The Journey From Spatula To Pen In A Nutshell

As the saying goes, “Necessity is the mother of invention”. And what they never say- every invention has its own story. Every little history that has been written down has its own importance. It seems that history is always related to writing. And did you ever enquire about the history of the most famous writing instrument, Pen?

From The Beginning…

It can be surprising enough that the pens today come out of the violence. The handy and sharpened tool that was used for skinning and injuring the wild animals were first used as an instrument of writing. In 24,000 BC this tool was used by the cavemen as an instrument of painting. Writing is the civilised version of out coming thoughts that first came into being as a beautiful painting, rather can say, cave painting. These are the very first steps of writing down the ancient history.

Before the Term “Pen” and “Paper”…

Then there was nothing like paper and pen. Perhaps they were unable to give a proper name but started putting their thought down on clay or wax tablets. Around 6000 years ago, Egyptians became the epitome of the technology of that time and started inventing different miraculous products and Invented Papyrus.

The FIRST form of pens

The word paper is derived from the term papyrus that was actually a thin woven mat made by moulding grass and raw bamboo trees. Another history tells that ancient Greek too used some writing mat alike the papyrus.

Now, the time had come to invent something by which one could write as the sharpen instrument that was used for killing animal and craving on the caves were no longer useful on papyrus as they could not be scratched on it .  And this need of writing instrument led the Egyptians to invent a sharp-hollow instrument made of bamboo called Pen and the ink that were used in the hollow part was made of the juice of reed plant. That was the very first step of the modern pen.

Feather Pens:

Thinking about an imaginary scene of a Victorian poet, leads you to an imagination of writing some love poetry with a quill pen dipping into the ink.  Yes, around 1300 years ago pens were made of bird’s feathers. Goose feathers were the most common in use and swan’s are the one of the most expensive and high quality. For making fine line drawing they used the feathers of an eagle, owl, hawk and turkey.

Ball Pen, The modern version writing instrument:

It was the late 19^th century when the ball pens manufacturers came about with the new and amazing product that did not require refilling frequently. In the field of writing improvising it created a milestone.

How does a Ball Pen work?

A ballpoint pen uses a small rotating ball on the tip made of steel, brass or tungsten carbide to scatter ink on the paper. All of the pens that preceded the ballpoint — whether metal, quill or fountain — used a liquid ink that fed through the pen using capillary action.

The goal of a ball point pen is creating a device that can distribute a fast-drying thick ink, without having the ink dry out in the pen itself. The word “Ball” is the key here and the ball acts as:

• A continuous cap that keeps the ink from drying
• A mechanism for getting the ink onto the paper

Technology is something that cannot stand still. From the pin to the aeroplane and from the pen to penthouse it spreads its colourful wings and makes it more interesting with each passing day.