The speed of technology transfer

Telegraph | News | Caxton's first page to go on display

The oldest surviving document from England's first printer William Caxton goes on public display in Kew this month. Dating from 1476, it is an indulgence recognizing a contribution by Henry Langley and his wife Katherine to building a fleet to fight the Turks who had recently captured Constantinople. Another reminder, if any were needed, of the long history of conflict between Islam and Christendom.

But what really struck me was the fact that it took about 20 years for the relatively simple and obviously useful technology of the printing press to cross from Germany to England. Another point it drove home was that whereas Gutenburg had labored first to produce a Bible, the more practical Englishman Caxton started out in the printed forms business before moving on to book publishing in 1477, eventually publishing over 100 titles from philosophy to the Canterbury Tales.

Book publishing brought literature within the financial reach of the merchants, clerics, and mechanics who formed the nucleus of what we now call the middle class. Less wealthy than nobles, more economically independent than serfs and more likely than either to be literate. Serfs had no use for written language and many nobles employed people to handle their limited need for reading and writing. The necessity to keep written records and to correspond with customers and suppliers made literacy very important to this middle class. And, without a middle class, who would have bought books in the quantities the printing press made possible?