Samples of paper, apparently manufactured around 100 B. C., have been discovered in China. These samples were made not of rags or fishing nets, but of bast fibers from the Kodzu tree. As for other inventions, one must assume that the technique of making paper was an improve-ment on earlier techniques, i. e., that paper had ancestors. There is a belt along the Earth's Equator where papermaking material is obtained from plant fibers. This material is called Tapa, and the name originates from South Pacific islands. It is found also in Asia, central Africa, and Central America. The material is used frequently for clothing or for wall decorating, and is colored by immersion in dyes or printed by primitive printing stamps. Traveling Malaya people carried the art of making Tapa to South-Eastern Asia, Madagascar, and Africa. It is not certain how the trade reached Mexico or the northern part of South America, but beating tools similar to those used on Celebes were found in Mexico. Mexico is also one of the few countries where Tapa was used early as a writing material. Fermentation, cooking with potash, and in many cases the fibers (from the Kodzu plant) are common to Tapa and paper. -- AATA