Bruno Fabbiani, a lecturer at Turin Polytechnic, claims that Johannes Gutenberg may be wrongly credited with producing Europe's first printed book, that the first copies were created with stamps, rather than movable type.

There is evidence that the Koreans and Chinese previously knew about movable metal types at that time, but due to the complex nature of the Chinese writing system, printed material probably was not as abundant as that of Renaissance Europe.

It is often suggested that MARCO POLO must have come across movable type printing on his journeys and thus indirectly informed Gutenberg.

Gutenberg certainly could be credited for introducing efficient methods of book production.

MILAN (Reuters) - Johannes Gutenberg may be wrongly credited with producing Europe's first printed book, an Italian researcher said, causing an uproar among bibliophiles and academics who see him as the father of the modern hardback.

One of the world's most precious books, the Gutenberg bible was printed between 1452 and 1454. It sparked a literary boom in Europe.

Bruno Fabbiani, a lecturer at Turin Polytechnic, said Gutenberg used stamps rather than the individual, moveable letters he is said to have invented that accelerated printing and book production.

Before the invention of moveable type, craftsmen laboriously carved wooden stamps for each page. According to accepted academic research, German goldsmith Gutenberg was the first to break down the stamps into individual letters.

"Bruno Fabbiani has devised 30 experiments that show Gutenberg did not use moveable type to print the bible," Francesco Pirella of Genoa's Museum of Print said on Friday.

Fabbiani will perform his experiments in a mock trial of Gutenberg in the Italian port city of Genoa on Saturday.

But other print researchers dismissed Fabbiani's experiments as a stunt.

Eva Hanebutt-Benz, director of the Gutenberg Museum in the German town of Mainz, said the Gutenberg bible gave a strong hint on how it was produced -- the imprint of a single piece of type that accidentally fell on one of the pages.

"It's true that there are many open questions because we don't have any documents from Gutenberg's workshop," she said by telephone from Mainz, where the printer was born.

"Everything we know about the technique has been deduced from the printed originals, so it makes sense to carefully consider the findings -- but not with that kind of heave-ho method," she said.

Hanebutt-Benz said established Gutenberg experts planned to snub the mock trial in Genoa.

Gutenberg, whose real name was Johannes Gensfleisch, printed 180 copies of the bible, of which only 48 still exist. When he died in 1468, his invention had already spread across Europe.

Gutenberg not the father of printing?
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/041029/325/f5kza.html

Additional Information:
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Johann Gutenberg
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07090a.htm