Before the invention of electronic amplifiers, mechanically coupled carbon microphones were also used as amplifiers in telephone repeaters for long distance service.

Before the invention of the integrated circuit in 1959, electronic circuits were constructed from discrete components that could be manipulated by humans.

Before the invention of reliable electrical methods, hot tube and flame methods were used.

Before the invention of synthetic dyes, mushrooms were the source of many textile dyes.

Before the invention of clocks, people marked the time of day with apparent solar time ( also called " true " solar time ) – for example, the time on a sundial – which was typically different for every settlement.

Before the invention of the self-propelled torpedo the term was applied to any number of different types of explosive devices, generally having the property of being secret or hidden, including devices which today would include booby traps, land mines and naval mines.

Before the invention of measuring tools ( like weights, meter sticks, clocks, etc.

Before the invention of crinoline, women's underwear was often very large and bulky.

Before the invention of artillery, many of the world's cities and towns, particularly in Europe and Asia, had protective walls ( also called town walls or city walls ).

Before the invention of electronic amplifiers, mechanically coupled carbon microphones were used as amplifiers in telephone repeaters.

Before the invention of electric lighting, candles and oil lamps were commonly used for illumination.

Before the invention of the printing press, stories were passed on via oral tradition.

Before this, Huang ( 皇 ) and Di ( 帝 ) were given as titles of a number of rulers from the era known as the " sage kings " period, supposedly predating written history, but probably coinciding with or following the invention and early stages of evolution for the Chinese writing system.

Before the invention of photography, people commonly hired painters and engravers to " re-create " an event or a scene.

Before printed circuits ( and for a while after their invention ), point-to-point construction was used.

Before the invention of spinning yarn or weaving fabric, archaeologists believe Stone Age people across Europe and Asia sewed fur and skin clothing using bone, antler or ivory needles and " thread " made of various animal body parts including sinew, catgut, and veins.

Before its invention, wet country roads became muck and were often nearly impassable.

Before 1925, recording was done by the same purely mechanical, non-electronic " acoustical " method used since the invention of the phonograph nearly fifty years earlier.

Before the invention of the variometer, sailplane pilots found it very hard to soar.

Before Mergenthaler's invention of the linotype in 1884, no newspaper in the world had more than eight pages.

Before this invention, coal was mined from underground with a pick and shovel.

Before the fuze's invention, detonation had to be induced either by direct contact, or a timer set at launch, or an altimeter.

Before the invention of the car, whiplash injuries were called " railroad spine " as they were noted mostly in connection with train collisions.

Before the invention of impermeable glass bottles, oxygen caused many wines to spoil within the year.

Before the advent of printing, breviaries were written by hand and were often richly decorated with initials and miniature illustrations telling stories in the lives of Christ or the saints, or stories from the Bible.

Before many copies of the book could be printed, however, the printing press and most of the printed copies were destroyed by a mob in Missouri.

* Before the printing press, the state of the written records of cases rendered the stare decisis doctrine utterly impracticable.

Before printing occurs, the frame and screen must undergo the pre-press process, in which an emulsion is ' scooped ' across the mesh and the ' exposure unit ' burns away the unnecessary emulsion leaving behind a clean area in the mesh with the identical shape as the desired image.

Before printer's magenta was invented in the 1890s for CMYK printing, and electric magenta was invented in the 1980s for computer displays, these two artificially engineered colors were preceded by the color displayed at right, which is the color originally called fuchsine made from coal tar dyes in the year 1859.

Before this started, Zedler requested a royal Prussian printing privilege, and at the same time an Imperial privilege.

Before the era of printing, manuscripts were handwritten, and so few copies existed, explaining why so much has been lost.

Before mechanical printing, literature was copied by hand, and many variations were introduced by copyists.

Before the introduction of the Kodak, photographers were responsible for making their own arrangements for the development and printing of their pictures.

Before the advent of printing in Scotland, writers such as Robert Henryson, William Dunbar, Walter Kennedy and Gavin Douglas have been seen as leading a golden age in Scottish poetry.

Before the invention of the printing press, books, such as Medieval illuminated manuscripts, were hand-illustrated.

" Before he had settled into his new printing office on Gay Street, Brownlow had become embroiled in a war of words with Knoxville Register editor John Miller McKee that lasted until McKee's departure in 1855.

Before the invention of the printing press, a writing, once created, could only be physically multiplied by the highly laborious and error-prone process of manual copying by scribes.

Before the invention of the printing press and its distribution there was often a very thin line between a private office and a private library since books were read or written in the same space at the same desk or table, and general accounting and personal or private letters were also done there.

Before the invention of printing, accounts of the same events by different eyewitnesses were sometimes retold several times before being written down, then often went through multiple rounds of translating and copyediting.

Before the advent of printing, herbals were produced as manuscripts, which could be kept as scrolls or loose sheets, or bound into codices.

Before the age of printing, guests at banquets had no idea who was at High Table.

Before printing books, Fitzhugh tried his hand at a pamphlet titled " Slavery Justified " ( 1849 ).

Before the invention of movable type and printing, simple grids based on optimal proportions had been used to arrange handwritten text on pages.

Before this he had left school aged fourteen to work in a printing office as an apprentice compositor.

Before the availability of digital image and text processing tools, preparing camera-ready art for use in printing ( literal cut and paste or paste up ) depended heavily on the use of knives like the X-Acto for trimming and manipulating slips of paper.