TECHNOLOGY × LANGUAGE
Woodblock Printing in China
868 CE
History · Middle Ages · Holocene · Meghalayan
The Diamond Sutra, printed from woodblocks in 868 and dated by its colophon, comes from the caves of Dunhuang, six centuries before the European presses.
Woodblock printing is attested in East Asia six centuries before the European presses. Paper, whose use is reported at the Chinese court in 105, meets woodblock engraving there; the Diamond Sutra, printed in 868 and dated by its colophon, comes from the Mogao caves at Dunhuang and is conserved at the British Library: it constitutes the oldest dated printed book preserved. The object is not a trial: it is a scroll several metres long, evenly inked, opened by a frontispiece engraved by a practised hand and closed by a colophon indicating patron and date, which presupposes an already organised production. Bi Sheng develops movable type around 1041, and Korea develops its metal version: a work of 1239, long held to be woodblock, is today identified as the oldest preserved metal-type imprint, a century earlier than the Jikji of 1377.
Why it matters
The history of printing is ordinarily referred to Mainz, whereas the technique is attested a millennium earlier in East Asia, which modifies the question posed for Europe: it bears not on the invention of printing but on its conjunction with the alphabet, cheap paper and commercial circuits.
Dating & uncertainty
Paper is reported at the Chinese court in 105 and printing follows within centuries; the Diamond Sutra of 868 is the oldest dated printed book. Bi Sheng experiments with movable type from 1041. The Song of Enlightenment, whose status was debated for fifty years, is today read as a movable metal type imprint of 1239.
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