The printing press and its involvement in the reformation
Sometime before 1450 Johann Gutenberg developed the printing press, this invention made the printing of lengthy texts far easier. In the years following Gutenberg’s era to Luther’s, printing as an industry was improving exponentially. The press received mechanical improvements, increasing efficiency. Printing also became a large industry with large facilities dedicated to printing. The Reformation would prove good to the printing industry as more and more lengthy material was written. Gone was the need for manuscripts and the long process of hand written works. Martin Luther nailed his “Ninety-Five Theses” to the door of the Wittenberg church on October 31, 1517. He wanted to discuss …show more content…
Literacy was estimated to be at around five percent in the countryside and around 30 percent in more populated areas such as cities. If this was the case, how could the use of printed works and the printing press be so important to the reformatory work of Luther? In many towns, Luther’s books would be read out loud in the markets, for the public to consume. Learned members of the community that would have good literacy, such as lawyers or doctors would read Luther’s works out to gathered crowds. Through this word of mouth and public oration of texts, the reformatory works of Luther began to be circulated. Literate members of such public orations would transcribe and duplicate the texts by hand. Indeed the readily available works and manuscripts prompted many illiterate individuals to learn how to read. One could argue that while the printing press was useful in reproducing Martin Luther’s work, the same results could have been achieved with simple manuscripts. The fact that the text was mostly spread through public orations lends itself to this. However, if Luther had produced manuscripts rather than printed work, his reformatory work would have been slowed down. Indeed the fact that printing was a large business only helped in the distribution of the texts. The whole process was entirely sped up by means of the printing
Sometime before 1450 Johann Gutenberg developed the printing press, this invention made the printing of lengthy texts far easier. In the years following Gutenberg’s era to Luther’s, printing as an industry was improving exponentially. The press received mechanical improvements, increasing efficiency. Printing also became a large industry with large facilities dedicated to printing. The Reformation would prove good to the printing industry as more and more lengthy material was written. Gone was the need for manuscripts and the long process of hand written works. Martin Luther nailed his “Ninety-Five Theses” to the door of the Wittenberg church on October 31, 1517. He wanted to discuss …show more content…
Literacy was estimated to be at around five percent in the countryside and around 30 percent in more populated areas such as cities. If this was the case, how could the use of printed works and the printing press be so important to the reformatory work of Luther? In many towns, Luther’s books would be read out loud in the markets, for the public to consume. Learned members of the community that would have good literacy, such as lawyers or doctors would read Luther’s works out to gathered crowds. Through this word of mouth and public oration of texts, the reformatory works of Luther began to be circulated. Literate members of such public orations would transcribe and duplicate the texts by hand. Indeed the readily available works and manuscripts prompted many illiterate individuals to learn how to read. One could argue that while the printing press was useful in reproducing Martin Luther’s work, the same results could have been achieved with simple manuscripts. The fact that the text was mostly spread through public orations lends itself to this. However, if Luther had produced manuscripts rather than printed work, his reformatory work would have been slowed down. Indeed the fact that printing was a large business only helped in the distribution of the texts. The whole process was entirely sped up by means of the printing