movable type

…compass, the first description of movable type, and a fairly accurate explanation of the origin of fossils. The Mengxi bitan also contains Shen’s observations on such varied subjects as mathematics, astronomy, atmospheric phenomena, cartography, optics, and medicine. Shen produced a number of works, including commentaries on the Confucian Classics, atlases,…

…stimulated by the invention of movable type (first made of earthenware, then of wood and metal). This advance from the older method of block printing led to the multiplication of books; the printing of a complete set of the classics was a boon to literary studies in schools.

…15th-century invention of printing with movable metal type. The details of this epochal invention are disappointingly obscure, but there is general agreement that the first large-scale printing workshop was that established at Mainz by Johannes Gutenberg, which was producing a sufficient quantity of accurate type to print a Vulgate Bible…