Scripts Workshop Home THE HISTORY OF PAPER AND THE SPREAD OF WRITING 

By Carol Murphey CaMup@aol.com
© Bay Area Global Education Program, January 25, 2002
TASK CARDS:| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
TASK CARD ONE In the beginning writing was cut with a stylus, (a sharpened object) into tablets of soft clay and allowed to harden. To retain these writings, it involved the storage of cumbersome clay tablets. Mesopotamia had libraries that stored these clay tablets. The tablets were heavy, breakable, and therefore not accessible by the ordinary person. Scholars were trained to inscribe business transactions, religious material, laws, care of crops, and other useful things. 

GET THE FOLLOWING MATERIALS: a lump of clay, a plastic knife, a pencil, a map of Ancient Mesopotamia and a copy of the Cuneiform Alphabet.

  • Read the statement above. Answer the questions below. Produce your product and prepare your class presentation.
QUESTIONS: 
  1. What problems will you have storing your documents and keeping them from harm?
  2. Who will be taught to read and write in your society? Why? 
  3. What kind of documents do you think will be created?
  4. Do you think your form of writing will spread world wide? Why? Why not? 
Your task is:

Use your piece of clay, the knife, the pencil, and the cuneiform alphabet to write a message and design a storage unit to keep it safe. Indicate on your map the place you will build this storage unit, and explain why you chose it. Train each member of your group to present to the class, a part of the information you have gathered.
TASK CARD TWO Egypt had scrolls made out of papyrus. Papyrus, from the Latin, papyrus, is the source of our word paper. Papyrus was made from a sedge growing in Egyptian marshes along the Nile. It is made from the stems of the plant that can vary a lot in size. Away from the Nile, the plant rarely grows stems thick enough to produce papyrus. This made its production strictly an Egyptian enterprise. It was glued together in scrolls that usually contained 20 sheets that were then rolled up and tied shut. This form took up a lot of space, but at least was not breakable. A major draw back to its use in legal documents was that ink did not penetrate its surface, therefore documents could be erased. 

GET THE FOLLOWING MATERIALS: 20 pieces of paper, paste or glue, felt tip pens and hieroglyphic sheet, or the Hieroglyphic Stamp Set.

  • Read the statement above. Answer the questions below. Produce your product and prepare your class presentation.
QUESTIONS: 
  • What problems will you have storing your documents and keeping them from harm?
  • Who will be taught to read and write in your society? Why?
  • What kind of documents do you think will be created?
  • Do you think your form of paper and writing will spread world wide? Why? Why not?
Your task is:

Use your 20 pieces of paper and the Hieroglyphic Stamp Set to write a message. Decorate your scroll with pictures related to your message and indicate how you will keep it safe for the future. Show on your map the place you will put this scroll, and explain why you chose it. Train each member of your group to present to the class, a part of the information you have gathered.
TASK CARD THREE In the second century BC, the Greeks were using parchment made from goat or sheep- skin. The skins were wetted, stretched on a frame and repeatedly scraped. This was a labor- intensive process that did not produce many sheets of writing material, quickly. 

GET THE FOLLOWING MATERIALS: a long strip of paper, a dictionary, and colored felt tip pens.

  • Read the statement above. Answer the questions below. Produce your product and prepare your class presentation.
QUESTIONS:
  1. What problems will you have storing your documents and keeping them from harm?
  2. Who will be taught to read and write in your society? Why? 
  3. What kind of documents do you think will be created?
  4. Do you think your form of paper and writing will spread world wide? Why? Why not? 
Your task is:

Create a series of cartoons illustrating the process of making parchment. Look up the word vellum in the dictionary. Add the definition to your last cartoon panel and suggest what it might be used for today. Train each member of your group to present to the class, a part of the information you have gathered.
TASK CARD FOUR We see the real explosion of writing when the Chinese, in the second century BC, invent a paper from pounded Mulberry bark. This produced thin sheets that could be produced quickly and that ink penetrated. Because of the latter property, ink could not be erased from this paper. The spread of this technology was transmitted by Silk Road traders throughout Central Asia, pre Islam, and by Muslim traders throughout the Middle East and North Africa later. 

GET THE FOLLOWING MATERIALS: colored felt tip pens, a large piece of paper, and the 7th century silk road map.

  • Read the statement above. Answer the questions below. Produce your product and prepare your class presentation.
QUESTIONS: 
  1. What are the strengths of your form of paper versus clay tablets, papyrus, and parchment?
  2. Who will be taught to read and write in your society? Why?
  3. What kind of documents do you think will be created?
  4. Do you think your form of paper and writing will spread world wide? Why? Why not? 
Your task is:

Use the map of 7th century Silk Road to create your own map of places that will most likely be an area of exchange of paper technology. Be prepared to explain your reasons for your choices. Train each member of your group to present to the class, a part of the information you have gathered. 
TASK CARD FIVE Samarkand, after the battle of Talus in 751, Samarkand becomes a major manufacturing center for paper in the Arab world. The process for paper making was introduced by captured Chinese prisoners. Paper was cheaply produced and widely used. It took more than a millennium for the technology to reach Europe. 

GET THE FOLLOWING MATERIALS: a large piece of paper, a 7th Century Map of the Silk Road, and colored felt tip pens.

  • Read the statement above. Answer the questions below. Produce your product and prepare your class presentation.
QUESTIONS: 
  1. What innovations will occur in your society because of the manufacture of cheap paper?
  2. Who will be taught to read and write in your society? Why?
  3. What kind of documents do you think will be created? How will they be stored?
  4. Why do you think your form of paper and writing will spread world wide?
Your task is:

Create an advertising campaign to sell your new product. Remember the date is 755AD in Central Asia. How will the advertising be done? Remember there are no TVs or computers, or radios. Refer to your 7th Century Silk Road Map and try to imagine what life was like. Train each member of your group to present to the class, a part of the information you have gathered.
TASK CARD SIX In the eleventh century paper mills were set up in Spain. There were 400 paper mills by the end of the 12th century. The rest is history. The sheets of Chinese paper allowed books to be produced and caused an incredible amount of knowledge from the Arab world in mathematics, the sciences and literature to spread. With the invention of the printing press in the fifteenth century, there was an explosion in the use of paper. The word ream, the standard 500 count, comes from antiquity and the Arabic word, rizma, the Spanish word, resma, the old French word, rayme, and this became the English word, ream, meaning "bale" or "bundle." 
 

GET THE FOLLOWING MATERIALS: a long piece of paper, the Paper Trail Map, and felt tip pens.

  • Read the statement above. Answer the questions below. Produce your product and prepare your class presentation.
QUESTIONS:
  1. Find the meaning of the word millennium in a classroom dictionary. Be prepared to explain how long it took paper technology to reach Europe.
  2. Who will be taught to read and write in your society, since the invention of the printing press? Why?
  3. What kind of documents do you think will be created? How will they be stored?
  4. Who will write and read world wide now? Why?
Your task is:

Create a Timeline of the spread of paper and therefore writing. Use your Paper Trail Map as a guide. Draw a symbol for each important place on your Timeline. Be prepared to explain your choices. Train each member of your group to present to the class, a part of the information you have gathered.