Typography for a Modern World? The Ways of Chinese Movable Types

This article presents a brief history and poses questions about traditional Chinese movable type printing. This is a technology that developed in the pre-modern period and never underwent in the mechanization in the ways that Western movable type printing did. Nevertheless, even today, Chinese traditional movable types continue to be used in some places in China. The authors not only describe the chronology of but also analyse significant cultural, political, and social factors affecting the development traditional Chinese typography. The first part of this article discusses the movable type made of earthenware and of wood, which are described in various sources written by scholar-officials. In the case of movable type for the Tangut script, however, the main evidence come from chiefly religious imprints which provide information about material evidence as well as a few about printers, typesetters, etc. The second section describes the long hiatus from the Yuan until the second half of the fifteenth century in the utilization of metallic typography in the private circles in Wuxi in Jiangnan, whose publications still survive, and how during the last dynasty, the movable type production reflects some trends in book publishing in general, with the important engagement of some of the Manchu emperors. In the last section of the paper, the authors explain why although wooden types existed in the Kingdom of Xixia (1032-1227) and in the Yuan dynasty (1279-1368), it was only in the Ming (1368-1644) to Qing (1644-1911) periods that their use became more widespread in China. Wooden movable type played a key role in the printing of genealogies in various areas (e.g. Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangsu, Hunan, and Fujian). That all also indicates that wood is the “material medium” of traditional Chinese printing, never mind if employed in blocks or types.