thefictionvixens Chapter 177
Chapter 177
The printing house and the papermaking house were less than a hundred steps apart. Li Tai led Li Shimin and others to the printing house.
At this time, there were no workers in the printing house. There were more than a dozen elderly villagers outside, burning positive character molds. This step did not require literacy.
Before this, Li Tai and the woodblock craftsmen had already made negative character molds (positive character molds with concave strokes).
They only needed to make the glue clay, use the negative character mold to press out the positive character blank (mirror character with protruding strokes), and finally burn and polish it smooth.
"Father, this is a movable type mold for printing books.
When printing books, you only need to pick the corresponding type mold according to the content of the book for typesetting."
Li Tai came to a long table with ten rows of squares on it, with more than three hundred wooden squares in each row.
The movable type molds were placed in the squares in the order of pinyin. There were more than three thousand six hundred commonly used characters in total, and more than twenty of each character were made for backup.
In front of the long table was the printing operation table, and there were only a dozen printing tables at present. According to what Su Chen and Li Tai thought, to print books in large quantities, at least fifty printing tables are needed.
Li Shimin and others reached out to pick up the type mold and carefully identified the text on it.
The size of the type mold is a little smaller than the dice, which is also the smallest type mold that can be made at present.
"It's unimaginable. The so-called movable type printing is actually not unfamiliar to us. It has the same purpose as seals, but no one has ever used it to print books."
Fang Xuanling took a type mold and looked at it carefully, and sighed.
"Uncle Fang is right. The principles of movable type printing and seals are the same." Li Tai smiled.
"Hey~ Hey~ Hey~ Your Majesty, don't throw it around. These are placed in a regular pattern. If you throw them around, it will be difficult to find the typesetting."
Li Shimin threw the three type molds he had just picked up into the square.
Everyone else knew to put them back in place, but Li Shimin threw them around.
"Boy, is there something special about the placement of these fonts?" Li Shimin asked with a little apology on his face.
"Yes, Your Majesty!
These fonts are placed according to the pronunciation rules. You need to learn pinyin to understand this." Su Chen did not explain too much. They had never been exposed to pinyin, and they would not understand if he said too much.
The order of font placement is somewhat similar to the dictionary of later generations.
While answering, Su Chen found the three fonts that Li Shimin had misplaced.
"Well, sorry, I didn't know the secret before."
Li Shimin looked at Su Chen and expressed his sincere apology. He knew very well that papermaking and printing were actually made by Su Chen. This was the result of Su Chen and Li Tai's hard work, and it should be respected.
However, it was Su Chen, and others dared to accept the emperor's apology?
"Your Majesty, it's serious, but it doesn't matter. After each typesetting, the typesetting will be checked first. Only after the text and punctuation are confirmed to be correct, will it be printed in large quantities."
Su Chen bowed and smiled. Li Shimin apologized to him in person, which was something Su Chen had never thought of.
Fang Xuanling and other ministers thought it was no big deal for Li Shimin to apologize to Su Chen.
Ma Zhou was completely shocked. The emperor apologized to his ministers so easily?
This marquis didn't seem to be panicked at all!
"Your Majesty, instead of just watching like this, why not let the King of Wei print a few pages of paper so that your Majesty can see the complete printing process. How about it?" Su Chen asked with a smile.
"Hahaha, good, it should have been done long ago, Qingque, you start now! So that I and you can open your eyes."
Li Shimin's mood instantly improved, which was what he had thought in his heart before.
"Yes, father, I will start now!" Li Tai replied respectfully.
Li Tai took the wooden tray for typesetting from the printing table and began to pick the type mold.
Just thinking about what to print, I suddenly thought of the poem that Li Shimin "created" last night.
"Father, the content I want to print may use your name, please allow it!" Li Tai pleaded.
"No problem!" Li Shimin instantly guessed what Li Tai was printing.
"Thank you, father!" Li Tai began to pick characters and layout.
After about half a cup of tea, Li Tai finished picking characters and layout. Place it on the printing table to prevent it from moving during printing.
Then brush it with ink, take a piece of paper slightly larger than the layout, and lay it flat on the layout.
After several rollings, it is fully in contact with the positive character mold after the ink is applied to complete the rubbing.
Gently remove the paper, Li Tai carefully checks and confirms that it is correct, and then hands the printed [Midsummer Night·Li Shimin is inspired] to Li Shimin.
"Father, please take a look!"
After Li Shimin took it and looked at it, he said, "Good, movable type printing is indeed simple. It is indeed as you said, this process is not something that ordinary people can do."
After watching the entire printing process, Li Shimin found that he needed to master several skills and knowledge at the same time to complete the printing.
Although movable type printing saves the frequent steps of making engravings,, the requirements for printing workers have increased.
Typesetting first requires literacy and pinyin, and later on, it is necessary to bind the pages into books according to the lowercase numbers.
Then, Li Shimin handed the printed paper to Changsun Wuji and others for circulation.
"Your Majesty, I think this punctuation mark is a stroke of genius when added to the article!
Whether it is poetry or articles, the meaning is clear after adding punctuation." Fang Xuanling sighed.
After several circulations, the poem was handed back to Changsun Wuji.
Just as Changsun Wuji was about to hand the paper back to Li Shimin, he found that Ma Zhou's eyes were full of curiosity.
"Ma Zhou, take it and take a look. Your Majesty's masterpiece after drinking on the full moon night." Changsun Wuji looked at Ma Zhou and said.
"Student Ma Zhou, thank you, Minister Changsun!" Ma Zhou bowed respectfully and took the paper with both hands.
"No need to be so formal!"
After taking the paper, Ma Zhou habitually read it as a vertical book.
After turning the paper vertically, he found that the direction of the text was wrong.
Finally, Ma Zhou found that the article should be read horizontally and from left to right. What was even more puzzling was why some strange symbols were added to such a good article, which puzzled him.
Ma Zhou knew that now was not the time to ask questions.
"Midsummer Night, Li..." After reading the word "Li", Ma Zhou was frightened and some beads of sweat immediately appeared on his forehead.
"It was close, I almost called your majesty's name!"
Ma Zhou subconsciously wiped his forehead and continued to browse.
For some reason, Li Shimin was quite satisfied when he saw Ma Zhou's frightened look.
Perhaps it was because Su Chen never treated him as an emperor and tried to make up for some sense of superiority in Ma Zhou.
"When will it be tomorrow? Let's drink and ask the sky..."
After Ma Zhou finished reading, Li Shimin glanced at Changsun Wuji.
Changsun Wuji nodded slightly, then smiled faintly and asked: "Ma Zhou, what do you think of your majesty's poem?"
Hearing this, Ma Zhou looked at Emperor Li Shimin, who had a faint smile on his face.
"Reply to Minister Changsun, I dare not speak nonsense!" Ma Zhou said with a bow.
Li Shimin knew Ma Zhou's concerns and smiled:
"Ma Zhou, don't worry, speak boldly if you have any ideas!"