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Encyclopedia entry: printing
- Article from:
- The Oxford Companion to British History
- Author:
Copyright© The Oxford Companion to British History 2002, originally published by Oxford University Press 2002. (Hide copyright information)
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printing
with movable types, or letterpress, as opposed to printing using carved wooden blocks, was invented by Johannes Gutenberg of Mainz
c.
1440, though there is evidence that a Dutchman, Coster of Harlem, made a similar breakthrough about the same time. One of Gutenberg's associates, Peter Schoffer, produced a psalter in 1457, the first known book with a printed date. In 1462 the sack of Mainz dispersed printers and their equipment, the process being introduced to England by William
Caxton
in 1476. It did not reach Scotland until 1507 when the first printing press was set up in Edinburgh by Walter Chapman and Andrew Myllar.
Early printers used a wooden press, types, paper, and ...