On This Day: The First Section of the Gutenberg Bible Was Finished

On [Sept. 30] in 1452, the first section of the Gutenberg Bible was finished in Mainz, Germany, by the printer Johannes Gutenberg. Little is known of Gutenberg’s early history or his personal life except that he was born around the year 1400, the youngest son of a wealthy merchant. But from the time of the appearance of his beautiful Bibles, he has left an indelible mark on human culture.

Ancient books had primarily been written on scrolls, though an innovation in the second century A.D. — that of the codex, a sheaf of pages bound at one edge — gave us the familiar book form we recognize today.