First Minister of the Tang Dynasty

Chapter 482 Movable Type Printing
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After the servant's voice fell, the audience was silent, and Dou Gui frowned, full of doubts.

Wei Yunqi struggled to get up, and laughed loudly, "The clear will be clear, the turbid will be turbid, Dou Shize, you can't kill me."

Dou Gui snorted coldly, turned around and left.

"Wait a moment, Dou Pushe," a person behind the servant shouted, and he took out a letter from his pocket and offered it with both hands, "This is a private letter from His Royal Highness the Crown Prince."

Dou Gui took the letter, crossed his hands and turned to leave.

"Brother Guo, what's going on here?" Wei Yunqi asked curiously as he watched Guo Xingfang arrive with the edict servant.

Guo Xing showed a look of embarrassment, and Zhao Hongan beside him said bluntly: "When I realized that something was wrong, I wanted to gallop back to Chang'an and report the truth to the prince. thing".

Guo Xingfang nodded straightly when he heard the words, "I believe His Royal Highness will not let Dou Shize mess around. Sure enough, fortunately, he met the order, otherwise...".

Wei Yunqi was very moved.

When Dou Gui returned to the Xingtai yamen, opened the letter and read it, he couldn't help being stunned. Li Shimin had found out that Wei Yunqi was not against the party. In addition, the reason why Wei Yunqi only cared about training soldiers and didn't go to the mountain to fight the rebellion was that Li Shimin also thought that Inform them one by one.

The most important thing is that Li Shimin told Dou Gui very directly that the construction of the new abolition, Shimin ascended to the throne, there are many dissatisfied people, the most important thing now is stability, never kill indiscriminately, and not ruin the reputation.

In addition, there are many great talents in the old party, and the court has ordered that the past should not be blamed, and there is no need to continue to pursue responsibility.

Dou Gui is just stubborn and stubborn, not stupid. After reading the letter, he knew that he had too much prejudice against Wei Yunqi, and he wanted to eliminate the hostile people for Li Shimin, and his actions were too extreme.

But according to Dou Gui's temperament, it is naturally impossible to apologize to Wei Yunqi.

But after Wei Yunqi left Yizhou with the edict, Dou Gui ordered to continue to use Wei Yunqi's method of military training, pulling the soldiers into the deep mountains and dense forests for training.

A few months later, Dou Gui led his army to attack the Fangshan Liaoren, and won a great victory, capturing more than 2 people. In the memorial of the victory, Dou Gui attributed his meritorious service to Wei Yunqi's method of training troops in the mountains.

However, this great victory did not make Dou Gui increase his official status, but was criticized instead.

Because of Dou Gui's scholarly spirit, the use of troops was too harsh. If the soldiers made a slight mistake, they would be severely whipped. Rail beheaded.

Most of these hussars and chariot generals were from Guanzhong, and most of them were relatives and friends with high officials and dignitaries.

Because Dou Gui was Li Shimin's uncle, fearing that Li Shimin would take sides, those people went to Renshou Palace to sue.

Li Yuan was furious when he heard the words, and said bluntly: "There are more than ten Huqi riders who followed you, and killed more than half of them. I am also a chariot general from Longxi. How can I not control you if you kill so indiscriminately?"

Immediately issued an edict to put Dou Gui in prison.

At this time, Wei Yunqi, Shangshu of the Military Department of Daxingtai in Eastern Shaanxi Province, went up and said that the situation in Bashu was bad at that time, and it would be difficult to put down the bandits and bureaucrats if Dou Gui had not used heavy codes.

Since Dou Gui's handling was reasonable and Wei Yunqi proved it, Li Shimin ordered Dou Gui to be released.

In Cheng'en Hall, Li Shimin put down the book in his hand, looked at Gao Chong with a complicated expression, "You're so embarrassed?"

In this book, Li Yuan, Li Shimin, Gao Junya, Gao Chong, these two father and son pairs are the absolute protagonists, with a shining halo.

Gao Chong grinned, "Chang'an Xiaoxiaosheng, who is he? Only the saint, His Highness and I know, no, Ananda also knows." Gao Chong glanced at Zhang Ananda.

"Forget it, Zuo Zuo is just a legendary novel, and not many people can afford it," Li Shimin said disapprovingly, putting down "Romance of the Sui and Tang Dynasties".

After all, if the books at this time are published, the cost is extremely high, and most people can't afford them. Li Shimin thinks that they won't have much effect.

Gao Chong had already prepared for this, "His Royal Highness, please back away from the left and right sides, within five feet, do not get close to others, I will show you a big killer."

Li Shimin paused, looked at Zhang Anan, Zhang Anan took the initiative to retreat, and dispersed the attendants in the outer hall, guarding five zhang away.

Gao Chong took out a pamphlet from his pocket, "Your Highness, this invention is enough to affect history, please treat it with caution, at least at this sensitive stage, it is not suitable to show it to the public, and it will not be put into practice until His Royal Highness is in charge of it in the future." Late".

Seeing what Gao Chong said was so serious, Li Shimin couldn't help being startled, took the booklet half-believingly, and opened it to read.

Full of confidence, Gao Chong quietly waited for Li Shimin's reaction. As Gao Chong expected, Li Shimin stood up awkwardly, with a look of horror on his face, "It really has such a miraculous effect?"

Gao Chong nodded, "Don't dare to lie to Your Highness, the technique of movable type printing can halve the cost of books, double the speed, or even more."

After much thought, Gao Chong finally took out movable type printing ahead of time.

As for papermaking, in fact, the papermaking technique in the Sui and Tang Dynasties was very mature, and there were countless raw materials for papermaking, such as hemp, mulberry bark, rattan bark, tree bark, daphne bark, bamboo, etc., all of which could be used to make paper.

Even official documents use blue, white, yellow and other colors of paper, each with a different purpose.

Papermaking is a real technical work, and Gao Chong doesn't understand it, so let alone improve it, but the principle of movable type printing is very simple.

The current popular printing technique is woodblock printing. Later generations believe that woodblock printing originated in the middle and late Tang Dynasty. In fact, woodblock printing appeared as early as the Sui Dynasty.

In the tenth year of Zhenguan, after the death of Empress Changsun, Li Shimin ordered the publication of "Nv Ze" written by Empress Changsun with woodblock printing in memory of Empress Changsun. This is enough to show that woodblock printing has been widely used at least in the early Tang Dynasty.

The principle of woodblock printing is very simple. It is to carve words on a smooth wooden board, then brush ink on it, and then cover it with paper, so that the handwriting remains on the paper.

The principle is simple to say, but in practice, woodblock printing is time-consuming, laborious and extremely cumbersome.

First of all, engraving is extremely difficult. If you engrave a wrong character, the whole board will be invalidated, and a set of engraving can only correspond to the printed book. Therefore, it is quite expensive to print books with engraving, which is why books are expensive now. one of the reasons.

However, movable type printing is very economical and practical, and it can be printed quickly. The blanks with the same specifications are made of clay, and then the reverse characters are engraved. Use a framed iron plate as a base for printing.

After movable type printing is completed, it can be disassembled and reused. It is simple to make, low in cost, and easy to store and store. Unlike woodblock printing, a set of woodblock printing is invaluable and requires constant maintenance to prevent moths from cracking.

After Li Shimin thoroughly figured out the principle, he paced excitedly in the hall, pointed at Gao Chong and said, "You Zhi, do you know the meaning of your invention? This is amazing."

"I know, once movable type printing comes out, it will definitely affect the interests of the family," Gao Chong said in a deep voice.

"Therefore, movable type printing must wait until His Royal Highness, Royal Highness, before implementing it. Your Highness, a thousand-year-old family, a century-old dynasty, I believe you understand, and you must not rush for a while. This is not something that can be accomplished by one generation or two."

(End of this chapter)