Perspective and Printing Press - The First Information

Revolutions

Printing

Language: The First Information Technology

GreekEnaDioTriaTesseraPenteHexaHeptaOktoEnneaDeka

RussianOdinDvaTriChetyrePyatShestSemVosemDyevyatDyesyat

LatinUnusDuoTresQuattuorQuinqueSexSeptemOctoNovemDecem

KurdishEgDuShayCharPenchShashHayshHeftNa Da

GermanEinsZweiDreiVierFunfSechsSiebenAchtNeunZehn

EnglishOneTwoThreeFourFiveSixSevenEightNineTen

Language FamiliesArabicWahidIthnainThalathaArba’aKhamsaSittaSabaThamanyaTisaAshra

KurdishEgDuShayCharPenchShashHayshHeftNa Da

EnglishOneTwoThreeFourFiveSixSevenEightNineTen

TurkishBirIkiUcDortBesAltiYediSekizDokuzOn

The Indo-European LanguagesGermanic– English, German, Dutch, Scandinavian

Romance (From Latin)– French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian

Slavic– Russian, Polish, Czech, Serbo-Croatian

Others: Hellenic, Iranian, Indian, etc.

Tracking Language Evolution• Historical Documents• Words resistant to borrowing (small

numbers, self, mother, sun, etc.)• Patterns of Sound Change• Grammatical Structures• Genetics• Search for the Proto-Language

A Modern Idea?• Alfa Hotel Oscar Victor• Bravo India Papa Whiskey• Charlie Juliet Quebec X-Ray• DeltaKilo Romeo Yankee• Echo Lima Sierra Zulu• Foxtrot Mike Tango• Golf November Uniform

The Oldest Idea in the Book

Hebrew 1000 B.C.Aleph - OxBeth - HouseGimel - CamelDaleth - Door

Old Slavic 1000 A.D.Az (I)Buki (Beech Tree)Vedi (Know)Glagol (Word)Dobro (Good)

In a pre-literate world, the best way to learn the alphabet is to use words as mnemonics, not meaningless syllables

How We Got English• Pre-Roman Britain was Celtic– Only a few place names are relics (Ben for

mountain, glen for valley)

• Romans occupied Britain– Castra, military camp, survives in Lancaster,

Worcester, Manchester

• Angles and Saxons invaded starting in the 5th Century– Largely wiped the linguistic slate clean

English is a Germanic Language

• Closest language is Frisian, spoken by 300,000 in Holland and Germany

• Closest national language to English is Dutch• About 80% of our small everyday words (day,

word, father, mother, sun, moon) are Germanic• Sometimes the relationship is hard to see: Vogel

isn’t much like bird but very similar to fowl

Word EndingsThe Dog Bites the Man

is not the same asThe Man Bites the Dog

-but-Der Hund beisst den Mannmeans exactly the same asDen Mann beisst der Hund

Dropping the Endings

• Languages that use word endings for meaning are called inflected

• England was partly occupied by the Vikings beginning in 865 A.D.

• Vikings and Anglo-Saxons spoke Germanic languages but differed in word endings

• We just dropped the word endings (except for plural s, possessive ‘s, and a few others)

The French Influence• In 911 the King of France gave part of

France to a Viking chief in return for protection

• This region, settled by the “Norsemen,” came to be called Normandy

• In 1066, William of Normandy (a Viking descendant) defeated Harold (also a Viking descendant) and conquered England

• By this time, the Normans spoke French

A Double LanguageMore earthy terms tend to be Anglo-Saxon,

more abstract synonyms French:Friendship AmityFreedom LibertyLove Affection

A Double Language

Rural and small-town occupation names are often English, more urban or technical ones French:

Baker CarpenterMiller PainterWeaver Mason

A Double LanguageFrench government terms reflect a more

complex society than Anglo-Saxon termsKing GovernorQueen Parliament

A Double LanguageThe English grew it, the French cooked it

Sheep MuttonCow BeefDeer Venison

Of course, many cooking terms are French:Fry, Broil

Prerequisites for PrintingPaper!

Cheap, abundant, smooth and absorbent.

Far better for printing than papyrus or vellum.

Means of printing impressions.

Chinese wood-block printing.

Wood block used in Europe in 14th century for religious pictures and cards.

Laurenz Janzoon (1420-30) used blocks for individual letters.

Press

adapted from wine-making, book-binding, paper-making

Advent of movable type Metal type used ca. 1430 in Holland to

stamp copper plates. Lead poured on to copper to make printing face

Gutenberg ca. 1450 used dies as masters to cast copies of letters.

• Early type letters Pb-Sn (for corrosion resistance) - Sb (for hardness). Basically modern composition. Type metal is one of the oldest unchanged industrial materials.

The Spread of Printing

By 1480, there were printing presses in 110 towns.

Ten million books in print by 1500. Aldus Manutius of Venice (d. 1515). First

cheap mass-market books. William Caxton, 1476, first press in England

The Great Vowel Shift• Almost all English “long” vowels are diphthongs or blends of vowel sounds– “a” in “bay” = a + i as in “bait”– “i” as in “bite” = e + i as in “height”– “o” as in “go” = o + u as in “though”

• We also dropped or changed guttural “gh”: cough, through, light, sight

Why English Spelling is so Chaotic• Great Vowel Shift happened just as English

was first being printed• Caxton used the spelling system of Chaucer

(ca. 1400)• Result: English was set into print with an

already-obsolete spelling system• Also, English has borrowed from just about

every other language and preserved their spelling

Effects of printing

Vast increase in literacy. Rapid dissemination of ideas. Standardization and simplification of spelling.

(& from Latin et and % from p/c are relics of pre-printing days)

• Stimulus toward accuracy.

Change in our concept of "fact" Before printing, documents were suspect as too easily

forged. Eyewitnesses and personal testimony were considered more reliable.

Printing made documents more authoritative than personal testimony. Hard to fake printed documents.

Before printing, people relied on memory to store facts. Printing changed the concept of "fact" to "printed fact";

"show me in black and white.” Electronic forgery: we have come full circle from pre-

printing days

The printed image Wood-cut along with type. Itaglio-engraved metal. Copper plates with

engraved lines did for pictures what type did for text.

Lithography. Zinc plate, 1868. Photography-halftone method. Xerography, computer graphics, etc.

Printing, Culture, and Control• Europe: mass literature• China: official documents, validation• Islamic World: suppressed until 19th century• Modern corporate and government

attempts to control Internet, copyrights, etc.