WI: A Greek printing press

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Why go to the trouble of making high grade metal and fine metal work and developing new ink that is more viscous to print when you can just buy literate slaves to do the work without development costs or mechanical breakdowns. Not to mention that the Greeks would have to advance metallurgy by a thousands years or so.

I've yet to see any evidence about scriptoria employing massive amounts of educated slaves. I can understand that printing is not an obvious application of technology that already could have existed at the time (or certainly before the end of Antiquity) but "slaves copied books cheaply" seems like it requires actual proof.

 

[Unconsensual]

I've yet to see any evidence about scriptoria employing massive amounts of educated slaves. I can understand that printing is not an obvious application of technology that already could have existed at the time (or certainly before the end of Antiquity) but "slaves copied books cheaply" seems like it requires actual proof.

Slave are cheaper than scribes, is there any doubt to that?

 

[RGB]

Slave are cheaper than scribes, is there any doubt to that?

There are many things that are logical, but we have no proof that they existed, is really my point.

Sometimes societies have considerations we don't quite understand or attach the same importance to. Scriptoria full of slaves seems to me like one of those things that could have existed but nobody really knows of one. There's ample evidence for educated slaves employed as secretaries, for example. I wouldn't be debating you on that point. Mass production of books by slave labour is something that doesn't have nearly as much evidence by comparison.

 

[Unconsensual]

There are many things that are logical, but we have no proof that they existed, is really my point.

Sometimes societies have considerations we don't quite understand or attach the same importance to. Scriptoria full of slaves seems to me like one of those things that could have existed but nobody really knows of one. There's ample evidence for educated slaves employed as secretaries, for example. I wouldn't be debating you on that point. Mass production of books by slave labour is something that doesn't have nearly as much evidence by comparison.

That's the thing, there was never mass production of books back then; it simply wasn't feasible or desired. That's why you'd get scholars who travel all the way to Pergamon, Alexandria , or Rome just to see the actual material as opposed to just ordering a book: this is the day where a dozen books is considered an impressive library for a king.

 

[Arafeel]

T this is the day where a dozen books is considered an impressive library for a king.

A dozen? Really? While we do not actually know to what degree writing and read was know if antiquity, it was more than this. The fact that at least a fifth of the Roman head count could read as well as the amount of writings found from Egypt (from the Macedonian and Roman period) points to a significant larger amount that this. Actually this sound like something out of the medieval period. Also, clerical slaves were expensive and often sett free as well. Also based on actual book fragments found, copiers often could not read, and even when they did, were no better at grammar and spelling than we are today.

 

[Unconsensual]

A dozen? Really? While we do not actually know to what degree writing and read was know if antiquity, it was more than this. The fact that at least a fifth of the Roman head count could read as well as the amount of writings found from Egypt (from the Macedonian and Roman period) points to a significant larger amount that this. Actually this sound like something out of the medieval period. Also, clerical slaves were expensive and often sett free as well. Also based on actual book fragments found, copiers often could not read, and even when they did, were no better at grammar and spelling than we are today.

Hm...You are probably right, I'll have to check my books again.

 

[Pesterfield]

Wooden prints wear out too fast,

How fast is too fast?
It seems wooden ones would have the advantage of being pretty trivial to replace.

 

[Unconsensual]

How fast is too fast?
It seems wooden ones would have the advantage of being pretty trivial to replace.

Well you have to consider the cost of paper which was expensive and so the letters must be small. Considering that of an entire page of hundreds of letters they all needed to be uniform in height, length and etching replacing them was no easy task: it was something that required uniform molds to create letter blocks of consistent height, length and depth. It's something better suited to cast metals than individual woodwork.

 

[RGB]

Well you have to consider the cost of paper which was expensive and so the letters must be small. Considering that of an entire page of hundreds of letters they all needed to be uniform in height, length and etching replacing them was no easy task: it was something that required uniform molds to create letter blocks of consistent height, length and depth. It's something better suited to cast metals than individual woodwork.

China's been printing for a while nonetheless. What were the fundamental economic differences between the two places/periods?

 

[mrmandias]

Two things to keep in mind. First, the book buying market was probably bigger when Gutenberg did his thing. Second, printing is most useful for books which are in high demand, which for the classical world means dream interpretation manuals and omen handbooks.

I think this POD will make a difference, and progressively a greater difference, but lets not get carried away.

 

[Pesterfield]

How long had people in Europe been working on printing before Gutenberg?

These Greek attempts even with their problems might encourage more experiments so could lead to earlier reliable printing even if if isn't the Greeks that do it.

 

[carlton_bach]

Two things to keep in mind. First, the book buying market was probably bigger when Gutenberg did his thing. Second, printing is most useful for books which are in high demand, which for the classical world means dream interpretation manuals and omen handbooks.

I think this POD will make a difference, and progressively a greater difference, but lets not get carried away.

Gutenberg actually wasn't taregeting the book market. His business was formulaic documents that every scribe hated making out, but that needed to be produced in their hundreds or thousands. Printing the Bible was more a proof-of-concept idea (we can make books), and financiallky ruinous despite the fact that he was able to undercut prices for handwritten books.

The market for books in Classical Athens was probably much, much smaller than it was in 15th century Germany, but by the end of the classical and the Hellenistic era, it would have grown enormously. There were, by then, businesses that had scribes copy the most popular works in the expectation of ready sales. Hellenistic Athens could have used printing very well to export its culture yet more effectively.

Unfortunately, the limits of technology make it very improbable. Not because literate slaves would be cheaper than printing - both buying and training a scribe would cost serious money, and you could not starve a slave of such quality. The cost of employing skilled slaves or freemen was equal for third parties, and the income generated by slaves for their owners was still not high enough to make the model attractive. The problem is that there are going to be hundreds of details that need to be gotten right, and without a lot of previous work to build on, it is hard to see how they would get there.