The origins of genuine paper began in South East Asia. Like the people of Egypt, the Chinese had, virtually 50 centuries in the past, invented a pictographic form of writing. The Egyptians also had been making use of many different kinds of objects to scribe upon, usually strips of bamboo and silk woven into a fine fabric and possibly the barkcloth they used for other uses derived from the Paper. Mulberry was also used.
History tells us that in 105AD a government worker named Tsai Lung, created usable paper, though it is almost certain from archaeological digs that in fact it was in existence in what is now the People's Republic of China for probably two centuries prior to him.
Way back during times gone by writing was usually done on some form of bamboo or sometimes on pieces of silk, which were known as Ji then. Nevertheless silk was expensive and bamboo being weighty, these two materials were inconvenient. Around then Tsai Lun thought of utilizing bark, fish nets, rags, and hemp. In 105 years after the birth of Christ he made a report to the emperor with regard to the process of paper making and was endowed with high accolade for his idea. Consequently, from those distant days paper has been availed of everywhere and is known as the "paper of Marquis Tsai".
Whether the above title is Marquis Tsai's entitlement, will probably never be known! Nonetheless the main factor must be that the discovery was made that if they pounded certain compounds taken from plants in to a mache, purge unwanted substances, float the mache in water, filter it onto textile sheets and allow it to dry. When it dried, it calcified into a firm, robust sheet that was extraordinarily light, and provided that it did not get damp or wet, proved incredibly dense.
It's a fact that this simple of paper making techniques is still practised in exactly the same way in and around Tibet and Nepal, the initial regions to make use of the techniques from China. A simple frame utilizes a kind of cotton cloth made to stretch over a side, thin mush is situated into the other side and moved around until it is smooth. After which it is suspended so that it will let the liquid to leave it and the grume to dry in to a sheet of parchment which can be stripped off.
As time went by a very talented individual came to realize that building a frame with ribs and putting a fine replaceable bamboo mat across this, would enable the procedure to be accelerated enormously. Instead of using one mold for each paper sheet, therefore severely limiting the amount of sheets that can be made at one time, a stack of sieved paste was able to be built up a layer at a time, with merely a strip of cotton thread between them which would facilitate separation at a later time. The stack would then be squeezed very lightly, and every sheet of pulp moved to a board to dry.