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TRPrinting from the Past to the Present
Printing from the Past to the Present
It is known that the invention of the modern printing press was made by Johannes Gutenberg in the 15th century, but the history of the printing press goes back earlier. The printing press was first used in China in 593 AD. Initially, the wood carving technique was used. With the emergence of the printing press, the first known newspaper printing was made in Beijing, the capital of China, in 700. It is known in history that the Japanese empress Shotoko printed the sacred texts of Buddhism in Sanskrit with the Chinese alphabet in the 8th century. The Tiananmen Rolls, the oldest known and complete print book, were printed in China in 868. It is stated that a Chinese named Pi Sheng tried to print for the first time in 1040 by using letters made of porcelain one by one.
Johannes Gutenberg and the Invention of the Printing Press
The real development of the printing press in Europe began with the development of the printing technique with metal letters. The first person to develop this printing technique in Europe was Johannes Gutenberg. Gutenberg developed his printing press in the 1440s and published his first book in 1450. The printing machine that Gutenberg invented made it possible to print fast and with high quality.
Although the invention of the printing press first took place in China and was applied in many countries in the Far East before the printing technique with separate metal letters, Gutenberg introduced important innovations in the field of printing. The printing press that Gutenberg invented was quite advanced compared to the technique applied in the Far East.
The letter patterns used in the Far East countries were quite large. Gutenberg produced metal letters that are smaller, compatible with each other and quite strong compared to these molds. Thus, it was possible to print much more text on one page. Gutenberg produced a new alloy using lead, tin and antimony to produce letters that could withstand the large number of prints desired. This alloy, invented by Gutenberg, has been used in printing presses for centuries.
