History of printing and printing in Europe [ part - 1 ]

History of printing and printing in Europe

Beginning of Printing in Europe - Europeans were unfamiliar with the use of paper for printing until the tenth century. In the 11th century, paper reached Europe via the silk route from China. Handwritten manuscripts were produced from paper. In 1295, when an explorer named Marcopolo returned from China to Italy, he brought with him the technique of printing on wooden blocks. This marked the beginning of wood block printing in Italy. From Italy this technique spread to other parts of Europe as well. In Europe, books were printed on still precious 'velam' or parchment for associations of nobility and monks, but books were printed on paper for the use of commoners, students and merchants. In 1336 the first paper-making factory was opened in Germany. This helped in the development of the art of printing. With the publication of a large number of books, their demand increased and their prices also became cheaper. The demand for books increased across Europe. Therefore, booksellers in Europe started shipping them to different countries. Book fairs were held at various places, which increased the sales of books, increased production of books, and book publishers and sellers began to restore their salaries to meet the growing demand. Earlier only rich people used to keep their titles, but now publishers and sellers have started doing so too. Usually a bookseller started employing fifty writers here. This gave impetus to the creation of books.

The work of preparing the manuscripts was extremely difficult and costly. Also it was difficult to maintain them and carry them from one place to another. Not even such a large number of manuscripts were produced to meet the growing demands of readers. It introduced wood block printing in place of handwritten manuscripts. This led to the printing of books with greater numbers, less cost and effort. By the beginning of the fifteenth century, woodblock printing had begun to take place on a large scale in Europe. It also started printing clothes, card paintings and religious paintings.

Invention of Printing - Printing boomed after the invention of the printing press. The printing press was invented by Johann Gutenberg (Straberg) of Germany in 1448. He was born into an affluent family in Mainznagar, Germany. He was inquisitive. He developed the printing press (hand press) based on the olive crushing machine. printing it The machine was lengthened with the help of screws. The plot (of board, wood, or steel) was applied to wet paper by turning a screw. The metal figures of the letters were molded using a mould.

The type or letter was made from a mixture of lead, tin and bismuth. Lead was cheap and had the ability to transfer ink. Ranga was used because of its hardness and quality of smelting. Bismuth was treated because "it expands upon cooling to compensate for the contraction of other metals and to maintain the accuracy of the magnitude." Gutenberg also invented printing ink.

Types were created for all 26 letters of the Roman alphabet. Arrangements were made to rotate or 'move' these. Therefore, the Gutenberg printing machine was called 'movable type printing machine'. This process led to the rapid publication of books. This can be gauged from the fact that in this machine one edge of two hundred characters could be printed in one hour. The printing press used to run in a single big room hall. All the work was done in one place. There were compositors, letter ink, galleys (metal frames in which letters were kept), proofreaders, stitchers of books. The invention of the printing press brought a kind of intellectual revolution in Europe. People greet the printing press A painting made in 1739 shows how people are celebrating the arrival of the printing press. The picture depicts a goddess descending from heaven carrying a printing press. On either side of the goddess were carved images of Minerva and Mercury, the goddesses of wisdom, who were considered an angel and a symbol of wisdom, respectively. The front of the picture shows six women holding portraits of six famous European publishers. The picture also depicts Gutenberg, who invented the printing press.

[ Part - 2 ]