畢升

Bi Sheng is considered the inventor of movable type printing, one of China’s “four great inventions.” He lived during the Song dynasty, a time of great technological and social change. Virtually nothing is known about his life, or even what he printed from movable type, although it is thought that he was a commoner. His techniques followed upon centuries or print – and papermaking innovations in China and were in turn improved upon by innovators in Korea, Holland, and, most famously, by the German printer Johannes Gutenberg. Bi Sheng’s inventions was not fully utilized in China for several hundred years after his death.