51:32,560 --> 00:51:36,640 Speaker 1: a particular mechanical problem. And in the same way. Often 918 00:51:36,680 --> 00:51:39,880 Speaker 1: the poet who conjures great imagery and themes is not 919 00:51:39,960 --> 00:51:42,600 Speaker 1: the one who you know, shoots lightning bolts of genius 920 00:51:42,600 --> 00:51:44,920 Speaker 1: straight out of their brain. But it's somebody who does 921 00:51:44,960 --> 00:51:47,520 Speaker 1: a lot of work on the page, writing and writing 922 00:51:47,560 --> 00:51:51,160 Speaker 1: lots of junk until things begin to click and beauty emerges. 923 00:51:51,719 --> 00:51:55,640 Speaker 1: Just pounding the pulp, tell you have you can make 924 00:51:56,080 --> 00:51:59,840 Speaker 1: a fine piece of parchment out of out of old rags. 925 00:52:00,680 --> 00:52:04,480 Speaker 1: Now to go back to the paper industry itself. Uh, 926 00:52:04,800 --> 00:52:07,120 Speaker 1: there's another bit from Burke here that I wanted to share. 927 00:52:07,560 --> 00:52:10,319 Speaker 1: Writes that quote as the paper mill spreads, so too 928 00:52:10,320 --> 00:52:14,239 Speaker 1: to the spirit of religious reform unquote. And this would 929 00:52:14,239 --> 00:52:17,920 Speaker 1: have been alongside literacy itself and scriptoriums. And as the 930 00:52:17,960 --> 00:52:21,440 Speaker 1: price of paper fell, the development of eyeglasses advanced to 931 00:52:21,480 --> 00:52:24,759 Speaker 1: meet the demand for literacy, something we discussed in our 932 00:52:24,880 --> 00:52:29,759 Speaker 1: our our podcast episode of Invention on the sunglasses. But 933 00:52:29,800 --> 00:52:33,239 Speaker 1: there would still be too far, too few scribes in 934 00:52:33,320 --> 00:52:35,799 Speaker 1: Europe to meet the demands of the business world at 935 00:52:35,800 --> 00:52:39,960 Speaker 1: the time, even if you were now making cyborg scribes 936 00:52:40,120 --> 00:52:43,759 Speaker 1: via your your spectacle technology, you know, extending the the 937 00:52:44,120 --> 00:52:47,080 Speaker 1: the basically the uh, you know, the life of a 938 00:52:47,160 --> 00:52:51,239 Speaker 1: scribe by altering their eyes with these fabulous lenses. Um, 939 00:52:51,440 --> 00:52:55,360 Speaker 1: you still needed one invention yet that will really, you know, 940 00:52:55,480 --> 00:52:58,960 Speaker 1: boost literacy enough to you know, to give you the 941 00:52:59,000 --> 00:53:01,560 Speaker 1: scribes you need for the for the business world to thrive. 942 00:53:01,880 --> 00:53:04,839 Speaker 1: And that, of course is the printing press. But that, 943 00:53:05,080 --> 00:53:08,080 Speaker 1: as they say, is another story, and she'll be told 944 00:53:08,120 --> 00:53:12,200 Speaker 1: another time. Man, I'm not done thinking about how not 945 00:53:12,320 --> 00:53:14,520 Speaker 1: just the contents of the books we read, but the 946 00:53:14,520 --> 00:53:17,480 Speaker 1: physical form of the book has shaped our brain. I 947 00:53:17,520 --> 00:53:21,480 Speaker 1: think that there are there are insights yet left unearthed 948 00:53:21,719 --> 00:53:25,360 Speaker 1: on this subject. Absolutely all right, we're gonna have to 949 00:53:25,400 --> 00:53:27,800 Speaker 1: close it out for now, but we hope you enjoyed 950 00:53:27,840 --> 00:53:31,120 Speaker 1: our our two episode look at the invention of the book, 951 00:53:31,120 --> 00:53:34,880 Speaker 1: the invented invention of the codex. Uh. Perhaps this is 952 00:53:34,920 --> 00:53:37,319 Speaker 1: just the beginning of a journey for us as we know. 953 00:53:37,400 --> 00:53:42,920 Speaker 1: Come back to UH two additional literary inventions paper inventions 954 00:53:43,400 --> 00:53:46,919 Speaker 1: in the subsequent episodes. In the meantime, if you would 955 00:53:47,000 --> 00:53:48,839 Speaker 1: like to listen to other episodes of Stuff to boil 956 00:53:48,880 --> 00:53:52,719 Speaker 1: your mind for you who long for our little podcast 957 00:53:52,800 --> 00:53:55,319 Speaker 1: to be with you everywhere and want to have companions 958 00:53:55,400 --> 00:53:58,680 Speaker 1: for a long journey. You can find them wherever you 959 00:53:58,719 --> 00:54:03,080 Speaker 1: get your podcasts. Look up Secundus behind the Temple of 960 00:54:03,120 --> 00:54:06,360 Speaker 1: Palace right and when you get our podcast from Secundus, 961 00:54:06,640 --> 00:54:09,520 Speaker 1: make sure that you rate, review and subscribe for more 962 00:54:09,880 --> 00:54:13,440 Speaker 1: Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer Seth 963 00:54:13,520 --> 00:54:15,799 Speaker 1: Nicholas Johnson. If you would like to get in touch 964 00:54:15,840 --> 00:54:18,000 Speaker 1: with us with feedback on this episode or any other, 965 00:54:18,040 --> 00:54:20,680 Speaker 1: to suggest a topic for the future, just to say hello, 966 00:54:21,000 --> 00:54:23,719 Speaker 1: you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow 967 00:54:23,760 --> 00:54:33,640 Speaker 1: your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is 968 00:54:33,640 --> 00:54:36,360 Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts for my 969 00:54:36,400 --> 00:54:39,440 Speaker 1: heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or 970 00:54:39,480 --> 00:54:49,880 Speaker 1: wherever you listening to your favorite shows.