Movable type

Movable type (US English; moveable type in British English) is the system and technology of printing and typography that uses movable components to reproduce the elements of a document (usually individual letters or punctuation) usually on the medium of paper.

The world's first movable type printing press technology for printing paper books was made of ceramic porcelain china materials and invented in ancient China around AD 1040 by the Han Chinese innovator Bi Sheng (990–1051) during the Northern Song Dynasty (960–1127). In 1377, currently the oldest extant movable metal print book, Jikji, was printed using Chinese characters in the Goryeo dynasty of Korea. The diffusion of both movable-type systems was, however, limited. They were expensive, and required a high amount of labor involved in manipulating the thousands of ceramic tablets or metal tablets, required for scripts based on the ancient Chinese writing script, which has thousands of characters. Around 1450 Johannes Gutenberg made another version of a metal movable-type printing press in Europe, along with innovations in casting the type based on a matrix and hand mould. The more limited number of characters needed for European languages was an important factor. Gutenberg was the first to create his type pieces from an alloy of lead, tin, and antimony—and these materials remained standard for 550 years.

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