The invention, or more properly the discovery, of lithography, claims a
high rank among those of the present age, on account of its extensive
usefulness. The honour of the invention belongs to Alois Sennefelder,
originally a performer at the Theatre Royal of Munich. He had conceived
the idea of etching on stone instead of on copper, and was proceeding to
make the experiment, when an accidental discovery gave a more beneficial
turn to his speculations. The discovery, which was that of the
lithographic art, has been thus narrated by Sennefelder himself:--
"I had just succeeded, in my little laboratory, in polishing a stone
plate, which I intended to cover with etching ground, when my mother
entered the room, and desired me to write her a bill for the
washerwoman, who was waiting for the linen. I happened not to have even
the smallest slip of paper at hand, as my little stock of paper had been
entirely exhausted by taking proof impressions from the stones; nor was
there even a drop of ink in the ink-stand. As the matter would not admit
of delay, and we had nobody in the house to send for a supply of the
deficient materials, I resolved to write the list with my ink prepared
with wax, soap, and lamp-black, on the stone which I had just polished,
and from which I could copy it at leisure."
"Some time after this, I was going to wipe this writing from the stone,
when the idea, all at once, struck me to try what would be the effect of
such a writing with my prepared ink if I were to bite it in the stone
with aquafortis; and whether, perhaps, it might not be possible to apply
printing ink to it in the same way as to wood engravings, and to take
impressions from it." Sennefelder surrounded the stone with a border of
wax, and applied aquafortis, by which in a few minutes the writing was
raised. Printing ink was then applied with a common printer's ball,
impressions were taken off, and the practicability of the important art
of lithography thus was fully established.
The first application of the art to purposes of usefulness unconnected
with the fine arts, was made by the Duke of Wellington in the Peninsular
War, for the purpose of rapidly multiplying copies of general orders,
instructions, etc., and accompanying them with sketches of positions. It
has since been introduced into the public offices of almost every state
in Europe; and its uses in every department of commercial, social, and
artistic activity are innumerable.