Art of typography.
Approximately from the 14e century on there are printed books in Europe. This art already existed centuries before in China.
Every page was cut out in a log. This was a very time-consuming and labour-intensive occupation. A large improvement was the use of single characters. Made of wood and metal. Afterwards single characters in lead were used. A faster way than cutting metal.
Until the industrial (end 19th century) revolution the way of printing remained substantial unchanged. Just when faster ways of printing came into fashion, such as rotary press, the pressing plate became cylindrical. Because of the changing into an ongoing process the rapidity increased substancaily.
The large break-even point that you can mention as the real industrial revolution of typography was the change of the character type of the letters.
In the era before the industrial revolution, one can typify the characters as female. Ink was poured in the characters and was pressed for a while to a paper.
One can determine this technique rather simply. The characters lie on the paper. When one goes with a finger across one feels this very clear. With a magnifying glass, one can see the elevation.
The real revolution was the changing into male characters. The characters on the cylindrical-press were pushed against the ink role and afterwards against paper. The impressions lie a little deeper than the surface of the paper. This you can see with a magnifying glass.
This means, and do not underestimate this, that there are many printed papers, like newspapers, old books and chronicles, from which are claimed that these are before the industrial revolution (±. 1860). Whereas one easily can determine that these papers are printed with male characters.
Especially Sonstral and consorts, the third party, have made themselves to these counterfeitings in a serious manner guilty. |
