AP European History
AP European History
Two inventions helped spread the ideas produced by the Humanists across Italy and the rest of Europe. About 1450, Johannes Gutenberg (c. 1390–1468), a German printer, invented printing from a movable metal type press. The first European book printed by machine was the Gutenberg Bible (1456). With the Gutenberg Bible, the European age of printing had begun. As compared to the medieval practices of hand copying or block printing books at a tediously slow pace, the movable type press tremendously increased output and decreased costs. As books became more readily available, more people learned to read and write. The increased circulation of books by Italian writers helped to spread more of the ideas of the Renaissance to other parts of Europe.