Gutenberg’s invention revolutionized
the world of communication and was the most revolutionary advancement in
technology since the wheel, because it was the first beneficial example of mass
production in the world which initiated an information revolution. The printing
press allowed for an assembly line style production process that was much more
efficient than pressing ink to paper by hand, books were created at a fraction
of the cost of conventional printing methods and movable type established a
standard of technological excellence for later generations. His technologies
spread across Europe at an extraordinary speed which gave new ideas a chance to
surface, this saw the number of printed books rise from 0 to 20 million in just
50 years. The art of movable type defines us today in modern society, as it
wouldn’t exist without the intervention of Gutenberg because up until now,
knowledge was sparse and was available only to the elite, those of royalty or
the religious order.
There was a shift from the
laborious creation of handwritten manuscripts to a new print technology that allowed
large quantities of written work to be created quickly and efficiently. The
press gave texts a consistent look and feel as it produced type with suitable
yet uniform spacing and hyphenation, the consistency of the text allowed
readers to easily understand the author’s writings and intentions which
enhanced the overall reading experience. Printed books had a positive impact on
educational practices that transformed learning and were viewed as teaching
machines whereas manuscripts were now crude and outdated teaching tools. Prints
were now available to the general public, as the costs to create books had
significantly decreased since books could now be published and mass-produced
with less effort.
The first few hundred years of freely available literature wasn't religious, almost all of it was travel literature as people couldn't leave and explore the world themselves so they wanted to explore through stories and non-fiction experiences, as information was now available to a much larger segment of the population who were eager for knowledge of any variety. Production costs to make books plummeted and knowledge flourished, access to knowledge was now granted to those who were unable to have it before. It completely transformed Europe as literacy was booming which brought about a thirst for more knowledge, particularly information on travel, other cultures, and what was going on around the world.
Writing became a broadcast medium due to the printing press, it lead to a more literate populace and a stronger economy as prior to the press, ideas were lost and now opinions and information could be spread freely. It was now possible to integrate and refine ideas and texts through time by commentary and comparison. It was the catalyst for many world movements and events, as well as cultural and societal transformations that began in the 16th century by providing an effective way to disperse texts. The impact of the printing press was astounding as it had dramatic effects on European civilisation, one of its immediate effects was that it spread information quickly and accurately as handwritten and translation errors were a thing of the past. It enabled the production of laws, maps, histories, scripture, and the classical writing that survived the Dark Ages where the body of printed writings stored in libraries around the world made up the collective, cumulative, comprehensive memory of humanity. The book trade flourished throughout Europe, as there was now always a consistent demand for new books.
The press used type that did at first imitate a manuscript but then eventually developed new typefaces as the contents of books covered an increasingly wider variety of non-religious topics such as: grammar, etiquette, geology, and travel literature. These new topic areas appealed especially to the professional members of the middle class. Printing prevented any further corruption of texts through hand copying, this allowed scholars to learn and work from the same text and they made progress in scholarship and science faster and more reliable. It stimulated literacy amongst those who previously had no knowledge of anything and eventually came to have a deep and lasting impact on their lives and promoted the circulation and preservation of knowledge in standardized form, which was important for the advancement of science, technology, and scholarship.
The first few hundred years of freely available literature wasn't religious, almost all of it was travel literature as people couldn't leave and explore the world themselves so they wanted to explore through stories and non-fiction experiences, as information was now available to a much larger segment of the population who were eager for knowledge of any variety. Production costs to make books plummeted and knowledge flourished, access to knowledge was now granted to those who were unable to have it before. It completely transformed Europe as literacy was booming which brought about a thirst for more knowledge, particularly information on travel, other cultures, and what was going on around the world.
Writing became a broadcast medium due to the printing press, it lead to a more literate populace and a stronger economy as prior to the press, ideas were lost and now opinions and information could be spread freely. It was now possible to integrate and refine ideas and texts through time by commentary and comparison. It was the catalyst for many world movements and events, as well as cultural and societal transformations that began in the 16th century by providing an effective way to disperse texts. The impact of the printing press was astounding as it had dramatic effects on European civilisation, one of its immediate effects was that it spread information quickly and accurately as handwritten and translation errors were a thing of the past. It enabled the production of laws, maps, histories, scripture, and the classical writing that survived the Dark Ages where the body of printed writings stored in libraries around the world made up the collective, cumulative, comprehensive memory of humanity. The book trade flourished throughout Europe, as there was now always a consistent demand for new books.
The press used type that did at first imitate a manuscript but then eventually developed new typefaces as the contents of books covered an increasingly wider variety of non-religious topics such as: grammar, etiquette, geology, and travel literature. These new topic areas appealed especially to the professional members of the middle class. Printing prevented any further corruption of texts through hand copying, this allowed scholars to learn and work from the same text and they made progress in scholarship and science faster and more reliable. It stimulated literacy amongst those who previously had no knowledge of anything and eventually came to have a deep and lasting impact on their lives and promoted the circulation and preservation of knowledge in standardized form, which was important for the advancement of science, technology, and scholarship.
Texts became more reliable and
the risk that material might be lost, corrupted, destroyed, or suppressed was
reduced. Books were now affordable to ordinary people and as society grew more
literate the number of potential readers increased as 20 years after Gutenberg
revealed his new machine, the new technology was firmly established in Europe. The
majority of books were originally published in Latin but during the Renaissance
there was a demand for books in different languages so that natives were able
to read the contents. Readers also wanted a greater variety of books and so new
topics such as almanacs, travel literature, chivalrous romances, and poetry
were published.
Despite the blooming knowledge and literacy which shaped European countries for the future, the press also created a disturbance within the Church as the increased number of books in circulation proved difficult for the church to control and censor their content. The power of the press was also used as a decentralizing force to undermine established elite institutions, and as an instrument of mass influence and control through advertising and propaganda, it allowed political and religious views to be widely distributed throughout Europe.
By 1482 there were over 100
printing presses in Western Europe and a Venetian printer called Aldus Manutius
began to print the works of the Classical Authors such as Aristotle,
Theocritus, and Aristophanes. He created the Aldine Press printing office in 1494,
which comprises Europe’s humanistic intellectual elite and employed the most talented
printers of the age. It was here that the typeface Antiqua was developed and soon spread throughout Europe. The font
was modelled on Roman inscriptional capitals and Carolingian writing which
feature more or less uniform thickness of all strokes and slanted serifs, it
was a font style that was used to mimic handwriting and is classified as an Old
Style typeface.Despite the blooming knowledge and literacy which shaped European countries for the future, the press also created a disturbance within the Church as the increased number of books in circulation proved difficult for the church to control and censor their content. The power of the press was also used as a decentralizing force to undermine established elite institutions, and as an instrument of mass influence and control through advertising and propaganda, it allowed political and religious views to be widely distributed throughout Europe.
Manutius discovered that the real
market for books was not for huge volumes of the Bible but for smaller, cheaper
pocket books. He wanted to create books
that were affordable, small, and easier to handle, with a condensed yet
readable type to cut paper costs and with the goal of saving space on the pages,
he commissioned Francesco Griffo to develop a cursive type for this new series.
Griffo designed the new italic type based on the cursive script developed in
the 1420’s by Niccolo de Niccoli. De Niccoli was an Italian Renaissance
humanist of the early 15th century who worked as a copyist and
collator of ancient manuscripts where he corrected text, introduced divisions
into chapters, and made tables of contents. He began to oblique and add
flourishes to his letters when he wished to write in a faster and more relaxed
fashion and by the mid 15th century, other scholars began to imitate
his writing style.
Manutius had the idea to create books in an octavo format where pieces of paper around A2 size were folded to produce eight leaves and sixteen pages, this process created miniature books that were almost A5 paper size. These were called pocket books and were a great success that encouraged Aldus and his sons continue publishing classical texts in small format throughout the 16th century, however Manutius did not sell these new fonts to his competition so they became widely counterfeited. The term italic was established as the style was developed it Italy and was used by Manutius’ plagiaristic competitors. Modern typefaces such as Bembo, Garamond, Aldus, and Palatino were based on the works of Griffo commissioned by Manutius. By the 16th century his books had spread throughout Europe with over 40,000 editions and 6 million copies published.
Manutius had the idea to create books in an octavo format where pieces of paper around A2 size were folded to produce eight leaves and sixteen pages, this process created miniature books that were almost A5 paper size. These were called pocket books and were a great success that encouraged Aldus and his sons continue publishing classical texts in small format throughout the 16th century, however Manutius did not sell these new fonts to his competition so they became widely counterfeited. The term italic was established as the style was developed it Italy and was used by Manutius’ plagiaristic competitors. Modern typefaces such as Bembo, Garamond, Aldus, and Palatino were based on the works of Griffo commissioned by Manutius. By the 16th century his books had spread throughout Europe with over 40,000 editions and 6 million copies published.
Martin Luther was a German friar
and theologian that became angry at the clergy for selling indulgences which
promised remission from punishments for sin and in 1517, he published his 95 Theses attacking the papal abuses
and the sale of indulgences. He was turned against many of the major teachings
of the Catholic Church and wanted to reveal the true story of the Bible rather
than the false interpretation put about by the Church. He wrote a series of
leaflets developing his ideas on Christian
Liberty, Freedom of a Christian Man, Christian Nobility, and The Babylonian Captivity of the Church,
and thanks to the printing press hundreds of thousands copies were printed of
his theses and leaflets which spread quickly throughout Europe. Gutenberg’s
Bible inspired him to print the German translation of the Protestant Bible by publishing
the New Testament in 1522 and the complete Bible with New and Old Testaments in
1534, which initiated the Protestant Reformation. His translation also fostered
the development of a standard version of the German language.
A
selection of Luther’s leaflets, translation from left to right: To Christian
Nobles of German Nation from 1520, To the Councilmen of all Cities from 1524
and A Sermon to Send Children to School from 1530.
The 16th century saw the steady
evolution of basic standards and techniques to organise bodies of knowledge and
information as alphabetical order, tabulation, graded textbooks, and reference
guides all emerged. The uniform texts allowed people to index and
cross-reference material by page and line numbers which grants citations of
previous works by author, date, title, and publisher. Some libraries were
hesitant in accepting these new books as the addition of these printed books
were thought to devalue the enormous cost of the previous collection of
handwritten scripts, even though they were now able to store greater quantities
of books.
The movable type printing press
vastly changed the nature of book publishing as it simultaneously increased
printing volumes and decreased prices. The press was spread throughout Europe
where over 2,500 European cities had acquired presses where German masters held
an early leadership but the Italians now challenged their pre-eminence, as the
press was used extensively in Italy where humanist writers of the Renaissance
had long sought a way to more easily express their ideas to the public. The
increased number of texts reached an audience of unprecedented size as
literature became a part of the lives of the greater public and the growing economic
success led to the founding of more schools and universities before the 16th century.
Renaissance was a very complex period with no well-defined beginning or end and no simple root causes, although the invention of the printing press clearly aided the bloom of education involving literature, sciences, and arts. The Renaissance was the rebirth of European art and literature that was influenced by the Classical era of Ancient Greece and Rome which included their thought processes and art styles. Italy became refuge for the intellectuals of Constantinople due to the collapse of the Byzantine Empire in 1453, the scholars brought with them the great works of the Ancient Greeks and Romans that had been lost to the West during the Dark Ages. The Holy Roman Empire had lost power in northern Italy so the Papal States were governed by various leading families within each region, this vacuum of leadership allowed merchants to gain considerate power as the revised laws governing banking, commerce, shipping, and trade created a freer atmosphere which led to a busy exchange of both goods and ideas.
Renaissance was a very complex period with no well-defined beginning or end and no simple root causes, although the invention of the printing press clearly aided the bloom of education involving literature, sciences, and arts. The Renaissance was the rebirth of European art and literature that was influenced by the Classical era of Ancient Greece and Rome which included their thought processes and art styles. Italy became refuge for the intellectuals of Constantinople due to the collapse of the Byzantine Empire in 1453, the scholars brought with them the great works of the Ancient Greeks and Romans that had been lost to the West during the Dark Ages. The Holy Roman Empire had lost power in northern Italy so the Papal States were governed by various leading families within each region, this vacuum of leadership allowed merchants to gain considerate power as the revised laws governing banking, commerce, shipping, and trade created a freer atmosphere which led to a busy exchange of both goods and ideas.
Books also spread awareness of a new philosophy that emerged when the Renaissance scholars known as humanists returned to the works of ancient writers as previously, scholars were guided by the church’s teachings. These humanists learned to read Greek and Latin as they were influenced by the writings of Ancient Greece and Rome because they were known as The Classics and had been greatly ignored. They sought to uncover ancient manuscripts that had been forgotten for almost 2,000 years and in these manuscripts the humanists rediscovered writings on scientific matters, government, rhetoric, philosophy, and art; the knowledge of these ancient civilisations changed their thinking process during the Renaissance.
Books on secular nature were printed as scientists specifically benefited from the reproduction of accurate, non-miscopied information that allowed the advancement of knowledge and further understanding. It enabled the creation of widely dispersed scholarly communities whose members systematically refine and build upon ideas and results through generations, where the impact on the development of scholarship, science, and technology were profound. This led to the Scientific Revolution of the Enlightenment in the 16th century which reshaped how Europeans viewed the world and universe.
The press ultimately created the
notion that machines were able to carry out tasks quicker and more efficiently
than man and so brought about the end of the artisan era that then saw the
beginning of the manufacturing era. The impact of the printing press ultimately
brought about the Industrial Revolution, Gutenberg’s invention was so
revolutionary that his name lives on as one of the greatest inventors in human
history.
