The Discovery Of The Printing Press Dbq Essay

The Renaissance was a period of rediscovery of ancient Greek and Roman cultures. It was made possible by the invention of man named Gutenberg who created a machine were letters can be printed on paper, in a very efficient way and volumes. Books were printed in quantities that spread the recollection of knowledge very fast, both as it related to religion and to cultural knowledge. The most important consequence of the printing press was the spread of cultural knowledge because there was an enormous amount of cultural information to be spread, religious information was already disseminated quite well, and new information that available through the new invention gave way to the advancement of science, geography, philosophy, mathematics, etc.

In document 3 from the Excerpts from Luther’s 95 Theses, “According to one estimate, a third of all books printed in Germany between 1518 and 1525 were by him…”. The Catholic church and its hierarchy in Rome were selling indulgences in return for official pardons for one’s sins and grants of salvation for the after life. This and other practices prompted Luther to start a campaign against the Catholic Church in created its own religion within Christianity. Luther then published the amended Bible including his own doctrine. Luther publishing one third of all books in seven years, was an important achievement for himself and the promotion of his principles, but that information means that two thirds were the subject of other matters. We can see on document 6 Christopher Columbus’ Letter to the King of Spain : Because my undertakings have attained success, I know that it will be pleasing to you: these I have determined to relate, so that you may be acquainted with everything done and discovered in this our voyage….”. Columbus letter tells the King of Spain, in which name he sailed, that as a result of his voyage he has discovered a new part of the world and people that he was conquering for Spain. The dissemination of that letter in less than a year throughout Europe, thanks to the printing of the news, change the way people thought with the existence of new lands and

On Document 7, Expanding Knowledge of the Globe we see three different maps of the world from 1489 to 1570. In these maps we see an expanding world as knowledge was more precise. The first map in 1489, the map shows the world without the Americas. The next map, in 1507, five years after the discoveries of Columbus, some form of the new continent is shown. By 1570, the size of the Americas was much better defined. In about one hundred years thanks to the invention of the printing press, humanity grew in knowledge so that the entire world as we know today, was practically achieved by then. In document 10, The Mathematical Papers of Isaac Newton by Derek T. Whiteside, …”He read and made notes on Galileo’s Dialoges… and Descartes’ Principles of Philosophy….As we turn the pages of his notebooks we can see his mind leap from summaries of his readings to his own principles and results...He began to think of gravity as a force extending as far as the moon...in those two years, a mathematician was born. One knowledge lead to the next from reading books available to him thanks of the advancement of the printing. Here we find the spread of knowledge thanks to the velocity with which books