At the same time the new craft of printing was introduced to Basel by apprentices of Johann Gutenberg.

A leap in technology occurred when the Gutenberg printing-press was invented in the 15th century.

Around 1439, Johannes Gutenberg, a citizen of Mainz, was the first European to use movable type printing and became the global inventor of the printing press, thereby starting the Printing Revolution.

Gunpowder was widely used as early as the 11th century and they were using moveable type printing five hundred years before Gutenberg created his press.

Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg ( ; 1398 – February 3, 1468 ) was a German blacksmith, goldsmith, printer, and publisher who introduced printing to Europe.

Gutenberg was the first European to use movable type printing, in around 1439.

Gutenberg was born in the German city of Mainz, the youngest son of the upper-class merchant Friele Gensfleisch zur Laden, and his second wife, Else Wyrich, who was the daughter of a shopkeeper.

Wallau adds, " His surname was derived from the house inhabited by his father and his paternal ancestors ' zu Laden, zu Gutenberg '.

Around 1439, Gutenberg was involved in a financial misadventure making polished metal mirrors ( which were believed to capture holy light from religious relics ) for sale to pilgrims to Aachen: in 1439 the city was planning to exhibit its collection of relics from Emperor Charlemagne but the event was delayed by one year due to a severe flood and the capital already spent could not be repaid.

It was in Strasbourg in 1440 that Gutenberg is said to have perfected and unveiled the secret of printing based on his research, mysteriously entitled Kunst und Aventur ( art and enterprise ).

Some time in 1456, there was a dispute between Gutenberg and Fust, and Fust demanded his money back, accusing Gutenberg of misusing the funds.

A November 1455 legal document records that there was a partnership for a " project of the books ," the funds for which Gutenberg had used for other purposes, according to Fust.

Thus Gutenberg was effectively bankrupt, but it appears he retained ( or re-started ) a small printing shop, and participated in the printing of a Bible in the town of Bamberg around 1459, for which he seems at least to have supplied the type.

Meanwhile, the Fust – Schöffer shop was the first in Europe to bring out a book with the printer's name and date, the Mainz Psalter of August 1457, and while proudly proclaiming the mechanical process by which it had been produced, it made no mention of Gutenberg.

In 1462, during a conflict between two archbishops, Mainz was sacked by archbishop Adolph von Nassau, and Gutenberg was exiled.

Gutenberg died in 1468 and was buried in the Franciscan church at Mainz, his contributions largely unknown.

It was not until 1567 that the first portrait of Gutenberg, almost certainly an imaginary reconstruction, appeared in Heinrich Pantaleon's biography of famous Germans.

An undated 36-line edition of the Bible was printed, probably in Bamberg in 1458-1460, possibly by Gutenberg.

A 1568 history by Hadrianus Junius of Holland claims that the basic idea of the movable type came to Gutenberg from Laurens Janszoon Coster via Fust, who was apprenticed to Coster in the 1430s and may have brought some of his equipment from Haarlem to Mainz.

At the turn to the Renaissance, Gutenberg ’ s invention of mechanical printing made possible a dissemination of knowledge to a wider population, that would not only lead to a gradually more egalitarian society, but one more able to dominate other cultures, drawing from a vast reserve of knowledge and experience.

Since the late 1890s, Haarlem has been willing to concede that perhaps Mainz printed earlier, in the person of Johann Gutenberg.

If true, this points to Johann Gutenberg about a decade after Coster's death.

** Johann Gutenberg, inventor of the printing press

* 1448 – Johann Gutenberg develops type metal alloy

fr: Tuerie de Johann Gutenberg

The 15th century, however, also brought Johann Gutenberg and his invention of the printing press, an innovation ( for Europe, at least ) that would change literature forever.

After the invention of the printing press by Johann Gutenberg, books became prevalent, and different institutions such as universities and governments and churches found ways to keep and share them.

* John Lewis Burckhardt ( Johann Ludwig Burckhardt )-Travels in Arabia ; comprehending an account of those territories in Hedjaz which the Muslims regard as sacred, online version available free from the Gutenberg Project

* 1454 – Johann Gutenberg prints the Gutenberg Bible.

It is named after Johann Gutenberg, the inventor of printing from moveable metal type.

A group of citizens founded the museum in 1900, 500 years after Johann Gutenberg ’ s birth, to honor the inventor and present his technical and artistic achievements to the public at large.

On account of his connection with Johann Gutenberg, he has been called the inventor of printing, and the instructor as well as the partner of Gutenberg.

* Johann Gutenberg

Being an educational title, the player ends up in many famous historical situations, meeting William the Conqueror and Johann Gutenberg, among others.

Bloch also creates articles, pamphlets, books, and mail art-related projects in the tradition of Johann Gutenberg, William Blake, William Morris, Thomas Paine, and El Lissitzky and Mickey Mouse.

He is famous for the first printing of the Bible in an East Slavic language ( in Old Belarusian ) in 1517, several decades after the first-ever printed book by Johann Gutenberg and just several years after the first Czech Bible ( 1506 ).

* Observations on the mystery of print and the work of Johann Gutenberg, 1937, Book Manufacturer's Institute / New York Times

* Johann Gutenberg

' His ' name is a play on Johann Gutenberg, the German inventor of moveable type, being a rough translation of " Gutenberg " to English.

In 1481 Adam of Rottweil, a pupil and collaborator of Johann Gutenberg, obtained permission to establish a printing press in L ' Aquila.

It is not clear when Gutenberg conceived the Bible project, but for this he borrowed another 800 guilders from Fust, and work commenced in 1452.

Setting each page would take, perhaps, half a day, and considering all the work in loading the press, inking the type, pulling the impressions, hanging up the sheets, distributing the type, etc., it is thought that the Gutenberg – Fust shop might have employed as many as 25 craftsmen.

Whatever the truth, the Helmasperger document of November 6, 1455, shows that Fust advanced money to Gutenberg ( apparently 800 guilders in 1450, and another 800 in 1452 ) to carry on his work, and that Fust, in 1455, brought a suit against Gutenberg to recover the money he had lent, claiming 2026 guilders for principal and interest.

The suit was apparently decided in Fust's favour, November 6, 1455, in the refectory of the Barefooted Friars of Mainz, when Fust swore that he himself had borrowed 1550 guilders and given them to Gutenberg.

A third source involves a business partner of Johann Gutenberg, Johann Fust, who sold several of Gutenberg's bibles to King Louis XI of France and his court officials, representing the bibles as hand-copied manuscripts.

It was no coincidence that on August 24, 1456 the printing of the Gutenberg Bible was completed, perhaps triggering the very first wayzgoose party at Fust – Schöffer shop in Mainz.