Technology & Medicine › Medieval › Woodblock printing
Movable type (Bi Sheng)
c. 1040 (ceramic type, Song China)· Invention or discovery· Communication & computing
Mostly agreedGood evidence; some details, dates or numbers uncertain.
Printing with individual, reusable characters, invented by the Chinese commoner Bi Sheng around 1040 using baked clay.
See it on the Technology & Medicine map →How it works
Bi Sheng carved single characters on small clay pieces and baked them hard. To print, he set them in an iron frame on a bed of wax and resin, warmed it so the type stuck, pressed it level, and afterward melted the wax to free the type for reuse. Two frames let one be set while the other printed. Wang Zhen later used tens of thousands of wooden types (1290s), and Korea cast metal type, as in the Jikji (1377).
Why it mattered
It introduced the key idea behind all later typesetting — reusable, rearrangeable characters — though Chinese, with thousands of characters, mostly kept using woodblocks.
How we know
Our only source on Bi Sheng is Shen Kuo's Dream Pool Essays (1088); surviving Tangut and Chinese prints from the 1100s–1200s show the technique in use.
Still unknown or debated
Almost nothing is known of Bi Sheng himself, and no print certainly made by him survives.
Inside this (1)
Connections (3)
▸Woodblock printing led to Movable type (Bi Sheng)Well documented
The connection
Woodblocks meant carving every page anew, then storing stacks of blocks. Bi Sheng broke the page into single reusable characters that could be set, printed and rearranged, keeping the same inking and paper-pressing process. Woodblock printers supplied the skills, ink and paper; movable type changed only how the printing surface was assembled.
When and how
Song China, during the Qingli reign period (1041–1048), recorded by the scholar-official Shen Kuo.
How we know
Shen Kuo's Dream Pool Essays (1088) describes Bi Sheng's method in detail, presenting it as a development of long-established block printing.
Debates and open questions
Movable type never displaced woodblocks in China; with thousands of characters, carving a page was often simpler, so historians debate how big an advance it was there.
▸Movable type (Bi Sheng) was cast in metal in Korea for Jikji and Korean metal movable typeWell documented
The connection
Bi Sheng in Song China made movable type from baked clay around 1040. Korean printers took the idea further by casting characters in bronze, which lasted longer and printed more crisply. By 1377, monks at Heungdeok Temple used such type to print Jikji, the oldest metal-type book that survives.
When and how
China's Bi Sheng around 1040, described by the scholar Shen Kuo; Goryeo Korea cast metal type by 1234; Jikji was printed in Cheongju in July 1377.
How we know
Shen Kuo's Dream Pool Essays (about 1088) describes Bi Sheng's method; Korean records note a 1234 metal-type book; Jikji's closing note records its printing.
Debates and open questions
How Korean printers learned of Chinese movable type, and exactly when they first cast metal type, is unclear; some scholars argue for dates before 1234.
▸Movable type (Bi Sheng) may have influenced Gutenberg's printing pressDebated
The connection
By Gutenberg's time East Asia had used movable type for 400 years, and Korea had cast metal type since the 1200s. Gutenberg combined metal type cast in a hand mould, oil-based ink and a screw press. Some historians think word of Asian printing reached Europe via Mongol-era trade; others see independent invention.
When and how
Song China (about 1040) and Goryeo Korea (1200s–1377); Mainz, Germany, about 1440–1450.
How sure are we?
No document shows Gutenberg knew of Asian type. Block-printed playing cards and religious images were in Europe by about 1400, possibly via Asia.
Debates and open questions
Whether the idea traveled — perhaps through Uyghur wooden-type printers or Mongol contacts — or Europe reinvented movable type is unresolved and sometimes politicized.