Simple as the first of the four successive discoveries—,stamping or printing with a pigment—may be thought, it was perhaps both the most important and the meet difficult to achieve of the whole. As for the three subsequent improvements, which constitute the whole portion of the art of printing indisputably inyented in Europa in the 15th century, and to which alone the claims of the several individuates to whom the invention has been Attributed hare any reference, even the chief of them, the substitution of types containing each a single letter for blocks containing an entire page, must, we Apprehend, be considered as inferior to the primary Chinese discovery in novelty, or real originality of conception, en it undoubtedly is in importance. That wonderful instrument, the alphabet, being already invented, thin improvement eonaisted merely in chopping down the engraved wooden block into as many separate pieces as there were letters cut upon it. The casting of metal types again was only An application of the art of fodnd ing, which is one of the most ancient of the arta practised by men ; and the fabrication of the matrix by a punch was merely an example of the familiar practice of receiving the impression of a stamp or seal upon a substance softer than itself, and precisely the same thing with the very common mode of stamping coina by hammering.
Four names have principally figured in the controversy that bra been raised about the invention of printing:—Joie Gtormoirun tpatentally Giinsficiach), of Strasburg; Jon:: FI'ST (or Faust), of stains; Prrea Scniirrxn (in Latin, ()Olio), of Gornsheim ; and LAWRIE:ME Rotate (or Januoon), of Haarlem. Of all these, and of their claim? to the invention, accounts will be found in the Mucus. ritiest DIvislos; under their respective names.
An ancient chronicle, first printed at Cologne in 1499 (' Chronlca, Hive Famiculun 'femponim; kc., commonly called the ' Cologne Chro nicle'), notes that, after ten years bail been spent in preparation, the art of printing began to be practised (eteptilm eat imprimi) in the year 1 450. The knowledge of the art was first made public and carried into other countries by the dispersion of many of the workmen on the storming of Mainz by Adolplitin of Nassau, in 1462. Printing was first practised in Italy, In the town of Sublime, in the Roman territory, in 1165 ; in France, at Patin, in 1449; In England, et Westminster, in 1 174 ; and in Spain, at Barcelona, In 1475. It in said that by the year 1.1 0 there were already about 200 printing-premes in Europe.
The following works relating to the invention of printing may be consulted with advantage : H. Junius, ' Batavia,' 1558, which contains the claim for Koster; 1'. Marchand, ' Ilistoire de l'Origine et dee Progres do l'Imprimerie.' 1719.41 ; 1'. S. Founder, ' Dissertation our l'Origine de l'Imprimerio,' 17 59 ; 31. Mai ttaire, Almelo/ Typographic; 1760; Jo. Dan. SchOpflin, Vindicial Typographicse; 1760; Baron 11 eineken, ' Mete G6ittmle dune Collection complete d'Estampes: 1771 ; Fisher, ' Typographische Selteoheiten,' 1804 ; linger, ' Itesearchen into the History of Playing-Quals, with illustrations on the Origin of Printing and Engraving on Wood,' 1816; W. Ottley, History of Engraving upon Copper and on Wood,' 1816 Dahl, 'Die Buchdrucker kunst erfunden von J. Gutenberg, verbessert mid at Vollkommen.
belt gubracht lurch P. Schiffer,' 1832; Jackson and Chatto. ' Treatise on Wood Engraving,' 1839; C. Knight, chiefly with reference to the introduction of printing into England, ' The Old Printer and the Modern Prom, 1854 ; and W. L. Sotheby's costly work on ' Early Mock Books,' 1859.
Of the important effects produced by this great discovery, and of the progress made in civilisation by the diffusion of books, it in not our province to treat here. We proceed to describe the mechanical pro. ceases connected with printing. For very many yearn these processes received few improvements; but from about the commencement of the present century they have been numerous and important. We shall therefore treat of them in the order in which they may be said to occur in their uses In n modern printing.offico. These are Type. founding ; Composing; Printing Presses and Printing Machines; and Stereotyping. To these as connate subjects we shall add Printing for tke Blued; Nature Printing or Autotypogruphy ; and Printing by Collins's Patent Process.
Type-foanding.—After the invention of Schiffer, the apparatus em ployed Appears, at a very early period, to have assumed its present feim. The first satisfactory evidence upon thin point is atibrded by the device of Badius Ancensiue, an eminent printer of Paris and Lyons, at the beginning of the 16th century ; which device was subsequently adopted, with various modifications, by several other printers, among whom was an English practitioner, Anthony Scoloker, of Ipswich. It exhibits the various operations then usually carried on at a printing office, embracing type-founding as well as composing and printing; and it represents the matrix and other apparatus of the type-founder in the form still used. Most of the early printers, in England as well as on the Continent, cut And cast their own types; And Aldus Manuzio, towards the end of the 15th century, distinguished himself by the elegance of his type, and invented that now called italic. [211ANUZIO, ALDO, in Moo. Div.] One of the earliest notices of that division of labour which has tended so greatly to the improvement of the art, is found in a decree of the Star Chamber, dated July 11, 1637, intended to suppress or render more difficult the publication of seditioue works by the Puritans and others opposed to the government, who, about that period, established secret printing-offices for the purpose. This decree ordained that there should be only four founders of letters for priutiug in the kingdom ; and that any vacancies which might occur in that number should be filled up by the Archbishop of Canterbury or the bishop of London, and six other high commissioners ; and it laid the most stringent regulations upon the respecting the employment of journeymen and the taking of apprentices. These oppressive restrictions were re-enacted for two years, by an Act of Parliament of the 14th year of Charles II., and renewed for limited periods in his 16th and 17th years. They were again revived for seven years in the 1st year of James 11., 1685, and finally expired, on the termination of the last-mentioned term, iu 1693.