German Museum of Books and Writing "Signs - Books - Networks"

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  Miniature of a scriptorium from Echternach Pericopes of Heinrich III. (1039-1043)

  Deutsches Buch- und Schriftmuseum der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek Leipzig

  789

  Charlemagne orders the establishment monastery schools, in which writing among other things was to be learned.
• 800

  first illuminated manuscripts in the scriptoria of European monasteries (Book of Kelts in Ireland)
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  Hrabanus Maurus as the bishop of Mainz, woodcut from his work De Clericorum institutione, 1532

  Deutsches Buch- Schriftmuseum der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek Leipzig

  822

  Hrabanus Maurus becomes abbot at the monastery of Fulda.
• 868

  The oldest block-printed book (Diamond Sutra) appears in China.
• 1045

  The Chinese Bi Sheng invents movable type block printing using clay letters.
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  Set of Korean letters with copper letters, produced using investment casting, photo: Punctum, Bertram Kober

  Deutsches Buch- und Schriftmuseum der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek Leipzig (Schenkung des Cheongju Early Printing Museums)

  11th century

  First experiments are carried out in China with single type printing.
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  Page from the Heidelberg illuminated manuscript of the Sachsenspiegel, circa 1300

  Universitätsbibliothek Heidelberg

  1220

  Eike von Repgow begins transcribing the Sachsenspiegel.
• 1377

  Movable cast brass type is invented in Korea and used to print the Buddhist work Jikji.
• 1430

  first attested copperplate engraving, followed by etchings and mezzotints
• 1445 / 1450

  Johannes Gutenberg develops the letterpress printing in Europe.