For seven centuries the Chinese guarded the secret of paper manufacture. They also tried to eliminate other Asian centers of paper production, to ensure the kind of monopoly the Ptolemies had enjoyed over papyrus. The paper monopoly, though, was inherently fragile. At the Battle of Talas, in 751, the Ottoman Turks defeated the T’ang army. Prisoners were taken to Samarkand, where the local people learned the secrets of papermaking. Soon the people of Samarkand were producing paper in large quantities for export.
