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List of Chinese inventions
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A four-horse chariot with a parasol from the
Terracotta Army of
Qin Shi Huang's tomb (interred by 210 BC); the Chinese were the first to invent the collapsible umbrella.
China has been the source of some of the world's most significant inventions, including the Four Great Inventions of ancient China: paper, the compass, gunpowder, and printing (both woodblock and movable type). The list below contains these and other inventions which first appeared in China. It does not include foreign-born technologies which the Chinese cultural realm acquired through contact, such as sugarcane production from 7th-century India or the telescope from Early modern Europe. It also does not include technologies which were originally invented elsewhere but were later invented separately by the Chinese in their own right, such as bronze production or the chain pump. Since the Chinese did not first invent the concepts of writing or the calendar, Chinese inventions such as Chinese writing and the Chinese calendar do not need to be mentioned or described.
The Chinese invented original technologies involving mechanics, hydraulics, and mathematics applied to horology, metallurgy, astronomy, agriculture, engineering, manufacturing and craftsmanship, nautics, and warfare. The rise of a sophisticated economic system in China gave birth to inventions such as the use of paper money during the Song Dynasty (960–1279). The invention of gunpowder by at least the 10th century led to an array of unique inventions such as the fire lance, land mine, naval mine, the hand cannon, exploding cannonballs, and the multistage rocket. With the navigational aid of the 11th-century compass and ability to steer at high sea with the 1st-century stern-post rudder, premodern Chinese sailors sailed as far as East Africa and Egypt.[1][2][3]
The contemporaneous Peiligang and Pengtoushan cultures represent the oldest Neolithic cultures of China and were formed sometime around 7000 BC.[4] Some of the first inventions of Neolithic, pre-historic China include semilunar and rectangular stone knives, stone hoes and spades, the cultivation of millet, rice and the soybean, the refinement of sericulture, the building of rammed earth structures with lime-plastered house floors, the creation of the potter's wheel, the creation of pottery with cord-mat-basket designs, the creation of pottery tripods and pottery steamers, and the development of ceremonial vessels and scapulimancy for purposes of divination.[5][6] Francesca Bray argues that the domestication of the ox and buffalo during the Longshan culture (c. 3000 – c. 2000 BC) period, the absence of Longshan-era irrigation or high-yield crops, full evidence of Longshan cultivation of dry-land cereal crops which gave high yields "only when the soil was carefully cultivated," suggest that the plow was known at least by the Longshan culture period and explains the high agricultural production yields which allowed the rise of Chinese civilization during the Shang Dynasty (c. 1600 – c. 1050 BC).[7] With later inventions such as the multiple-tube seed drill and heavy moldboard iron plow, China's agricultural output could sustain a much larger population.
Four Great Inventions
The following is a list of the Four Great Inventions of ancient China—as designated by the late Joseph Needham (1900–1995)—in the chronological order that they were established in China.
Paper
An illustration published in
Wang Zhen's (fl. 1290–1333) book of 1313 AD showing
movable type characters arranged by rhyme scheme in round table compartments
Although it is recorded that the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) court eunuch Cai Lun (c. 50–121 AD) invented the papermaking process and established the use of new raw materials used in making paper, ancient padding and wrapping paper artifacts dating to the 2nd century BC have been found in China, the oldest example of paper being a map from Fangmatan, Tianshui;[8] by the 3rd century, paper as a writing medium was in widespread use, replacing traditional but more expensive writing mediums such as strips of bamboo rolled into threaded scrolls, scrolls and strips of silk, wet clay tablets hardened later in a furnace, and wooden tablets (use of oracle bones as a writing medium died out after the Shang Dynasty).[9][10][11][12][13] The earliest known piece of paper with writing on it was discovered in the ruins of a Chinese watchtower at Tsakhortei, Alxa League, where Han Dynasty troops had deserted their position in 110 AD following a Xiongnu attack.[14] In the papermaking process established by Cai in 105, a boiled mixture of mulberry tree bark, hemp, old linens, and fish nets created a pulp that was pounded into paste and stirred with water; a wooden frame sieve with a mat of sewn reeds was then dunked into the mixture, which was then shaken and then dried into sheets of paper that were bleached under the exposure of sunlight; K.S. Tom says this process was gradually improved through leaching, polishing and glazing to produce a smooth, strong paper.[11][12]
Printing
Woodblock printing: The earliest confirmed specimen of woodblock printing is a miniature dharani Buddhist sutra bearing extinct Chinese writing characters used only during the reign of China's only self-ruling empress, Wu Zetian (r. 690–705), dated no earlier than 704 and preserved in a Silla Korean temple stupa built in 751.[15] However, the earliest known book printed at regular size is the Diamond Sutra made during the Tang Dynasty (618–907), a 5.18 m (17 ft) long scroll which bears the date 868 AD, or the "fifteenth day of the fourth moon of the ninth year" of Emperor Yizong's rule (859–873).[16] Joseph Needham and Tsien Tsuen-Hsuin write that the cutting and printing techniques used for the delicate calligraphy of the Diamond Sutra book are much more advanced and refined than the miniature dharani sutra printed earlier.[16] The two oldest Chinese calendars printed have been found in the Buddhist pilgrimage site at Dunhuang, dated 877 and 882; Patricia Ebrey writes that it is no surprise that some of the earliest printed items were calendars, since the Chinese found it necessary to calculate and mark which days were auspicious and which were not.[16][17]
Movable type: The polymath scientist and official Shen Kuo (1031–1095) of the Song Dynasty (960–1279) was the first to describe the process of movable type printing in his Dream Pool Essays of 1088, attributing this innovation to a little-known artisan named Bi Sheng (990–1051).[18][19][20][21] With the use of fired clay characters, Shen described Bi's technical process of making the type, type-setting, printing, and breaking up the type for further use.[22][21] Bi had experimented with wooden type characters, but their use was not perfected until 1297 to 1298 with the model of the official Wang Zhen (fl. 1290–1333) of the Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368), who also arranged written characters by rhyme scheme on the surface of round table compartments.[23][19] It was not until 1490 with the printed works of Hua Sui (1439–1513) of the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) that the Chinese perfected metal movable type characters, namely bronze.[24][25] The Qing Dynasty (1644–1912) scholar Xu Zhiding of Tai'an, Shandong developed vitreous enamel movable type printing in 1718.[26]
Effects on bookbinding: The advent of printing in the 9th century revolutionized bookbinding, as late Tang Dynasty paper books evolved from rolled scrolls of paper into folded leaves like a pamphlet, which developed further in the Song Dynasty (960–1279) into 'butterfly' bindings with leaves of paper folded down the center like a common book, then during the Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368) wrapped back bindings had two edges of the leaves attached to the spine and secured with a stiff paper cover on the back, and during the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) books finally had thread-stitched bindings in the back.[27] It was not until the early 20th century that traditional Chinese thread-stitched bookbinding was replaced by Western-style bookbinding, a parallel to the replacement of traditional Chinese print methods with the modern printing press, in the tradition of Johannes Gutenberg (c. 1400–1468).[28]
Gunpowder
Although evidence of gunpowder's first use in China comes from the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period (907–960),[29] the earliest known recorded recipes for gunpowder were written by Zeng Gongliang, Ding Du, and Yang Weide in the Wujing Zongyao military manuscript compiled in 1044 during the Song Dynasty (960–1279); the gunpowder formulas described were used in incendiary bombs lobbed from catapults, thrown down from defensive walls, or lowered down the wall by use of iron chains operated by a swape lever;[30][31][32] bombs launched from trebuchet catapults mounted on forecastles of naval ships ensured the victory of Song over Jin forces at the Battle of Caishi in 1161, while the Mongol Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368) used gunpowder bombs during their failed invasion of Japan in 1274 and 1281;[31] during the 13th and 14th centuries, gunpowder formulas became more potent (with nitrate levels of up to 91%) and gunpowder weaponry more advanced and deadly, as evidenced in the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) military manuscript Huolongjing compiled by Jiao Yu (fl. 14th to early 15th century) and Liu Ji (1311–1375), completed sometime before the latter's death with a preface added by the former in a 1412 Nanyang publication of the work.[33]
Compass
In San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán, Veracruz, Mexico, an ancient hematite artifact from the Olmec era dating roughly 1000 BC has been found shedding some light about possible use of the lodestone compass in Central America long before it was described in China, yet the Olmecs did not have iron which the Chinese would discover could be magnetized by contact with lodestone.[34] The Chinese by the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) began using north-south oriented lodestone ladle-and-bowl shaped compasses for divination and geomancy and not yet for navigation;[35][36][37] the polymath official and inventor Shen Kuo (1031–1095) of the Song Dynasty (960–1279) was the first to accurately describe both magnetic declination and the magnetic needle compass in his Dream Pool Essays of 1088, while the author Zhu Yu (fl. 12th century) was the first to mention use of the compass specifically for navigation at sea in his book published in 1119.[38][39][40][41][36][20][42] Even before this, however, the Wujing Zongyao military manuscript compiled by 1044 described a thermoremanence compass of heated iron or steel shaped as a fish and placed in a bowl of water which produced a weak magnetic force; the Wujing Zongyao recorded that it was used as a pathfinder alongside the South Pointing Chariot.[43][44]
Other inventions
Inventions which made their first appearance in China are listed in alphabetical order below.
- Animal zodiac: The earliest and most complete version of the animal zodiac mentions tweleve animals which differ slightly (for instance, the dragon is absent, represented by a worm).[45] Each animal matches the earthly branches and were written on bamboo slips from Shuihudi, dated to the late 4th century BC,[46] as well as from Fangmatan, dating to the late 3rd century BC.[46] Before these archaeological finds, the Lun Heng written by Wang Chong (27 – c. 100 AD) during the 1st century provided the earliest transmitted example of a complete duodenary animal cycle.[47]
Huizi currency, issued in 1160
- Banknote: Paper currency was first developed in China. Its roots were in merchant receipts of deposit during the Tang Dynasty (618–907), as merchants and wholesalers desired to avoid the heavy bulk of copper coinage in large commercial transactions; during the Song Dynasty (960–1279), the central government adopted this system for their monopolized salt industry, but a gradual reduction in copper production—due to closed mines and an enormous outflow of Song-minted copper currency into the Japanese, Southeast Asian, Western Xia, and Liao Dynasty economies—encouraged the Song government in the early 12th century to issue government-printed paper currency alongside copper to ease the demand on their state mints and debase the value of copper; the earliest paper currency was limited to certain regions and could not be used outside specified bounds, but once paper was securely backed by gold and silver stores, the Song government initiated a nationwide paper currency, sometime between 1265 and 1274.[50][51][52][53] The concurrent Jin Dynasty (1115–1234) also printed paper banknotes by at least 1214.[54]
- Belt drive: In 1090, Qin Guan's book on textiles and sericulture written during the Song Dynasty (960–1279) described the first mechanical belt drive for a silk-reeling device.[55] An illustration of a woman operating a multiple-spindle spinning wheel with a continuous driving belt is featured in the Book of Agriculture published in 1313 by Wang Zhen (fl. 1290–1333).[56] This silk-handling machinery was a type of flyer which laid thread evenly on reels.[57] By the 14th century, hydraulic power was applied to spinning mills in China for this purpose.[57]
- Blast furnace: Although cast iron tools and weapons have been found in China dating to the 5th century BC, the earliest discovered Chinese blast furnaces, which produced pig iron that could be remelted and refined as cast iron in the cupola furnace, date to the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, while the vast majority of early blast furnace sites discovered date to the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) period immediately following 117 BC with the establishment of state monopolies over the salt and iron industries during the reign of Emperor Wu of Han (r. 141–87 BC); most ironwork sites discovered dating before 117 BC acted merely as foundries which made castings for iron that had been smelted in blast furnaces elsewhere in remote areas far from population centers.[58][59]
- Borehole drilling: By at least the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD), the Chinese used deep borehole drilling for mining and other projects, such as using a derrick to lift liquid brine to the surface through a bamboo pipeline that led to a distilling furnace (which Michael Loewe says was possibly heated by natural gas) where salt could be processed; scenes of this entire process are featured in artwork on Han tomb brick reliefs of Sichuan province, while Loewe states that borehole sites could reach as deep as 600 m (2000 ft).[60] There have been Han Dynasty bronze foundries discovered where the mining shafts reached depths of 100 m (328 ft), complete with a timber frame, ladders, and iron tools.[61]
- Bristle toothbrush: According to a Library of Congress website, the Chinese have used the bristle toothbrush since 1498, during the reign of the Hongzhi Emperor (r. 1487–1505) of the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644); it also adds that the toothbrush was not mass-produced until 1780, when they were sold by a William Addis of Clerkenwald, England.[62] In accordance with the Library of Congress website, scholar John Bowman also writes that the bristle toothbrush using pig bristles was invented in China during the 1490s.[25]
- Bulkhead partition: The 5th century book Garden of Strange Things by Liu Jingshu mentioned that a ship could allow water to enter the bottom without sinking, while the Song Dynasty (960–1279) author Zhu Yu (fl. 12th century) wrote in his book of 1119 that the hulls of Chinese ships had a bulkhead build; these pieces of literary evidence for bulkhead partitions are confirmed by archaeological evidence of a 24 m (78 ft) long Song Dynasty ship dredged from the waters off the southern coast of China in 1973, the hull of the ship divided into twelve walled compartmental sections built watertight, dated to about 1277.[63][64] Western writers from Marco Polo (1254–1324), to Niccolò Da Conti (1395–1469), to Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790) commented on bulkhead partitions, which they viewed as an original aspect of Chinese shipbuilding, as Western shipbuilding did not incorporate this hull arrangement until the early 19th century.[65][66]
- Caliper: A Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) bronze sliding caliper used by craftsmen for minute measuring has been discovered with manufacturing information inscribed on it, including the exact date it was made (corresponding to January 15, 9 AD); it could be adjusted by means of a slot with a pin (keeping in place the component lug of the instrument) to measure with the precision of tenths of 1 in (0.23 cm), with a maximum of 6 in (15 cm).[67]
- Cast iron: Confirmed by archaeological evidence, cast iron, made from melting pig iron, was developed in China by the early 5th century BC during the Zhou Dynasty (1122–256 BC), the oldest specimens found in a tomb of Luhe County in Jiangsu province; despite this, most of the early blast furnaces and cupola furnaces discovered in China date after the state iron monopoly under Emperor Wu (r. 141–87 BC) was established in 117 BC, during the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD); Donald Wagner states that a possible reason why no ancient Chinese bloomery process has been discovered thus far is because the iron monopoly, which lasted until the 1st century AD when it was abolished for private entrepreneurship and local administrative use, wiped out any need for continuing the less-efficient bloomery process that continued in use in other parts of the world.[68][58][69][70][71] Wagner states that most iron tools in ancient China were made of cast iron in consideration of the low economic burden of producing cast iron, whereas most iron military weapons were made of more costly wrought iron and steel, signifying that "high performance was essential" and preferred for the latter.[72]
- Chain drive: Perhaps inspired by chain pumps which had been known in China since at least the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) when they were mentioned by the Chinese philosopher Wang Chong (27–c.100 AD),[73] the endless power-transmitting chain drive was first used in the gearing of the clock tower built at Kaifeng in 1090 by the official, mathematician, and astronomer Su Song (1020–1101) during the Song Dynasty (960–1279); in addition to the escapement mechanism invented earlier in the 8th century, the chain drive was used to mechanically rotate the tower's armillary sphere crowning the top (which imitated the movements of the stars in the celestial sphere) and move one of 600 mechanical gear teeth forward every 2 minutes and 24 seconds, thus each gear tooth represented
of a 24 hour day, each hour announced by one of 133 clock jack figurines rotated on a mechanical wheel behind opening windows where they could be seen banging gongs, drums, bells, and holding plaques for special times of day.[74][75][76]
Illustration of chopsticks
- Chromium, use of: The use of chromium was invented in China no later than 210 BC, the date when the Terracotta Army was interred at a site not far from modern Xi'an; modern archaeologists discovered that bronze-tipped crossbow bolts at the site showed no sign of corrosion after more than 2,000 years of being interred, the reason being that the Chinese had coated the bronze tips of their crossbow bolts in chromium; chromium was not used anywhere else until the experiments of Louis Nicolas Vauquelin (1763–1829) in 1797–1798.[79]
- Contour canal: After numerous conquests and consolidation of his empire, China's first emperor Qin Shi Huang (r. 221–210 BC) commissioned the engineer Shi Lu (fl. late 3rd century BC) to build a new waterway canal which would pass through a mountain range and link together the Xiang River and Lijiang River; the result of this project was the Lingqu Canal, complete with thirty-six lock gates, and since it closely follows a contour line, it is the oldest known contour canal in the world.[82]
- Crank handle: The earliest known depicted crank handle in art comes from a Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) green-glazed pottery tomb model of a farmyard, complete with a rotary grain mill, a man operating a foot tilt hammer for pounding grain, and to his left a winnowing machine with a crank handle used to operate the fan.[83] The crank handle in later Imperial China (Tang and Song dynasties) was also used in grain mills, silk-reeling and hemp-spinning machines, the hydraulic-powered flour-sifter, the hydraulic powered bellows, the water well windlass, and other devices.[84]
- Crossbow, handheld: In China, bronze and iron crossbow bolts dating from the 5th to 4th century BC were found at a State of Chu grave site in Hubei;[85] the earliest textual evidence of the handheld crossbow used in battle dates to the 4th century BC;[86] handheld crossbows with complex bronze trigger mechanisms have been found with the Terracotta Army in the tomb of Qin Shi Huang (r. 221–210 BC) that are similar to specimens from the subsequent Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD), while crossbowmen described in the Han Dynasty learned drill formations, some were even mounted as cavalry units, and Han Dynasty writers attributed the success of numerous battles against the Xiongnu to massed crossbow fire;[87][88] in a cross comparison with a contemporary civilization which created an early crossbow, the ancient Greeks had a large artillery crossbow known as the gastraphetes ("belly-bow") by roughly the late 5th century BC, yet the handheld crossbow in Europe was not seen until the 10th century AD.[89][90]
- Cupola furnace: Vincent C. Pigott states that the cupola furnace existed in China at least by the Warring States Period (403–221 BC),[91] while Donald B. Wagner writes that some iron ore melted in the blast furnace may have been cast directly into molds, but most, if not all, iron smelted in the blast furnace during the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) was remelted in a cupola furnace; it was designed so that a cold blast injected at the bottom traveled through tuyere pipes across the top where the charge (i.e. of charcoal and scrap or pig iron) was dumped, the air becoming a hot blast before reaching the bottom of the furnace where the iron was melted and then drained into appropriate molds for casting.[92] Pigott states that even in modern cupola furnaces, sometimes an excess of injected oxygen will cause enough decarburization that a resulting lump of low-carbon iron will appear in the furnace, similar to the wrought iron of the bloomery; although the ancient Chinese had produced wrought iron (no doubt, Pigott says, from the cupola furnace) from about the same time (c. 500 BC) cast iron appeared during the very late Spring and Autumn Period (722–481 BC), there is no direct evidence that the bloomery ever existed in China.[93]
- Escapement: The escapement mechanism is an essential device in clocks which marked the birth of the mechanical clock; it was first developed by the Buddhist monk, court astronomer, mathematician and engineer Yi Xing (683–727) of the Tang Dynasty (618–907) for his water-powered celestial globe in the tradition of Zhang Heng (78–139), and could be found in later Chinese clockworks such as the clock towers of both Zhang Sixun (fl. late 10th century) and Su Song (1020–1101).[94][95][96][97][76][98] However, unlike the modern escapement which employs a suspended oscillating pendulum resting and releasing its hooks on a small rotating gear wheel, the early Chinese escapement employed the use of gravity and hydraulics.[99] In Su Song's clock tower, scoop containers fixed to the spokes of a vertical waterwheel (which acted like a gear wheel) would be filled one by one with siphoned water from a clepsydra tank.[100] When the weight of the water in the scoop filled to an excess, it overcame a counterweight that in turn tripped a lever allowing the scoop to rotate on a pivot and drain its water.[100] However, as the scoop fell, it tripped a coupling tongue that temporarily pulled down on a long vertical chain, the latter yanking down on a balancing lever which would pull upward on a small chain connected to a locking arm, the latter lifting momentarily to release the top arrested spoke before coming back down to repeat the entire process over again.[100]
- Exploding cannonballs: The Huolongjing military manual compiled by Jiao Yu (fl. 14th to early 15th century) and Liu Ji (1311–1375) in the mid 14th century described the earliest known exploding cannonballs, which were made of cast iron with a hollow core packed with gunpowder; Jiao and Liu wrote that when fired, they could set enemy camps ablaze; the earliest evidence for exploding cannonballs in Europe date to the 16th century.[101][102]
- Fork: The fork had been used in China long before the chopstick; a bone fork has been discovered by archaeologists at a burial site of the early Bronze Age Qijia culture (2400–1900 BC), and forks have been found in tombs of the Shang Dynasty (c. 1600 – c. 1050 BC) and subsequent Chinese dynasties.[103]
- Finery forge: In addition to accidental lumps of low-carbon wrought iron produced by excessive injected air in Chinese cupola furnaces, the ancient Chinese also created wrought iron by using the finery forge at least by the 2nd century BC, the earliest specimens of cast and pig iron fined into wrought iron and steel found at the early Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) site at Tieshengguo.[104] Pigott speculates that the finery forge existed in the previous Warring States Period (403–221 BC), due to the fact that there are wrought iron items from China dating to that period and there is no documented evidence of the bloomery ever being used in China.[105] The fining process involved liquifying cast iron in a fining hearth and removing carbon from the molten cast iron through oxidation.[104] Wagner writes that in addition to the Han Dynasty hearths believed to be fining hearths, there is also pictoral evidence of the fining hearth from a Shandong tomb mural dated 1st to 2nd century AD, as well as a hint of written evidence in the 4th century AD Daoist text Taiping Jing.[106] Both Wagner and Pigott write that the fining hearth was a key feature of traditional Chinese iron smelting in recent centuries.[104][107]
- Hand cannon: The earliest metal-barrel hand cannons dating to the 13th century are attested to by archaeological evidence from a Heilongjiang excavation as well as written evidence in the Yuanshi (1370) concerning Li Tang, an ethnic Jurchen commander under the Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368) who in 1288 suppressed the rebellion of the Christian prince Nayan with his "gun-soldiers" or chongzu, this being the earliest known event where this phrase was used.[114]
- Heavy moldboard iron plow: Although use of the simple wooden ard in China must have preceded it, the earliest discovered Chinese iron plows date to roughly 500 BC, during the Zhou Dynasty (1122–256 BC) and were flat, V-shaped, and mounted on wooden poles and handles.[115][116] By the 3rd century BC, improved iron casting techniques led to the development of the heavy moldboard plow, seen in Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) artwork such as tomb carved bricks.[115] The moldboard allowed the Chinese to turn farm soil without clogging the plowshare with dirt, which was flung off the wheelbarrow via slanted wings on both sides.[117]
- Horse collar: A significant improvement of the ancient breast harness was the horse collar, first depicted in a Northern Wei (386–534) mural at Dunhuang, China, dated 477–499; the latter artwork does not feature the essential collar cushion behind the cross bar, but a later Tang Dynasty (618–907) mural of about 851 AD accurately displays the cushioned collar behind the cross bar.[118][119]
- Hybrid rice: A team of agricultural scientists headed by Yuan Longping (b. 1930) developed a new type of rice called hybrid rice in 1973 which allows for roughly 12,000 kg (26,450 lbs) of rice to be grown per hectare (10,000 m2).[48] Hybrid rice has proven to be greatly beneficial in areas where there is little arable land, and has been adopted by several Asian and African countries.[48]
- Hydraulic-powered bellows: Although it is unknown if metallurgic bellows (i.e. air-blowing device) in the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) were of the leather bag type or the wooden fan type found in the later Yuan Dynasty (1279–1368), the Eastern Han official Du Shi (d. 38 AD) applied the use of rotating waterwheels to power the bellows of his blast furnace smelting iron, a method which continued in use in China thereafter, as evidenced by subsequent records; it is a significant invention in that iron production yields were increased and it employed all the necessary components for converting rotary motion into reciprocating motion.[125][126][127][124][128]
- Kite: As written in the Mozi, the philosopher, artisan, and engineer Lu Ban (fl. 5th century BC) from the State of Lu created a wooden bird that remained flying in the air for three days, essentially a kite; there is written evidence that kites were used as rescue signals when the city of Nanjing was besieged by Hou Jing (d. 552) during the reign of Emperor Wu of Liang (r. 502–549), while similar accounts of kites used for military signalling are found in the Tang (618–907) and Jin (1115–1234) dynasties; kite flying as a pastime can be seen in painted murals of Dunhuang dating to the Northern Wei (386–534) period, while descriptions of flying kites as a pastime have been found in Song (960–1279) and Ming (1368–1644) texts.[137][138]
- Lacquer: The lacquer was used in China since the Neolithic period and came from a substance extracted from the lac tree found in China.[139] A red wooden bowl, which is believed to be the earliest known lacquer container,[140] was unearthed at a Hemudu (5000 BC–4500 BC) site. Michael Loewe says coffins at many early Bronze Age sites seem to have been lacquered, and articles of lacquered wood may also have been common, but the earliest well-preserved examples of lacquer come from Eastern Zhou Dynasty (771–256 BC) sites.[141] There were three imperial workshops during the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) established solely for the purpose of crafting lacquerwares; fortunately for the historian, Han lacquerware items were inscribed with the location of the workshop where they were produced and the date they were made, such as a lacquerware beaker found in the Han colony in northwestern Korea with the inscription stating it was made in a workshop near Chengdu, Sichuan and dated precisely to 55 AD.[142]
- Land mine: Textual evidence suggests that the first use of a land mine in history was by a Song Dynasty (960–1279) brigadier general known as Lou Qianxia, who used an 'enormous bomb' (huo pao) to kill intruding Mongol soldiers invading Guangxi in 1277.[143] However, the first detailed description of the land mine was given in the Huolongjing text written by Jiao Yu (fl. 14th to early 15th century) and Liu Ji (1311–1375) during the late Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368) and early Ming Dynasty (1368–1644).[144] Jiao and Liu wrote that land mines were spherical, made of cast iron, and their fuses ignited by a mechanism tripped by enemy movement; although Jiao and Liu did not describe this trip mechanism in full detail, a later text of 1606 revealed that enemy movement released a pin that allowed hidden underground weights to fall and spin a chord around an axle that rotated a spinning wheel acting as a flint to spark a train of fuses.[145]
- Multiple-tube seed drill: The wooden seed drill existed in China by the 3rd century BC, while the multiple-tube iron seed drill was first invented in China by the 2nd century BC, during the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD).[146][147] The seed drill allowed for greater speed and regulation of distributing seeds in lined rows of crops instead of casting them out onto the farm field.[146]
- Multistage rocket: Although there is still some ambiguity as to whether the earliest rockets of the 13th century were first developed in Europe (i.e. 'ignis volantis in aere' in the work of Marcus Graecus around 1232, although Needham and Davis assert it was most likely a fire lance), the Middle East (i.e. 'sahm al-Khitāi' or 'arrows of China' as referred to by Hasan al-Rhammāh in 1280) or China (i.e. 'di lao shu' or 'ground rat' mentioned in 1264 or the 'chong' mortar used by the armies of the Song Dynasty and invading Mongols during the 1270s), sometime during the Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368) the term 'fire arrow' once implied to mean incendiary arrows during the Tang Dynasty was then used to describe the true rocket, producing a headache, as Needham says, for historians;[148][149][31] the Huolongjing written by Jiao Yu (fl. 14th to early 15th century) and Liu Ji (1311–1375) during the early Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) described several types of rockets,[150] one of them being a multistage rocket known as the 'huo long chu shui' or 'fire dragon issuing from the water' which, despite its name, was not launched from beneath the water from a primitive submarine but rather at near water-level maintaining a flat trajectory; defined as a two-stage rocket, it employed booster rockets that, when about to burn out of use, ignited a swarm of smaller rocket arrows fired from the front end of the missile shaped as a dragon's mouth.[151]
- Naval mine: The Huolongjing military manuscript written by Jiao Yu (fl. 14th to early 15th century) and Liu Ji (1311–1375) also describes naval mines used at sea or on rivers and lakes; made of wrought iron and enclosed in an ox bladder, it was a timed device in that a burning joss stick floating above the mine determined when the fuse was to be ignited; the text explicitly mentions that without air and doused in water the fuse would not burn, so the fuse was protected by a long waterproof tube made out of goat's intestine; a later model shown in Song Yingxing's (1587–1666) encyclopedia of 1637 shows the ox bladder replaced with a lacquered leather bag while the mine is ignited by a rip cord pulled from the shore to rotate a flint-and-steel firing mechanism.[152]
- Porcelain: Although glazed ceramics existed beforehand, S.A.M. Adshead writes that the earliest type of vitrified, translucent ceramics that could be classified as true porcelain was not made until the Tang Dynasty (618–907).[155] Nigel Wood states that true porcelain was manufactured in North China from roughly the beginning of the Tang Dynasty in the 7th century, while true porcelain was not manufactured in South China until about 300 years later, during the early 10th century.[156]
- Pound lock: Although the one gate canal flash lock existed in China beforehand, the two-gate pound lock was invented in China in 984 by an official and engineer named Qiao Weiyo, during the early Song Dynasty (960–1279), so that ships could safely travel along canal waterways having gated and segmented chambers where water levels could be regulated.[157][158] The economic and transport benefits of this innovation were described by the polymath official and inventor Shen Kuo (1031–1095) in his Dream Pool Essays.[157]
- Raised-relief map: While on a court assignment of inspection along the Song Empire's (960–1279) frontier, the polymath scholar and official Shen Kuo (1031–1095) created a three-dimensional, raised-relief map depicting miniature roads, rivers, mountains and passes composed of wood, glue-soaked sawdust, beeswax, and wheat paste.[159][160]
- Restaurant menu: During the early Song Dynasty (960–1279), urban shopkeepers of the merchant middle class often had little time to eat at home, so they ventured out to eat at a variety of places such as temples, taverns, tea houses, food stalls, and restaurants which provided business for nearby brothels, singing-girl houses, and drama theatres; this along with traveling foreigners and Chinese who migrated to urban centers from regions with different cooking styles encouraged a demand for a variety of flavors served at urban restaurants, giving rise to the menu.[161][162]
- Rudder: The oldest depicted rudder at the back of a ship, used for steering ships at sea without the use of oars, comes from a ceramic model of a Chinese ship from a Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) tomb in Guangzhou dated to the 1st century AD.[166][167][168] According to the scholars Zhang Zunyan and Vassilios Christides, there is literary evidence to suggest that the axial stern rudder existed in China since the 1st century BC.[169] However, K.S. Tom points to the fact that all Chinese pottery models of ships before this Guangzhou tomb model show oars instead of a rudder, which he states is strong evidence for the rudder's invention only by the 1st century AD.[170] Jacques Gernet states that while the Chinese had invented the rudder in the 1st century, it was not completely fixed to the sternpost of Chinese ships until the end of the 4th century.[171] Following the invention of the balanced rudder pivoted on an axis, Tom states that the Chinese then innovated the fenestrated rudder with deliberate puncturing and boring out of holes in shapes such as diamonds, which made the rudder "easier to steer, reduced turbulence drag, did not affect efficiency and was hydrodynamically sound."[172]
- Salt, use of: The earliest salt use is argued to have taken place on Lake Yuncheng, Shanxi by 6000 BC.[173] Strong archaeological evidence of salt making dating to 2000 BC is found in the ruins of Zhongba at Chongqing. The historical records show that salt and iron monopolies often provided the bulk of state revenue, and remained important to state finance until the 20th century.[174][175] The Discourse on Salt and Iron, written by Huan Kuan during the 1st century BC relates a debate on the state monopoly over salt and iron production and distribution.
- Seismometer: The official, astronomer, and mathematician Zhang Heng (78–139) of the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) invented the first seismometer in 132, a large metal urn-shaped instrument which employed either a suspended pendulum or inverted pendulum acting on inertia (i.e. ground tremors from earthquakes) to dislodge a metal ball by a lever trip device; this ball would fall out of dragon-shaped metal mouth into the corresponding metal toad mouth indicating the exact cardinal direction of where a distant earthquake had occurred in order for the state to send swift aid and relief to the affected regions; several subsequent recreations of his device were employed by Chinese states up until the Tang Dynasty (618–907), when use of the device fell into obscurity, a fact noted even by the writer Zhou Mi around 1290, during the Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368).[176][177][178][179][180][181][182][172]
- South Pointing Chariot: Although the claim of Wei Dynasty statesman Ma Jun (fl. 220–265) that the South Pointing Chariot was first invented by the mythological Yellow Emperor are dubious, his South Pointing Chariot was successfully designed and tested in 255 AD with many later models recreated in subsequent dynasties; this device was a wheeled vehicle with differential gears that ensured a mounted wooden figurine would always point in the southern direction no matter how the vehicle turned, in essence a non-magnetic compass.[185][186][187]
- Suspension bridge using iron chains: Although there is evidence that many early cultures employed the use of suspension bridges with cabled ropes, the first written evidence of iron chain suspension bridges comes from a local history and topography of Yunnan written in the 15th century, which describes the repair of an iron chain bridge during the reign of the Yongle Emperor (r. 1402–1424); although it is questionable if Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) Chinese claims that iron chain suspension bridges existed since the Han Dynasty, their existence in the 15th century predates that of anywhere else.[188] K.S. Tom mentions this same repaired Ming suspension bridge described by Needham, but adds that recent research has revealed a document which lists the names of those who allegedly built an iron chain suspension bridge in Yunnan around the year 600 AD.[189]
- Star catalogue: China's earliest known astronomers were Gan De of the Qi State and Shi Shen of the Wei State, who created the earliest known star catalogues during the 4th century BC, roughly two centuries before the star catalogue of the Greek astronomer and mathematician Hipparchus (c. 190–c. 120 BC).[190][10] The star catalogue became a permanent feature of Chinese astronomy and some were quite large, such as the star catalogue of Zhang Heng (78–139) who catalogued 14,000 stars (2,500 of these he placed in a 'brightly shining' category) and recognized 124 constellations.[121][191]
One of five printed star maps from
Su Song's (1020–1101) celestial atlas, included in his book on
horology first printed in 1094
- Star chart, oldest printed: Although certainly not the oldest existing star charts in the world, the star charts of the astronomer, official, and engineer Su Song (1020–1101) are the oldest printed star charts in the world.
