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History of Lithographic Print

Name /  Meaning

Litho - Stone

Graphic - Writing or Pictures

Letterpress was the first print after scribing from roman times, It was invented by Johannes Gutenberg of Germany in 1452.It was later brought over to Britain by William Caxton, he came to Canterbury and Central London with it, mainly for work with the church.

During the 18th Century Alios Senefelder led the discovery of what is now the major form of planographic printing.

There are two stories of how Senefelder came about the discovery of Lithography, the first and most believed by many printers of today is that he discovered it when writing out a laundry list for his mother, the other was that he set out to devise a way to print his own music and writing.

What ever is believed it was after a lot of tests he found that relief etching limestone with gum arabic and nitric acid solution which he was using was unnecessary. He found that merely their application was sufficient to transform the quality of the background, so that in it’s damp state it would repel the printing ink and that the soap and tallow mixture which he was drawing his images with altered the character of the stone on which it had been applied and made it repel water.