The Influence of Moveable Typography

The invention of moveable type forever changed the spread of knowledge and information. Though it took several hundred years of innovation to finally reach Johann Gutenberg’s process, his moveable type accelerated literacy and education throughout the world.

Before moveable typography, block printing had become means to reproduce mass quantities of an image with remarkable consistency without having to repaint the image or re-write copy. Even though block printing was a substantial improvement to a scribe reproducing complete books by hand, this technology had only reached Europe sometime around the 1300’s and because there are few remaining examples, it is not known whether this process preceded the typographic print. When a surge in literacy in the 1400’s drove a huge demand for more books, they were still incredibly slow and expensive to make. It was also around this time when paper making had made its way from Asia along trade routes. This new market for books, the new knowledge of relief printing new availability of cheaper media had created the perfect opportunity to improve printmaking in Europe. In the mid 1400’s Johann Gutenberg combined his metalworking and engraving skills with printmaking to do just that. Gutenberg created a system of typographic punches that could be moved and spaced along a uniform matrix that could be used to press a mold to print from with impressive speed. Not only were the characters in this process able to be rearranged quickly, the materials were all reusable. The plate that Gutenberg used to print from was an alloy of his own invention. Johann needed a material that would not expand or contract when melted down and re-molded so he combined several metals to form an alloy of lead, tin, and antimony to maintain a constant mass through the entire process. He also soon found out that the traditional block printing ink was far too watery for metal plates so he used boiled linseed oil with colored lampblack to produce a tacky ink that could be applied smoothly to metal type. His innovations made typographic prints of superior quality, and consistency and speed to that of block printing and hand written documents. Gutenberg’s techniques would go on to be used for nearly 400 years with only minor improvements being made. Moveable typography made the production of countless books possible and by doing so literature available to the masses. With more reading material available and the speed at which knowledge could be exchanged, the uneducated would become enlightened thus sparking the transition to a new age of learning which in turn produced more authors, educators, and thinkers with their own ideas and innovations.

Not only do we have moveable typography to thank for the wealth and preservation of much of the knowledge from the 15th century on, we also are given the basis for the rules of typography and the spacing of characters. Gutenberg is really the father of modern graphic design.

Soures:

Johannes Gutenberg: The Invention of Movable Type, www.juliantrubin.com/bigten/gutenbergmovable.html.

Meggs, Philip B., and Alston W. Purvis. Meggs' History of Graphic Design. 5th ed., John Wiley & Sons, 2012.