Fascinating facts about the invention of the
Printing Press by Johannes Gutenberg in 1440.   .

The earliest dated specimens of printing by Gutenberg are papal indulgences (notes given to Christians by the Pope, pardoning their sins) issued in Mainz in 1454. In 1455, Gutenberg demonstrated the power of the printing press by selling copies of a two-volume Bible for a price that was the equivalent of approximately three years' wages for an average clerk, but it was significantly cheaper than a handwritten Bible that could take a single monk 20 years to transcribe.

In 1455, just as the project was nearing completion Johann Fust sued Gutenberg, taking possession of his printing equipment and the almost completed edition of the Bible. Fust subsequently entered into partnership with Peter Schoffer, who had been Gutenberg's assistant, and the project was finally completed in 1456 whereupon Fust undertook the task of marketing the bible. Fust first attempted to sell the Bibles as manuscripts but once potential purchasers observed the uniformity of the volumes, he had to reveal the means by which they were produced.

The mortgage covered the copious stock of type which had evidently been already prepared for the edition of the Psalter, which was printed by Fust and Schoffer in August, 1457. This included new type in two sizes, as well as the world-famous initial letters with their ingenious contrivance for two-color printing.

In 1457 Fust and Schoffer published a large Psalter, known as the Mainz Psalter, which featured printed red and blue intitials along with the black text. There is some debate about how these coloured letters were printed. They were either printed from two part metal blocks that were inked separately, re-assembled and then printed with the text, or they were stamped on after the main text was printed. Either way the process was time consuming and expensive so for several years it was more common for such decorative elements to be added by hand. The Mainz Psalter was also the first book to bear a printer's trademark and imprint, a printed date of publication and a colophon.

About 1457 Gutenberg also parted with his earliest-constructed founts of type, which he had made for the 40-line Bible,.Long before this Bible was printed the type had been used in an edition of the "Poem of the Last Judgment", and in the "Calendar for 1448", in editions of Donatus, and various other printed works. Most of this type fell into the possession of Albrecht Pfister in Bamberg.1460

The first person to print illustrated books was Albrecht Pfister. Around 1460 he published a book titled Der Ackermann von Bohmen (The Farmer from Bohmen). The only surviving copy of the first edition contains no illustrations but space has been left for them. A second edition printed in 1463 does include images. In 1461 Pfister printed an edition of Der Edelstein (a series of fables in German) which contained 101 woodcut illustrations. The woodcuts were in simple outline and were probably intended to be hand colored. (Most surviving copies have in fact been colored.)

Gutenberg next manufactured a new printer's outfit with the assistance he received from Conrad Humery, a distinguished and wealthy doctor of law, leader of the popular party, and chancellor of the council. This outfit comprised a set of small types fashioned after the round cursive handwriting used in books at that time and ornamented with an extraordinary number of ligatures. The type was used in the so-called "Catholicon" (grammar and alphabetic lexicon) in the year 1460, and also in several small books printed in Eltville down to the year 1472 by the brothers Echtermünze, relatives of Gutenberg. The Elector of Mainz, Archbishop Adolf of Nassau, presented him with a benefice  (an ecclesiastical office in 1465) yielding an income and various privileges.

Gutenberg's invention spread rapidly after his death in 1468.. It met in general with a ready, and an enthusiastic reception in the centers of culture. The names of more than 1000 printers, mostly of German origin, have come down to us from the fifteenth century. In Italy we find well over 100 German printers, in France 30, in Spain 26. Many of the earliest printers outside of Germany had learned their art in Mainz, where they were known as "goldsmiths". Among those who were undeniably pupils of Gutenberg, and who probably were also assistants in the Gutenberg-Fust printing house were (besides Schoffer), Numeister, Keffer, and Ruppel; Mentel in Strasburg (before 1460), Pfister in Bamberg (1461), Sweynheim in Subiaco and Rome (1464), and Johann von Speyer in Venice (1469).

The blocks used to illustrate early printed books were small and the images were often generic. There is evidence that printers exchanged blocks, with the same images being used in different editions of books. For example, two hundred woodcuts were used in a 1476 edition of Aesop's Fables and appear again in an edition by a different printer in 1480. There are also examples where the same image has been used to represent different subjects. In early illustrated books the text and illustrations were printed in separate operations, possibly because the type and the wood blocks were of different heights, but later examples were printed in one impression.

The first use of copper engravings for illustration occurred in 1476. Early experiments in using engraving for illustrations were not successful because the two different methods of printing not only required two operations; they required different types of equipment. As a result registration problems occurred. The solution was to print the images on separate sheets of paper and bind them into the book or to print on thin paper and cut out and paste the images in place.

William Caxton learned the printing trade in Europe and set up his press in Westminster, England. 1476  Many early printing types were calligraphic - they imitated handwriting. Caxton used and was famed for his Black Letter type which imitated the writing of the Haarlem monks. Artistically, he was perhaps the finest printer of his day although, as a man of politics and letters, he was an amateur.

The new printing presses had spread like brushfire through Europe. By 1499 print-houses had become established in more than 2500 cities in Europe. Fifteen million books had been flung into a world where scholars would travel miles to visit a library stocked with twenty hand-written volumes. Scholars argue about the number. It could've been as few as eight million or as many as twenty four. But the output of new books had been staggering by any reasonable estimate. The people had suddenly come into possession of some thirty thousand new book titles.

While the Gutenberg press was much more efficient than manual copying, the Industrial Revolution and the introduction of the steam powered rotary press allowed thousands of copies of a page in a single day. Mass production of printed works flourished after the transition to rolled paper, as continuous feed allowed the presses to run at a much faster pace.

Gutenberg's invention did not make him rich, but it laid the foundation for the commercial mass production of books. The success of printing meant that books soon became cheaper, and ever wider parts of the population could afford them. More than ever before, it enabled people to follow debates and take part in discussions of matters that concerned them. As a consequence, the printed book also led to more stringent attempts at censorship. This was a sign that it was felt by those in authority to be dangerous and challenging to their position.

Gutenberg's Movable Metal Type
In the Far East, movable type and printing presses were known but did not replace printing from individually carved wooden blocks, from movable clay type, processes much more efficient than hand copying. The use of movable type in printing was invented in 1041 AD by Bi Sheng in China. Since there are thousands of Chinese characters, the benefit of the technique is not as obvious as in European languages.

It is not clear whether Gutenberg knew of these existing techniques or invented them independently, though the former is considered unlikely because of the substantial differences in technique.The print technology that produced the Gutenberg Bible marks the beginning of a cultural revolution unlike any that followed the development of print culture in Asia.

Gutenberg was a goldsmith, a worker in metals, and a lapidary, and his invention both in conception and execution shows the worker in metals. Gutenberg multiplied the separate types in metal molds. The types thus produced he built in such a way that they might be aligned like the manuscript he was copying.

His aim, technically and æsthetically so extremely difficult, was the mechanical reproduction of the characters used in the manuscripts, i.e. the hand lettered books of the time. The works printed by Gutenberg plainly prove that the types used in them were made by a casting process where the letter-patterns were cut on small steel rods termed patrices, and the dies thus made were impressed on some soft metal, such as copper, producing the matrices, which were cast in the mold in such a manner as to form the "face" and "body" of the type at one operation.

The printing type represents therefore a multiplicity of cast reproductions of the original die, or patrix. In addition to this technical process of type-setting, Gutenberg found himself confronted with a problem hardly less difficult, namely, the copying of the beautiful calligraphy found in the books of the fifteenth century, constantly bearing in mind that it must be possible to engrave and to cast the individual forms, since the types, when set, must be substantially replicas of the model.

The genius of Gutenberg found a brilliant solution to this problem in all its complicated details. Even in the earliest types he made (e.g. in the Calendar for 1448), it can recognize not only the splendid reproduction of the actual forms of the original handwriting, but also the extremely artistic remodeling of individual letters necessitated by technical requirements.

The type reproductions were the work of a calligraphic artist of the highest order. He applied the well-tested rules of the calligraphist's art to the casting of types, observing in particular the rudimentary principle of always leaving the same space between the vertical columns of the text. Consequently Gutenberg prepared two markedly different forms of each letter, the normal separate form, and the compound or linked form which, being joined closely to the type next to it, avoids gaps. It is significant that this unique kind of letter is to be found in only four types, and these four are associated with Gutenberg.

No typographer in the fifteenth century was able to follow the ideal of the original inventor, and consequently research attributes to Gutenberg types of this character, namely, the two Bible and the two Psalter types. Especially in the magnificent design and in the technical preparation of the Psalter of 1457 do we recognize the pure, ever-soaring inventive genius of Gutenberg.

Gutenberg's Printing Press
The spread of literacy and the development of universities meant that by the 15th century, despite an assembly line approach to the production of books, supply was no longer able to meet demand. As a result there was widespread interest in finding an alternative means of producing books.Before books could be mass produced, several developments were necessary.

A ready supply of suitable material that could be printed on was required. Manuscript books were written on vellum and this material was used for some early printed books, but vellum was expensive and not available in sufficient quantity for the mass production of books. The introduction of the technique of making paper and the subsequent development of a European papermaking industry was a necessary condition for the widespread adoption of print technology.

Although a number of people had previously attempted to make metal type or had experimented with individual woodcut letters, it was not until a technique was devised for producing metal type in large quantities that printing with moveable type became economically feasible. Gutenberg, who had initially trained as a goldsmith, was to devise a means of producing metal type in sufficient quantities at a reasonable cost. This involved the design of a type-face and the production of molds used for making the individual pieces of type, as well as the development of an alloy that was soft enough to cast yet hard enough to use for printing.

It was also necessary to develop suitable inks for printing with the new type. The water-based inks used for hand lettering and for block printing will not stick to metal type, therefore a viscous oil based ink was required.

Finally, a press was needed for transferring the image from type to paper. Precedents existed in the presses used for making wine, cheese and paper and one of Johannes Gutenberg's innovations was to adapt these presses for the printing process. An operator worked a lever to increase and decrease the pressure of the block against the paper. The invention of the printing press, in turn, set off a social revolution that is still in progress.

TO LEARN MORE

RELATED INFORMATION:
Johannes Gutenberg Biography    from The Great Idea Finder
History of the Gutenberg Bible    from The Great Idea Finder
Communication History   from The Great Idea Finder
Turning Point Inventions    from The Great Idea Finder  

ON THE BOOKSHELF:
100 Inventions That Shaped World History
by Bill Yenne, Morton, Dr. Grosser (Editor) / Paperback - 112 pages (1983) / Bluewood Books 
This book contains inventions from all around the world from microchips to fire. This is a really good book if you are going to do research on inventions.
Popular Patents
by Travis Brown / Paperback - 224 pages / Scarecrow Press (September 1, 2000)
Eighty stories of America's first inventions. Each includes a sketch of the invention, a profile of the inventor and a glimpse of how the invention has found its way into American culture.
A History of Mechanical Inventions
by Abbott Payson Usher / Paperback: 450 pages / Dover Pub.; Rev. ed edition (1988)
This completely revised and updated classic explores the importance of technological innovation in the cultural and economic history of the West. Specific topics include invention of the printing, press.
The Engines of Our Ingenuity : An Engineer Looks at Technology and Culture
by John H. Lienhard / Paperback: 272 pages / Oxford University Press, USA (December 4, 2003)
Based on episodes from Lienhard's widely broadcast public radio series, this intriguing set of essays begins with a simple premise: more than we often care to admit, our lives are shaped by our machines. Fleshing out this proposition, Lienhard ransacks 2,000 years of scientific and technological history, cobbling together a quirky biography of the strange being he calls homo technologicus.
The Gutenberg Elegies: The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age
Sven P. Birkerts / Paperback / Fawcett Books -1985
Birkerts, a renowned critic, examines the practice of reading with an eye to what the future will bring.
Fine Print : A Story About Johann Gutenberg
Joann Johnson Burch / Paperback - 64 pages / Carolrhoda Books - 1992
This interesting book about Gutenberg's struggles to complete and perfect his printing
process gives a vivid picture of life in the Middle Ages.
Johann Gutenberg: Master of Modern Printing
by Michael Pollard, Anna Sproule / Library Binding: 64 pages /  Blackbirch Press; (February, 2001)
This book is straightforward and easy to read. The cover is attractive and the pictures along with the easy to read text provide information that sustains the reader's attention. Information can be correlated with the social studies curriculum. This book would be a great resource for elementary and middle school students. A welcome addition to most library collections.
The Printing Press as an Agent of Change (Volumes 1 and 2 in One)
by Elizabeth L. Eisenstein /  Paperback: 832 pages / Cambridge University Press; (1980)
The work is a full-scale historical treatment of the advent of printing and its importance as an agent of change. Professor Eisenstein begins by examining the general implications of the shift from script to print, and goes on to examine its part in three of the major movements of early modern times - the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the rise of modern science.
The Gutenberg Bible : Landmark in Learning
by James E. Thorpe / Hardcover - 48 pages 2nd edition (1997) / H E Huntington Library & Art
The Huntington Library holds one of the three vellum copies of the Gutenberg Bible in the United States. Details the early history of printing and how the Gutenberg Bible was printed.
The Coming of the Book: The Impact of Printing 1450-1800
by Lucien Febvre, Henri-Jean Martin, David Gerard /  Paperback: 378 pages / Verso; (Reprint.1997)
Yet the emergence of the book was a process of immense historical importance and heralded the dawning of the epoch of modernity.
Gutenberg (Limited availability.)
Leonard Everett Fisher / Library Binding - 28 pages / Simon & Schuster - 1993
Fisher's biography of Johann Gutenberg, the creator of movable type and the printer of the Gutenberg Bible, is marked by careful research, clear writing, and striking illustrations

ON THE SCREEN:
The Art of Block Printing
DVD /  Color, Full Screen, NTSC / 25 minutes / On Air Video, Inc. ( 2004 ) / Less than $15.00
The art of block printing is centuries old, and is still popular with today’s artists and craftspeople. In this video program you will learn the art and techniques of creating and producing your very own block prints. This clear and informative program addresses the various all aspects of block printing.

ON THE WEB:
Gutenberg Museum
His name is associated with innovation, activity and courage. His idea is the foundation stone of modern civilization. Johannes Gensfleisch zum Gutenberg created the basis of modern communication with his invention of printing with mobile letters.
(URL: www.gutenberg.de/english/erfindun.htm)
The Printing Press
In spite of Gutenberg's efforts to keep his technique a secret, the printing press spread rapidly. Before 1500 some 2500 European cities had acquired presses.
(URL: www.historyguide.org/intellect/press.html)
Johannes Gutenberg and The Printed Book
The printing press had developed from the wine press in the Rhine Valley. It was there in 1440 that Johannes Gutenberg (c.1397-1468) began using the printing press in conjunction with a series of blocks each bearing a single letter on its face.
(URL: www3.iath.virginia.edu/elab/hfl0228.html)
An Industry Born
When Johannes Gutenberg began building his press in 1436, he was unlikely to have realized that he was giving birth to an art form which would take center stage in the social and industrial revolutions which followed. Article by Pierre De La Mare for Dot Print.
(URL: web.archive.org/web/20021213053104/www.dotprint.com/fgen/history1.htm)
The Catholic Encyclopedia
Detail on the Gutenberg bible. Henne Gänsfleisch zur Laden, commonly called Gutenberg. The invention of Gutenberg should be classed with the greatest events in the history of the world.
(URL: www.newadvent.org/cathen/07090a.htm)
Introduction of Printing
The spread of literacy and the development of universities meant that by the 15th century, the supply was no longer able to meet demand. As a result there was widespread interest in finding an alternative means of producing books. Article by Sue Wood, Charles Sturt University, Australia
(URL: www.csu.edu.au/faculty/arts/humss/art317/printtech.htm)
Printing Press
Mass production of printed works flourished after the transition to rolled paper, as continuous feed allowed the presses to run at a much faster pace.
(URL: www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/printing+press)
Fifteen Million Books in Fifty Years
Five hundred years ago, the new presses had spread like brushfire through Europe. The people had suddenly come into possession of some fifteen million new books. Scholars argue about the number. It could've been as few as eight million or as many as twenty four million. But the output of new books had been staggering by any reasonable estimate. And those books reflected some thirty thousand titles. Article by John H. Lienhard
(URL: www.uh.edu/engines/indiana.htm)
Media History Project
It took the telephone 75 years and television 13 years to acquire 50 million users. It has taken the Internet five years. Today, more than 500 million people around the world are connected to the Internet. Its development is a historical prime mover like the alphabet and the printing press. This site is hosted and supported by the University of Minnesota.
(URL: www.mediahistory.umn.edu/index2.html)
The Information Age and the Printing Press: Looking Backward to See Ahead
There are some provocative parallels between the communications changes enabled by networked computers and those enabled by the printing press in its early days. Article by James A. Dewar
(URL: www.rand.org/pubs/papers/P8014/index.html)
Project Gutenberg
Fine Literature Digitally Re-Published. With over 16,000 free books in the catalog, Project Gutenberg is the largest single collection of free electronic books, or eBooks. The project is powered by ideas, ideals, and by idealism. It is not powered by financial or political power, it is powered totally by volunteers.
(URL: www.gutenberg.org)
The International Dunhuang Project
IDP is a ground-breaking international collaboration based at the British Library to make information and images of more than 100,000 manuscripts, paintings, textiles and artifacts from Dunhuang and other Silk Road sites freely available on the Internet.
(URL: idp.bl.uk/)
Gutenberg College
Gutenberg College consists of an undergraduate liberal arts program and two auxiliary institutes, McKenzie Study Center and Art Project. Together these three programs constitute a single educational institution in which each plays an integral role.
(URL: www.gutenberg.edu)
Another Point of View - The Legend of Koster
The invention in Europe circa 1440 of the wondrous art of printing with moveable type by Laurens Janszoon Koster, an innovation which came a dozen-odd years before Gutenberg printed his acclaimed 42-line Bible. You can visit this site for it's visual expertise alone. The pages are presented in the style of a book printed in the 15th century.
(URL: www.psymon.com/koster/)

WHERE TO FIND:
Gutenberg Bible at the British Library
On this site you will find the British Library’s two copies of Johannes Gutenberg’s Bible, the first real book to be printed using the technique of printing which Gutenberg invented in the 15th Century.

WORDS OF WISDOM:
"In our time, thanks to the talent and industry of those from the Rhine, books have emerged in lavish numbers. A book that once would've belonged only to the rich -- nay, to a king -- can now be seen under a modest roof. ... There is nothing nowadays that our children ... fail to know." - Sebastian Brant, written about the printing press just after 1500.

HOW IT WORKS:
The printing press which led to a considerable acceleration of the method so far used of taking an impression by rubbing, was a screw press with The basic idea of Gutenberg's invention was the splitting up of the text into individual components such as lower and upper case letters, punctuation marks, ligatures and abbreviations, based upon the tradition of medieval scribes. These individual components were cast in any quantity as type in reverse, then put together to form words, lines and pages. T

he prototype for each letter was the punch. A character was cut into the face of a steel block, resulting in a precise relief in reverse. Now the respective punch was struck into a rectangular block made of softer metal, probably copper, with a hammer-blow.

This matrix had to be worked over again and adjusted turning it into a right-angled cube with even sides. The right-reading picture had to have a uniform depth, therefore the surface was processed with a file. To facilitate the casting of a character, Gutenberg developed the hand casting instrument. Two sections enclose a rectangular casting void closed at one end by the matrix.

After casting the characters in the hand casting instrument, the most important part of the invention, enabled quick casting of the required quantities of the different characters needed. The casting metal was an alloy of lead, tin and further admixtures, that secured fast cooling and a sufficient durability under the high pressure of the press. special equipment for the effective and even transfer of the type from the forms to the paper or parchment.

DID YOU KNOW?

• In less than 50 years after the invention of the printing press, fifteen million books had been flung into a world where previously scholars would travel miles to visit a library stocked with twenty hand-written volumes. And those books reflected some thirty thousand titles.
• Books produced in this period, between the first work of Johannes Gutenberg in 1450 and the year 1500, are collectively referred to as incunabula.
• Gutenberg changed plans at least three times while printing the Bible
• The Bible that Gutenberg printed was a Latin translation from about 380 AD 
• There are many statues of Gutenberg in Germany -- one of the more famous being a work by Thorvaldsen, in Mainz, home to the Gutenberg Museum.
• Note: We discovered as many spellings with Johann as we did with Johannes. We went with a Google search that produced four times more Johannes Gutenberg's than Johann