Brief Past of Printing
In 1436, Johannes Gutenberg, a German citizen born in Mainz city, invented the printing press. He developed the idea of printing from movable wooden blocks. He used soft clay, lead and wood to print letters. He also used easy moveable articles for printing. He made special metal nails for printing. Soon he started a printing press in Mainz. Due to his contribution in printing, Mainz became a popular city. In 1456, he printed Bible in his printing press. The city also became famous for alphabets, nails, paper and ink.
Printing was perhaps invented in China in 7th century. Books were in use in Western Europe before the period of Gutenberg but only as handwritten manuscripts. In India also scholars created great literary works by their hands on palm-leaves. Dr. A.V. Samantha lyer, who edited some great Tamil classics written on the palm-leaves, brought them out in a book form. However, manuscripts in the palm-leaves are on display in many historic libraries.
Within no time, the printing history reached its top when books were printed in a printing press. In 1409, a publisher published books with beautiful letters. With a lovely balance of black and white letters on a page, these books were works of art.
The revolution in the art of printing has made millions of valuable books available to us. Books communicate ideas to us. They educate us. Books written by the great authors of the past are an everlasting literature. They contain the history of our rich cultural heritage.
Now computers have revolutionized the information technology. In this electronic age, lakhs of books, newspapers and magazines are printed in the shortest possible time. There are huge printing presses where machines turn out very huge number of copies of printing material in a few hours. Thus, this has brought a great revolution in the printing technology.
