Early 1800s.

18 世紀初期。

It's the middle of the Napoleonic Wars in the middle of Europe, and it's the middle of the night.

歐洲大陸中部正值拿破崙戰爭，而那時是午夜 。

One Captain Charles Barbier of Napoleon's army is trying to relay a message to one of his troops.

拿破崙軍隊的查爾斯‧巴比爾上尉正試圖傳訊給其中一支部隊。

But sending written communications to the front lines can be deadly for the recipient.

但傳送書信給前線士兵可能會惹來殺身之禍。

Lighting a candle to read the missive can give away their positions to the enemy.

點蠟燭閱讀書信，可能會間接洩漏藏匿的地點。

In a moment of vision, Barbier pokes a series of holes into a sheet of a paper with his blade,

巴比爾靈機一動，用刀片在紙張背後戳出許多小洞。

creating a coded message that can be deciphered by fingertip, even in the pitch black.

這些小洞組成的編碼可透過指尖觸摸解碼，所即使一片黑暗也能讀取。

The merits of his so-called night writing are never acknowledged by the military,

軍隊的人並不理解巴比爾所謂「點字」的好處。

but in 1821, Barbier approaches the Royal Institute for Blind Youth in Paris in the hopes that they might find a use for his innovative, new communication method.

但在 1821 年，巴比爾向巴黎盲人青年皇家學會提出建議，希望他們能運用這套創新的溝通方式。

There, a precocious teen by the name of Louis Braille does just that.

有位成熟的青年，路易‧布萊葉接受了他的提議。

Louis spends the next several years improving on Barbier's idea, creating an organized alphabet fitting into a six dot standardized cell.

路易花了許多年修正巴比爾原版的點字，創設了一套新系統，運用六個整齊的洞，排列組合出 26 個字母。

The system catches on.

於是這套系統開始流行。

Today, Braille is the universally accepted system of writing for the blind, adapted for more than 130 languages.

直到今日，點字已是全球通用的盲人書寫系統，適用於 130 種以上的語言。