Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
AD
(after Christ)
1545: hemp cultivation starts in Chile, South
America.
1564: Phillip of Spain orders that Spain be cul-
tivated across his empire, which at the time
extended from Argentina to Oregon.
16th and 17th centuries: the Dutch Golden
Age commences, thanks to the trade in
hemp.
1631: hemp is used as a unit of barter across
the American colonies.
1776: draft of the Declaration of American
Independence is printed on hemp paper. (Both
George Washington and Thomas Jefferson
cultivated hemp on their land.)
18th century: appearance of the first cotton
threshing machines allowed the harvesting of
cotton to become mechanized and cotton to
become a competitor to hand-harvested
hemp.
1807: patent deposited by Canson for
papier
calque
, otherwise known as tracing paper.
This was made from hemp fibre.
1850: introduction of exotic fibres. Start of the
petrochemical era. Development of sulfite
processing to extract lignin and of chlorine
bleaching (Berthollet procedure) allow paper to
be manufactured from wood pulp. Steam
power replaces sail power.
1895: first use of the word 'marijuana' by
Pancho Villa's partisans.
1910: African Americans introduce jazz and
'the weed' to New Orleans.
1937: the Marijuana Tax Act is enacted. Hemp
cultivation is taxed so severely that it is aban-
doned in the USA.
1932: creation in Le Mans, France, of what
was to become the Fédération Nationale des
Producteurs de Chanvre (FNPC), the National
Federation of Hemp Producers.
1937: nylon is patented by Dupont de
Nemours.
1943-1945: 'Hemp for 'Victory', a propa-
ganda film is produced to encourage American
farmers to produce hemp to help in the war
effort.
1961:
Convention Unique sur les Stupéfiants
(United Nations Single Convention on Narcotic
Drugs) signed with the exception of China,
India, the USSR, the Eastern block, Italy
and France (
http://www.incb.org/incb/
62-117: Cai-Lun, working for the Emperor of
China, perfects the manufacture of paper
made largely from hemp.
600: the Germans, Francs and Vikings all use
hemp fibre.
751: Battle of Talas, in Samarkand, saw the
Arab Abbasid Caliphate defeat the Chinese.
The vanquished Chinese prisoners passed on
the secret of paper manufacture.
770: the Chinese produce the first printed
book (Dharani scroll).
9th century: the introduction of cotton breaks
hemp's monopoly of the clothing and yarn
industries.
1109: first European document written on
paper by Charif Al Idrissi - the topic of King
Roger II of Sicily. This was written in both
Arabic and Greek for geographic purposes.
1117: according to legend, Jean Mongolfier,
during the time of the Second Crusade, was
taken captive by the Saracens and undertook
forced labour in a Damascus paper mill. On his
return to France, in 1157, he is supposed to
have established a paper mill in Auvergne.
1150: The Muslims introduced hemp to
Europe, leading to the first paper to be
produced on the continent.
1151: a water mill was established at Xativa,
near Alicante, in Spain. This mill macerated
scraps of paper. Cf. Bertrand Gille,
Histoire
des techniques
, Gallimard, coll.
La Pléiade
,
1978.
1154: paper first used in Italy in the form of a
register written by Giovanni Scriba and dated
1154-1166. It is thought that this paper was
imported from the East. No other example of
paper was found in Italy until 1276 and the
mention of the mills of Fabriano.
1348: a paper mill is established in the region
of Troyes: the
Moulin de la Peille
is probably
the oldest French mill.
1390: the first paper mill to be established in
Germany is set up by Ulman Stromer, in
Nuremburg. Previously, all paper used in
Germany was imported from Italy.
1492: Christopher Columbus sails to the New
World, a journey made possible by the
80 t of sails and rope, made of hemp, on his
caravels!
