Origin Of The Chinese Woodblock Printing

The writer has been told not merely once by Prot.Dai Nanhai that the study of Chinese photoxylographical printing is a very hard nut to crack in the study of the edition of anciant Chinese books.When was it invented?As opinions always vary on foreign and Chinese academic circles,no unanimous conclusion can be drawn.Judged by material,technological,and written languags conditions essential to its invention,it was probably invonted in late Sui or Northern and Southern Dynasties,but to say it invented in Eastern Han is absolately impossible.Nevertheless,in accordance with archaeo logical material and documetary nowadays there are enough evidences for its beginning in early Tang Dynasty.Yet as some Southern Korean scholars discovered Wu Gou Jing Guang Da dharnani or Buddhist charms in Shi Jia Ta Buddhist pagoda in Fo Guo Si monastery,the city of Qing zhou,in Oct1966, and seem the charms to be the earliest printed matter newly discovered in the world at present,they obstinately assert out of national sentiment that it is Korea which invented the printing the earliest in the world.Practically and realistically speaking,they don't understand Chinese archaeology and are thus a bit self-important.The earliest printed matter is still in China.Of the printed books,in foreign languages and in Chinese,of the charms unearthed in Tang Dynasty tombs,western suburbs,Xi'an any is earlier than those of the charms unearthed in Southern Korea.It is,the writer is afraid,very difficult for any other country to wrest the inventor's patent from China.