first two centuries of printing from movable types were 
motivated much more by the desire to see ancient and 
medieval books than by the need to read and write new ones. 
Until 1700 much more than 50 per cent of all printed books 
were ancient or medieval. Not only antiquity but also the Middle 
Ages were given to the first reading public of the printed word. 
And the medieval texts were by far the most popular.

     Like any other extension of man, typography had psychic 
and social consequences that suddenly shifted previous 
boundaries and patterns of culture. In bringing the ancient and 
medieval worlds into fusion—or, as some would say, 
confusion—the printed book created a third world, the modern 
world, which now encounters a new electric technology or a new 
extension of man. Electric means of moving of information are 
altering our typographic culture as sharply as print modified