The invention of printing at about the middle of the fifteenth century
marks an epoch in the world's literature and in the history of the
human race. Previous to this invention were spread out the events, the
scenes, and the achievements of ancient and medieval times; after it
came the marvelous unfoldings of the modern age.
The introduction of typography or the art of printing by means
of movable types set in operation an instrumentality which, for
multiplying the effectiveness of all literary productions, is far
beyond all adequate conception;--and this all apart from the time of
its origin and the person of its originator.
Printing as an invention and an art--for it is both--has been ascribed
to the Chinese, and is said to have been known from, or from before,
the dawn of the Christian Era. Mr. George H. Putnam states it as a
fact that "Printing from solid blocks was done in China as early as
the first century A. D.," and credits the art of printing from movable
types to a blacksmith who turned out books in China toward the close
of the tenth century, A. D., or early in the eleventh. And a writer in
the _Encylopedia Britannica_ (Eleventh Edition) asserts that printed
books were common in China in the tenth century, and that examples of
xylographic or block printing in Japan date from the period of 754 to
770 A. D. However this may be, it remains true that, in relation to the
spread of literature and the development of civilization, typography is
occidental rather than oriental. Furthermore, we need to distinguish
between the block printing of China and the great invention at the
middle of the fifteenth century. Comparing impressions from engraved
blocks of wood with the type-printing of Gutenberg, Professor Dobschütz
says: "People had used woodcuts before his time. Engraving large
blocks of wood with pictures and letters, they printed the so-called
block-books as a cheap substitute for illuminated manuscripts.
Gutenberg's great idea was that instead of using a woodcut block for
the page one might compose a page by using separate movable letters,
putting them together according to the present need, then separating
them again."[1] It is generally conceded that the invention of printing
from movable types, as an epoch of human history, had its real
beginning in Germany, dates from the middle of the fifteenth century,
and is associated with one named Johannes Gutenberg.
Gutenberg was of patrician parentage and was born at Mainz (the modern
Mayence), Germany, about 1400 A. D. His life was a prolonged struggle
with adverse circumstances. He died in 1468, poor, childless, and
almost friendless--scarcely dreaming that he had laid the foundations
of a benefaction which chronicled the turning-point of universal
history, set a permanent guide-post in the world's progress, and
proclaimed a new era in civilization. But so it was.
While we are without definite information as to how the first copies
were printed, yet it is obvious from Gutenberg's famous forty-two
line Bible that they used a mechanical press. The earliest picture
of a printing-press shows an upright wooden frame with a screw post
attachment by means of which the required pressure for impression
was obtained and then reversed to release and remove the printed
sheet. This screw post was operated by a movable bar. This kind of
press continued to be used for a hundred and fifty years. The first
types were cut from wood, but the ink used had a softening effect
thereupon and lead was substituted. Lead, in turn, was found to be
too soft a metal to resist the pressure requisite for printing. After
experimentation, an alloy of antimony and lead proved to have the
adaptable strength and softness; it was also capable of delicate and
clear-cut manipulation. These metal types were first cast in sand and,
later, in clay molds. The ink used for printing with the Gutenberg
press was a mixture of linseed oil and lamp-black and was applied to
the type-form by means of a "dabber" made of skin and stuffed with
wool. It is stated that the first types as used in China were made of
plastic clay; later, of copper; and then of lead, inasmuch as copper
had come to be utilized as coin. (Putnam.)
It is worthy of our note in this connection that the first important
product of the printing-press was the Bible;--was devoted, as has
been said, "to the service of heaven." This first "production" was
on 641 leaves of vellum, two columns to a page, and forty-two lines
to each column. "Probably," says Professor Dobschütz, "not more than
100 copies of the Bible were printed, a third of these on parchment.
Out of thirty-one copies which have been preserved, or, to speak
more accurately, are known as such, ten are luxuriously printed on
parchment and illuminated, each in a different way, but all very fine
and costly."[2] (One copy of Gutenberg's first printed Bible was sold
for $20,000.) The first copy of this edition known to scholars--the
Latin Vulgate--was discovered long after (in 1760) in the library of
Cardinal Mazarin, whence its designation, "the Mazarin Bible." Nine
other copies which were upon vellum and a score that were printed on
paper (two of which are in New York City) are all that are known to
the bibliographers of the first "edition" of the printed Bible. While
engaged in the production of this first book (which required four
years, 1453-1456, to complete) Gutenberg printed smaller works--school
books and the like--for immediate financial returns. In this first
edition of the printed Bible the initial letters were not struck off by
press but were left, together with the marginal decorations, for after
illumination by hand. A Bible printed at Mainz in 1462 is the first
printed book that bears the date of its production.