THE ROMANTIC HISTORY

New Zealand Times, Volume LI, Issue 12008, 10 December 1924, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE ROMANTIC HISTORY

of wnmNfi materials,. .. ■ L; ; , : i • The introduction’ of papyrus by; the Egyptians,gave a great uplift to. letterwriters and to literature generally. It is,- as the Germans would say, the “name-father” ’to -paper, and a very respectable;and worthy elder too.- . Bark had' been,used for ( tablets and for writing letfers-tthieh were capable of . being folded tho - beat' period of the Roman world, and Such were still ' in. ueo -under the later cm : perora. The tablets were,..of- bark' onwhich the Empefor Commod,us inscribed' his tittle 1 Ist of. victims, .the- discovery' of which led to his own victimisation. _lt was a simple thing, fho Egyptian idea of papyrus; the,improvement . oil the use of tree hark -being, the use of peelings from. a'.reed,instead. This reed' was called . Byblos or .Papyrus; then very common- arid ,now , very rare-in lower Egypt., From its name, Bybloe, comes the-Greek word l -meaning bookarid thus our own'word for the-Scrip' taros." ■, ' , ... The papyrus grew , abundantly In lakes and marshes to a' height of abput, 10 feet; the diameter of the Btera -was two or three-inches, 1 and ? froril* its surface peel could 'he taken Off, layer after layer, to the number of, some twenty coating* Tbo use of this peel occurred to the Egyptians' as an. improvement upon ordinary, hark, and the new writing material soon becamo popular. It could be written -upon one side only; but books were copied ‘ into long rolls of sheet glued under sheet, the sheet which felt -the drat, glue being called on %hat account .the protocol,, a term still preserved by diplomatists.' 1 . The run on papyrus being .very

-great, that plant; began to show signs of'scarcity in Egypt, and for that others, , its t exportation was; at one time forbidden.- At the same time the .Kings- of Pergamus became a literary ;sect, and wanted some-. thing wlierSon their scribes- oouTd write theiribooks-, J3o the skins of-beasts, occasionally used in some place already, began to attract increased- attention; they were prepared into, dry-substances 1 and called, .after: Pergamusp't “pergament’l or parchment, ; ancf;V: vellum, meaning 'skin, , of: course; " This parchment wasqjdear; however, and for common purposes papyrus was ■ so much more convenient t|lat the Egyptian, paper 'never - really.«was; supplanted untiltho"; birth i "of a - system which got_pap4r out of cotton, about seven or eight hundred years after the discovery of .parchment. The world then worked on for 1000 years before ive hit on theiplan of making the modern paper out of linen rags; a" very lucky thing, ; for up to that time tho monies,, who could not go to tho expense of. much new had; industriously been.scraping out the copier l , records of antiquity and works of the great masters to make room for tlieiv-own writings.-^“John o’ London.’’ ; .