Development of printing

Development of printing

Printing was first done from wooden blocks. The pictures and text for an entire page were carved on a single block of wood, and the block was inked and pressed against paper by hand. The Chinese began making books this way in the 800's, and Europeans did so by the late 1300's.

Bi Sheng of China invented moveable type in about 1045. He made a separate piece of clay type for each character. Later, the Chinese also developed metal type. But the se of movable type did not catch on in China because the Chinese language has thousands of different characters. People found it impractical to make so many different pieces of type.

Europenas developed moveable type independently in the mid-1400's. Johannes Gutenberg of Germany and his associates printed the first books in Europe by movable type in Mainz, Germany, between 1453 and 1456.

Gutenberg invented a new type of mold that made it possible to cast enough uniform metal type pieces to make printing from movable type practical for the first time. Individual pieces of type were made for each letter, character, or space. Gutenberg assembled his pieces of type in a form and then inked the type. Next, he placed paper on the type. Gutenberg also developed a printing press from a machine used to press grapes or cheese. By turning a huge screw on the press, he brought down a wood block that pressed the paper evenly against the type. The name "movable type" comes from the fact that after printing many copies of one sheet, the type pieces could be taken out of the form and rearranged, or moved, to make new pages.

Excerpt adapted from the "Printing" article, The World Book Encyclopedia © 1999