Susan Denham Wade: The Gutenberg Press (1454)

Travels Through Time

Today’s exhilarating episode takes us on a trip to the fifteenth-century, to see one of the greatest of all technological inventions at the moment of its creation: the Gutenberg Press.

Until the mid-fifteenth century European society had had a predominantly oral culture. The books that did exist were expensive manuscripts, produced by scribes in scriptoriums, each of them taking weeks or months to complete.

At the Frankfurt Trade Fair in 1454 something appeared that would change this. Among the English wool and French wine, one tradesman was selling a new kind of regularly printed manuscript, produced by a mysterious machine in the nearby town of Mainz.

The flutter of interest these pages generated was more than warranted. In fact, fair-goers were the first people to get a glimpse of Johannes Gutenberg’s magnificent Bible.

This was a book that would catalyse the shift from script to print, changing the world as it went.

Guiding us through this enchanting historical story is the author Susan Denham Wade. The author of A History of Seeing in Eleven Inventions, Denham Wade explains the brilliance of Gutenberg’s invention and why it appeared at the time it did.

This episode of Travels Through Time is supported by The History Press. To read a beautifully illustrated, exclusive extract from A History of Seeing, head over to the newly launched Unseen Histories.

As ever, much, much more about this episode is to be found at our own website tttpodcast.com.

Show notes

Scene One: Mainz, Spring 1454. A middle-aged man delivers a parcel to an office in the Church of St Martin, wrapped in cloth. Inside are 200 printed indulgences. The man making the delivery is Johann Gutenberg.

Scene Two: Summer 1454. A workshop near a riverbank in Mainz, Germany. Gutenberg’s printing presses are working frantically on producing the monumental Bible project.

Scene Three: October 1454. Frankfurt’s famous trade fair. The Italian cardinal Piccolomini – future Pope Pius II, but at this point Bishop of Siena – catches a first glimpse of Gutenberg’s Bible. He is amazed at the beauty, accuracy and clarity.

Memento: A handful of original Gutenberg type.

People/Social

Presenter: Peter Moore

Guest: Susan Denham Wade

Production: Maria Nolan

Podcast partner: Unseen Histories

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