Answer:
Papermaking, printing, gunpowder and the compass - the four great inventions of ancient China-are significant contributions of the Chinese nation to world civilization. China was the first nation to invent paper. In the 16th century, it went to America by way of Europe and then gradually spread all over the world.
Step-by-step explanation:
Four Great Inventions of Ancient China - Paper
China was the first nation to invent paper. Before its invention, words were written on various natural materials by ancient peoples-on grass stalks by the Egyptians, on earthen plates by the Mesopotamians, on tree leaves by the Indians, on sheepskin by the Europeans and strangest of all, even inscribed on bamboo or wooden strips, tortoise shells or shoulder blades of an ox by the early Chinese. Later, inspired by the process of silk reeling, the people in ancient China succeeded in first making a kind of paper called "bo" out of silk.
Four Great Inventions of Ancient China - Printing
Printed in Tang Dynasty. A Buddhist sutra is the first book in the world with a verifiable date of printing. Before the invention of printing, dissemination of knowledge depended either on word of mouth or handwritten copies of manuscripts. Both took time and were liable to error. Beginning 2000 years ago in the Western Han Dynasty (206 B.C.--- 25 A.D.), stone-tablet rubbing was in vogue for spreading Confucian classics or Buddhist sutras.
Four Great Inventions of Ancient China - Gunpowder
Credit for the invention of gunpowder also goes to ancient China. Ancient necromancers discovered in their practice of alchemy, that an explosion could be induced if certain kinds of ores and fuel were mixed in the right proportions and heated, thus leading to the invention of gunpowder.
Four Great Inventions of Ancient China - the Compass
Sinan (Warring States Period)the earliest guide tool in the world
The compass, an indispensable navigational tool, was another significant gift from ancient China. While mining ores and melting copper and iron, people chanced upon a natural magnetite that attracted iron and pointed fixedly north.