Johannes Gutenberg: from king of the printing press and “man of the millennium” to losing everything

He invented the printing press and opened a new era in mass communication, yet he died poor and in ruins

“The man of the millennium.” Those were the words with which the British Library named Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg, known as Johannes Gutenberg: the man who invented the printing press.

Although much of his life is shrouded in mystery, historical records indicate that this goldsmith was born around 1400 in the city of Mainz, which today belongs to Germany, but which at that time was part of the Holy Roman Empire.

According to historians, at the end of 1430, and in an attempt to pay the debts that he had after a business of small metal mirrors that had failed and that ended with a complaint against you for theft of metals, started to develop a device to print texts in a more efficient way.

Eventually, he invented a machine that replaced the hand-carved wooden letter and graphic blocks of traditional printers with easily cast metal types, which were then dipped in proprietary ink to print entire pages at once.

The first text he printed using movable type was a short school writing, which was only 28 pages long. However, he quickly took a leap and was the protagonist of a much more ambitious project:its creation made it possible to print the Bible in Latin.

In addition, the man who developed the modern printing press incorporated a work team (whom he called “my 26 tin soldiers”), with whom he printed – on average – 3,600 pages per working day. A) Yes,drove the first large-scale book production in Europe and managed to substantially lower the price of these, making them more accessible.

It is estimated that, in the 16th century, 200 million books were printed thanks to this, so that, from the Gutenberg press, anew era of mass communication and the media, with the rise of the press.

In any case, despite its importance and the fact that it was a key piece of cultural evolution worldwide, it faced large debts.

The last of his usurious lenders refused to extend his credit and sued him for delinquency, so the great inventor He lost his printing press, all his material, and the already printed Bibles. He was left in total darkness, on the street and without a coin, until finally, on February 3, 1468, while many others were filled with money with his invention, Gutenberg died.

Today, his legacy is maintained through Project Gutenberg – a digital library that offers more than 60,000 free books. In addition to this, exactly 21 years ago (on April 14, 2000), the Gutenberg Museum launched a retrospective exhibition in his honor, which is the one Google commemorates today, dedicating its famous doodle to him.