Johannes Gutenburg Essay

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Johannes Gutenberg The man credited with the invention of the printing press, Johannes Gutenberg, is a man whose history is clouded in many uncertainties. Although he is known to have been born around the beginning of the 1400’s in Mainz, Germany, his exact birth date is still unknown: “The sources do not reveal more than his birth must have occurred between the year 1394 and the year 1404.”1 Like his birth date, his youth and education is also uncertain, though it is believed he learned goldsmithing from his father, “His father worked with the ecclesiastic mint”2. It is believed that his knowledge of metals and smithing had a large contribution to his inventing of the printing press. After leaving Mainz, the first documented residence of Gutenberg: “The first record of Gutenberg's sojourn in Strasburg dates from 14 March, 1434”3. There he became a part of the goldsmith’s guild, which is where evidence of his plans for his printing press first became noted. According to a witness: “one witness states that, in his capacity of goldsmith, he had supplied in 1436 "printing requisites" to the value of 100 gulden; mention is also made of a press constructed by Konrad Saspach”3. Though evidence shows that he had started development of the printing press, he wouldn’t complete it for many years to come. The first concrete evidence of the completion of the printing press in came in 1448 when Gutenberg convinced a wealthy business man by the name of Johannes Fust to become his partner and fund his 42-line bible project1. It took a total loan of 1600 guilders from Fust and 7 years of work, making it the year of 1455, before the 42-line bible was finally completed and all 180 copies printed. Though the project had been completed, Gutenberg and Fust ended up getting into a dispute which ended with Fust suing Gutenberg and gaining control of the print-shop as well as half the

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