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The Four Great Inventions 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. [1]
The following is a list of the Four Great Inventions—as designated by Joseph Needham (1900–1995), a British scientist, author and sinologist known for his research on the history of Chinese science and technology.
The Four Great Inventions, the compass, gunpowder, papermaking, and printing – were among the most important technological advances, only known to Europe by the end of the Middle Ages 1000 years later. The Tang dynasty (AD 618–906) in particular was a time of great innovation. [citation needed]
Iron plate with an order 6 magic square in Eastern Arabic numerals from China, dating to the Yuan dynasty (1271–1368). Li Shanlan identity: discovered by the mathematician Li Shanlan in 1867. [29] Liu Hui's π algorithm: Liu Hui's π algorithm was invented by Liu Hui (fl. 3rd century), a mathematician of Wei Kingdom.
Printing is considered one of the Four Great Inventions of China that spread throughout the world. [3] [11]According to the Book of the Southern Qi, in the 480s, a man named Gong Xuanyi (龔玄宜) styled himself Gong the Sage and "said that a supernatural being had given him a 'jade seal jade block writing,' which did not require a brush: one blew on the paper and characters formed."
China was a global scientific and technological leader up until the early years of the Ming dynasty.Ancient and medieval Chinese discoveries and Chinese innovations such as papermaking, printing, the compass, and gunpowder (the Four Great Inventions) contributed to the economic development of ancient and medieval East Asia, the Middle East and Europe.
There were great innovations in metallurgy. In addition to Zhou-era China's (c. 1046 – 256 BCE) previous inventions of the blast furnace and cupola furnace to make pig iron and cast iron, respectively, the Han period saw the development of steel and wrought iron by use of the finery forge and puddling process.
Until the Qing Dynasty (1644–1912), China was a world leader in technology and scientific discovery. Many Chinese inventions — paper and printing, gunpowder, porcelain, the magnetic compass, the sternpost rudder, and the lift lock for canals — made major contributions to economic growth in the Middle East and Europe.