(Buringh, Eltjo, van Zanden, Jan Luiten: Charting the ‘Rise of the West’ [2009])
Cities with Printing in 1450 Cities with Printing in 1480 Cities with Printing in 1500 1500
LSource 4 Books printed in Europe by 1500 Others 5%
Scientific 10%
Legal 10% Religious 45% Literary 30%
LSource 5 As not only by your skill and the unrivalled beauty of your typography (letters/fonts), but also by intelligence and learning of no common order, you have thrown a vast light upon the literature of Greece and Rome. … I am told you are editing Plato in Greek, a book expected with the greatest interest by the learned world. (Erasmus to Aldus Manutius [a Venetian printer] 1507)
The spread of the printing press, 1450 to 1500
1. Examine Sources 1 to 3. How quickly did the printing press spread?
2. What conclusions can you draw from Sources 4 and 5?