excellent for etchings and~etchers have used it ever since.
Tt is doubtful if any invention has ever affected the world so much, as the invention of paper. It was the appearance of printed books which made the revival of learning possible and on this account many historians regard the printing press as responsible for the renaissance.
The First Printers It was in 1477 that Caxton started printing in London, but to Gut-ten berg of Mainz es generally given the honour of being the first print-ler. It is now, however, generally re-Jcognized that Coster was printing in 1446 in Holland before Guttenberg was printing in Germany. Printing, however, was known for} far before this, how for one cannot say; but manuscripts of the 12th century have been found with the initial letters printed Jwooden stamps. But the print preps war of little use until a sui ble material for punti discovered and it was paper that) made this possible.
The honour of this great invention belongs to the Chinese, who first made it from bamboo. In the Sth century the Chinese made war on the Arabs, who defeated them Vand amongst the prisoners taken were some Chinese _paper-makers from whom the Arabs learnt the secret.
Tu the reconquest of Spain the Christians captured some paper mills but made little use of the discovery until the end of the 13th cen: tury when the Italians recognized its importance and at the beginning of the 15th century paper was being manufactured cheaply enough in and Engravinge of the Old Master
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.