656 MATERIALS TO WRITE UPON BEFORE INVENTION OV PRINTING. 



aiitl twenty-three yeary before our era, that the invention of paper is 

 due. AVhether it was in consequence of cordial relations or through 

 Chinese prisoners that paper was introduced in Samarcand is of 

 little importance; the fact is certain that it did become known there 

 in 751. Forty-three years later pajDer was known at Bagdad and at 

 Damascus. Its employment and manufacture spread rapidly in 

 Syria, Arabia, Egypt. 



Doctor Karabacek had the good fortune to recover, among the 

 treasures of El Uschmunein, all the secrets of Egyptian paper 

 makers." He even discovered bills, or receipts of imposts, dating 

 from 950 to 103G of our era. This paper, is sometimes very thin and 

 often highly glazed. 



In the twelfth century paper mills were established in Fez, Mo- 

 rocco, and in Xativa, Spain, whence they spread to Valencia and 

 other cities. 



In Italy paper mills existed at Fabriano from the thirteenth cen- 

 tury. The collection of Prof. A. Zonghi comprises several thousand 

 :-amples of pa|)er from that locality, dating from 1267 to 1750. He 

 even had the j)atience to raise the filigrees from these papers, and his 

 manuscript album contains more than 20,000 designs.'' According to 

 a charter of the bishop of Lodeve, granted in 1189 to Kayniond de 

 Popian, a paper mill was to be erected at that date in Herault, but 

 this document could not be found. It is onl}^ cited in the chronology 

 of the bishops of Lodeve. Some reservation must therefore be made. 



This is not the case with another document found in the cartulary 

 of the monasteries of Gellone and Aniane, published by Meynial and 

 the Abbe Cassan. It is beyond doubt, according to this record, that 

 l^aper was known in France in 1340.^ 



Its introduction into Europe seems to coincide Avith the exodus of 

 the Jews to Spain and the south of France after the Arabs liad ex- 

 pelled them lirst from the north of Africa and later from the south of 

 Spain. 



Paper must have been introduced into (xermany in the second half 



1 Doctor Karabacek. Das arabiscbe Papier. Eiiie bistoriscbe-antiquarische 

 Untersucbung. \Yien, 1887, gr. 40. 



6 Masce rctrospectif de la cbisse 88. Fabrication du papier (Alatieres premi- 

 eres, materiel, procedcs et i)roduits) a TExposition uiiiverselle internationale de 

 jOOO, Jl Paris. Rapport de la Coimnissioii, d'Installation. Saint-Cloud, s. d., 

 gr. 8", p. I.j-IT. 



c " L'ubbe de Saint-Guilbem donne a nouveau oens a Paul Gilles, marcband de 

 Monti)ellier, originaire de Saint-Guilbem, le tenement de Rieux Cabrie " quod 

 extenditur a quodam loco vocato los estregs des cols de Cazelas, usque ad pontem 

 vocatum INIanafossa * * * jn quo quidem tenemento consensiit dominus 

 Abbas (piod idem Paulus et sui successores possint et valeant facere et reflcere 

 molendinuui et molendina, paratorum et paratoria, bladerum et bladeria. papi- 

 renm et papirea, et alia quaecumque." (Cite dans Musee retrospeetif * * *, 

 p. 12.) 



