Life and Conditions of the People of Hindustan (1200–1550 A.D.) c6.s2.t1.46

c6.s2.t1.46

⁴ For other details on the subject of rag-paper, compare R. Hoernle’s summary of the researches of Professors Wiesner and Karabacek of the Vienna University in *J.R.A.S.*, 1903, ‘Who was the inventor of rag-paper?’ pp. 663-684. It is made clear that when Muslims first came into touch with the Chinese, the latter used besides ‘grasses and plants’, more or less macerated rags and ropes (linen, hempen and others) in making paper. The Arabs gradually increased the substitution of rag-fibres, until at last they confined themselves to the use of woven or worked-up fibres, contained in rags, ropes, nets, and such-like material, mostly linen. This improvement affected the surface of the paper, by extracting the fibres through a mechanical process and by sizing it with starch glue. It is the preparation of paper by this improved method, the credit of which goes to the Arabs, or more properly to the paper-makers of Samarqand. The Arabs had similarly taken over from the Chinese the processes of ‘sizing’ and ‘loading’ of paper. By the close of the 8th century the whole process of making paper as it was substantially practised until the invention of paper-machines, had been completed. Compare I.G.I.; IV, 206 for the older theory.