Earlier techniques of master printing

In an environment permeated by almost infinitely multiplied images—in newspapers and magazines, on billboards and computer screens—it is difficult to imagine a world in which every image was unique. Yet prior to the fifteenth century, images were not only one-of-a-kind but uncommon, usually found locked away in palaces, to which few had access, or affixed to the wall of a church. The technology of printmaking, which first fell into place around 1400, suddenly made it possible for hundreds or even thousands of fundamentally identical images to be produced from a single matrix of carved wood or metal. When this invention was followed in the mid-fifteenth century by the introduction of movable type, so that the first printed books could be produced, the possibilities for the spread of knowledge and ideas extended in an unprecedented manner. The study of science was advanced through accurate transmission of the forms of medicinal herbs and the results of anatomical investigations the art of engineering took a great leap forward as detailed diagrams of newly invented machines were duplicated and dispersed throughout Europe, accompanied by instructions. Yet for all the far-reaching results of the capability to multiply images, the initial demand driving the early print market was the desire for playing cards and inexpensive devotional images. Prints provided a means of mass-producing these objects that brought them within the reach of even the poorest members of society.