中国文化遗产 ：毛笔的起源
毛笔，是中国文房四宝之一，但它的起源有多少人知道呢？
据说战国末年，因匈奴略侵秦国北方频密，秦王派大将军蒙恬镇守北方。当时人们广用竹片为纸，刀片为笔，一刀一刀的将文字刻在竹片上，非常耗时，不便用于瞬息万变的战场上。
眼看战况紧急，蒙恬急中生智，眼见到北方匈奴人以兽毛沾染颜料绘图后。灵机一动，随手将士兵装备上的布料撕下，当为纸。再将兔尾毛绑在竹枝上，当为笔，尝试书写并发现速度比刻字快上许多。
此举非但加快了军情传递时间，也获得秦王的敬宠。蒙恬之后多次改良，利用狼毛与羊毛制作笔头形成我们现在人所谓的兼毫笔。据后唐马缟《中华古今注》载：蒙恬始作秦笔，以枯木为管，鹿毛为柱，羊毛为被，谓之“苍毫”。所以世人后来将蒙恬奉为制笔业的始主。
蒙恬虽然奉为制笔始主，但他其实是制笔的改良者。考古学家发现最早的毛笔早在商朝就已出现过，但是当时各各地区对笔的称呼不一致。所用的原材料也不一定是竹子与兽毛， 凡是能够沾墨成字，都能称为笔。
蒙恬对笔的改良颠覆了当时人们对笔的认知，这一点绝对的是功不可没的。
We all know Chinese brush is one of the four treasures of Chinese literature, but how many people know its origin?
It was told that in the final few years of the Warring States period, the Xiong Nu tribes frequently invaded the northern land of Qin empire, the King of Qin sent one of his trusted generals, Meng Tian to guard the north. At that period of time, instead of writing on papers with brushes, people are engraving words on to bamboo stripes. It is very time-consuming and inconvenient especially in the ever-changing battlefield
Meng Tian was supposed to report the battlefield situation to the King of Qin, so that they could properly arrange a logistic planning to deploy foods and soldiers to assist Meng Tian in defending the North territories. Unfortunately, with Xiong Nu actively invading the land of Qin, engraving the report on the bamboo stripes takes up too much time, by the time they finished the report, the battle could be long over.
Seeing the urgency of the war, Meng Tian has to do something, and at that time he saw the Xiong Nu tribe’s people was painting with the animal hair. That moment he came up with an idea, he tore away a piece of fabric on his soldier’s equipment and use it as paper. He then cut off the rabbit tails and tie it on a bamboo branch to act as a brush. This has form the basic shape of a brush, he tested out with curiosity and the result was outstanding. This new finding not only speed up the military communication method but also gain the respect of the King of Qin.
After multiple times of experiment and improvised, he had officially designed the proper brush making techniques which no-body else had ever done so. According to a Chinese Ancient text recorded: “Meng Tian created Qin Brushes, with dried wood as tube, deer hair as the column and goat fur as the quilt” therefore, Meng Tian has became the creator of the brush-making industry.
Although Meng Tian was often relates as the creator of the brush, but he was actually a reformer of brush. Archaeologists has found evidences that the earliest Chinese brush had appearance in Shang Dynasty, but during that time the name of the tools were inconsistent throughout various regions. The raw materials used are not necessarily be bamboo and animal hair. In fact anything that can be inked and write wordings are called brushes. With Meng Tian’s improvement in the brush-making techniques, changed the people’s perception of the brushes, and his work is absolutely indispensable throughout the china cultural history.