The Tang Dynasty

During the Tang Dynasty, Woodblock Printing was invented. Firstly, people carved inverted Chinese characters on a piece of wood. Then, they put some ink on top. When the characters were printed on paper, they would be turned upside down again.

The ninth century B.C. gave rise to the first high tide in woodblock printing. During that period, printing was active in many places. Apart from the printing of Buddhist scriptures and Buddha portraits, private printing of almanacs, books on geomancy and fortune telling, glossaries and rhyming dictionaries were widespread. A considerable amount of printed material dating from this period has survived to the present day.
 
 
 
 

[Printing] [The Song Dynasty] [The Yuan Dynasty] [The Ming Dynasty] [The dissemination of printing]