The evolution of printing began with the invention of woodblock printing to the movable type printing. Woodblock printing is a technique for printing text, images or patterns using carved stamps that was adopted widely throughout East Asia. Nevertheless, due to its time and energy consuming features, the movable type printing invented by a Chinese man called Bi Sheng eventually replaced woodblock printing. Each piece of movable type had one Chinese character on it, which was carved in relief on a small block of moistened clay. After the block had been hardened by fire, the movable type became hard and durable and could be used wherever required.
This printing technique contributed enormously to the increasing educated rate of common people in which more books were printed and reading was no longer a privilege limited to the elite class. Besides its social impact, the printing technique also accelerated the spread of culture and ideas, which eventually led to the later on development of enlightenment thinking. The invention of printing is a huge step forward in the process of evolution of record keeping, which transformed the ancient stone carving, quipu and oral tradition to a more convenient form.
SPICE
Social- social and economic classes: The increasing amount of population that were able to read shorten the social gap between the upper and lower class citizens. The easier access to knowledge promoted further education of common people.
Cultural- religion and ideology: The printing technique caused the mass production of books including the Bible. This led to the Protestant Reformation led by Martin Luther in which people could now gained access to the Bible and they began to question the authority of priests. Moreover, the invention of printing also promoted cultural diffusion that spread among the world.
C. (2003). Four Great Inventions of Ancient China -- Printing. Retrieved from
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