WORLD CULTURES

Ancient Chinese Inventions

Entry Task Memo Books

Looking at your notes from yesterday: Which of the four religions would likely say these quotes.

"Like a spider caught in its own web is a person driven by fierce desires. Break out of the web, and turn away from the world of sensory pleasures and sorrow.”

"If a ruler himself in honest, all will go well without orders. But if he himself is not honest, even though he gives orders they will not be obeyed.”

"Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one getting burned.“

"No one can see their reflection in running water. It is only in still water that we can see. ”

Silk Production

Legend says that around 2700 BCE, the Empress Hsi Ling Shi had a silkworm cocoon fall into her hot tea. As she watched the stands of fiber unravel, she had a vision of how to harvest and weave the threads into silk.

Making Silk

The Seismograph

Chang Heng, a scientist, mathematician and inventor designed the first seismograph around 132 CE

Bronze vessel with an inverted weighted bob in the center which would release a small bronze ball through one of eight grooved openings when a tremor caused the bob to sway.

Paper

The invention of paper from hemp fibers dates to the second century BCE.

The oldest surviving piece of paper was found in a tomb near Xian and dates from between the years 140 and 87 BCE.

Rockets and multi-staged rockets

Invented around 1150 CE when a bamboo stick was attached to a cluster of fireworks. The stick was fitted with an arrowhead (sometimes coated with poison) and a balancing weight and was lit from a frame shaped like a dragon or other type of launcher box.

Multistage rockets were rigged so that the rear fuses for the second stage of the rocket would light once the front stage had burnt out.

The Abacus

By the 14th century the abacus was in common use. The abacus is a wooden frame with a horizontal bar that divides the upper section of the frame from the rest. Columns of vertical wood rods hold counting beads. The counting beads are moved over to represent the units, tens, hundreds, thousands and so on.

                                                                        

                                                

What is this?

Compass

The spoon or ladle is of magnetic lodestone, and the plate is of bronze.

The circular center represents Heaven, and the square plate represents Earth.

The plate bears Chinese characters which denote the eight main directions

Separately marked are the finer gradations of twenty-four compass points, and along the outermost edge are the twenty-eight lunar mansions.

The Great Wall of China

Danny Way

Kites

Video

Chinese Inventions