A Monastic Dilemma Posed by the Invention of Printing

Abstract

By no means was the invention of printing universally looked upon by contemporary witnesses an an unqualifiable progressive step in the history of mankind; in the monastic scriptorium, for example, the printing art came out into direct competition with the long-cultivated art of handcopying. A Benedictine abbot living in the age of incunabula, the Abbot Trithemius of Sponheim near Kreuznach in Germany, composed his De-laude scriptorum manualium (1492) in support of the proposition that the handcopying of texts is in many respects superior to printing. However, the author was not hostile to the printing art in principle, viewing it on balance as a divinely-inspired aid in the golden age of monastic erudition. Far from being a reactionary in the face of the printing revolution, Trithemius was one of printing’s most vigorous Renaissance advocates.