AHC: European Printing Revolution not started by Gutenberg

~1450 Johannes Gutenberg introduced printing (movable types, printing press, oil ink...) to Europe, one of the keystones of the modern period.

Your challenge is to have someone else at an other place and/or time do the task of starting the first media revolution.
What will the consequences be?
 
Have Marco Polo bring paper and knowledge of how to make it back from China in 1295. Monks would then realize that using block printing on the new materials is easier than copying books out by hand on parchment. In a few years somebody, most likely with a background in minting (Gutenberg was a goldsmith) would figure out movable type.
 
I had read years ago a book that claimed that Gutenberg did not invent the system of printing with movable type and a printing press, but instead it was stolen from a Dutch artisan named Laurens Janszoon Coster by Johannes Faust, an associate of Gutenberg.

From The Legend of Koster

Hadrianus Junius, who has held the noble reputation of being the most learned man in the Netherlands after Erasmus, was the first to give the full account of the legend of Koster in his Batavia, published posthumously in 1568. In addition to the above story of the initial idea and discovery, he relates how Koster then went on to experiment with block printing and improve the quality of ink employed (as the ink generally used by scribes tended to run when used in a press) and, with the help of his son-in-law, Thomas Pieter, produced the book Speculum Humanæ Salvationis, and then continued to improve his methods with various types of wood, then lead, and finally mixtures of lead and tin. Prospering with his invention, he hired a number of assistants, including one Johannes Faust. It was this Faust, as the story goes, who himself became adept at the art of printing and casting type, and who on Christmas Eve of 1441 then broke into his master's shop, stole all of his types and equipment, and fled to Amsterdam, then on to Cologne and, finally, to Mainz.
 
It's waiting to happen, though it may not come as quickly without his expertise and diligence. In fact, much like waterwheel and power transmission technology, the narrative of printing in Europe could be more of an organic growth, with block printing applying mechanical presses, moveable letters being integrated into picture blocks, and ultimately used on their own.

It is quite possible that wood remains in use more widely for longer, and that as a result print will have a tradition of large text. But generally, no Gutenberg most likely just means someone else comes up with it. Enough countries have traditions of "their own" inventor of moveable type.
 
The main consequence would be the spread of the Bible earlier or later, potentially speeding up or delaying the Reformation.
 
Have Marco Polo bring paper and knowledge of how to make it back from China in 1295. Monks would then realize that using block printing on the new materials is easier than copying books out by hand on parchment. In a few years somebody, most likely with a background in minting (Gutenberg was a goldsmith) would figure out movable type.

Paper was already known in Europe before Polo.
 
The main consequence would be the spread of the Bible earlier or later, potentially speeding up or delaying the Reformation.

Yeah, the printing press is a great way to spread new ideas very rapidly. Depending on the circumstances of the development of *printing, you could have the ideas of Lollard or Jon Hus or some alternate heretic spreading quickly across Europe and sparking a Reformation centuries ahead of schedule.
 

ingemann

Banned
Have Marco Polo bring paper and knowledge of how to make it back from China in 1295. Monks would then realize that using block printing on the new materials is easier than copying books out by hand on parchment. In a few years somebody, most likely with a background in minting (Gutenberg was a goldsmith) would figure out movable type.

Paper had been known in several centuries in Europe at that point, and it had outcompeted pergament in book production.
 
someone else comes up with the invention before him
How early? AFAIK Gutenberg didn't need resent inventions beside his own ones.
Or later, if Gutenberg is stopped somehow (died early, more financial problems...)
It's waiting to happen, though it may not come as quickly without his expertise and diligence. In fact, much like waterwheel and power transmission technology, the narrative of printing in Europe could be more of an organic growth, with block printing applying mechanical presses, moveable letters being integrated into picture blocks, and ultimately used on their own.

It is quite possible that wood remains in use more widely for longer, and that as a result print will have a tradition of large text. But generally, no Gutenberg most likely just means someone else comes up with it. Enough countries have traditions of "their own" inventor of moveable type.
Or that way.

But what will be the consequences? Printing is considered one of the cornerstones of the modern era. What will happen if it comes around decades/centuries early/late and maybe not in the HRE?

The main consequence would be the spread of the Bible earlier or later, potentially speeding up or delaying the Reformation.
Yeah, the printing press is a great way to spread new ideas very rapidly. Depending on the circumstances of the development of *printing, you could have the ideas of Lollard or Jon Hus or some alternate heretic spreading quickly across Europe and sparking a Reformation centuries ahead of schedule.
Religious texts were the first best sellers scientific ones were close seconds.

Now go and play some with it, please :cool:
 
How early? AFAIK Gutenberg didn't need resent inventions beside his own ones.
Or later, if Gutenberg is stopped somehow (died early, more financial problems...)

Not terribly much earlier. Gutenberg still needed a reliable, well-made screw press, a steady supply of high-grade paper, a good understanding of the properties of oil paints and very good metallurgical skills. I'm not sure about the details of the metallurgy, but in terms of paint and chemicals, it's unlikely the same knowledge would have been commonplace even a century earlier. Paper doesn't get mass-manufactured north of the Alps until the late fourteenth century. I'd say around 1350 as the earliest point in Germany.


But what will be the consequences? Printing is considered one of the cornerstones of the modern era. What will happen if it comes around decades/centuries early/late and maybe not in the HRE?

Religious texts were the first best sellers scientific ones were close seconds.

Now go and play some with it, please :cool:

For a given value of scientific - a lot of the early hot sellers were condensed versions of humoral theory or practical instructions for something or other. Not to forget - and that is where the real money will be - Latin primers, Donatuses, Decretals and government forms in huge quantities.

So what happens when someone figures out cheap journalism? It would certainly be interesting to read the broadsheet prints from around the Western Schism.
 
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