Four Great Inventions

Read this article to learn about the origins of China's great inventions, which include the compass, gunpowder, paper, and printing. After reading about China's role in inventing each of these, feel free to search for articles about each specific invention for more history of the use and development of these tools.

Four Great Inventions

The Four Great Inventions (simplified Chinese: 四大发明; traditional Chinese: 四大發明) are inventions from ancient China that are celebrated in Chinese culture for their historical significance and as symbols of ancient China's advanced science and technology. They are the compass, gunpowder, papermaking, and printing.

China held the world's leading position in many fields in the study of nature from the 1st century BC to the 15th century AD, with the four great inventions having the greatest global significance.

These four inventions had a profound impact on the development of civilization throughout the world. However, some modern Chinese scholars have opined that other Chinese inventions were perhaps more sophisticated and had a greater impact on Chinese civilization – the Four Great Inventions serve merely to highlight the technological interaction between East and West.



Source: Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Great_Inventions
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