Korean Type

HOWARD P. LINTON
 

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"^ HE true date for the first use of movable metal type in
Korea has yet to be established. In 1232, the scholar Yi
Kyoobo mentions the acquisition of Books of Cere¬
monies printed from movable metal type, and the British Museum
owns a type-printed book with title pages bearing the dates 1317
and 1324. Thomas Carter, from whose book The Invention of
Printing in China (New York, Columbia University Press, 1925)
most of the following information is taken, doubted the validity
of these claims, and accepted the date 1403. In that year. King
T'ai Tsung (reigned 1401-1419) set into motion the foundry
which had been established as a unit of the Department of Books
in 1392, the first year of the 500-year Yi Dynasty. T'ai Tsung
regretted that only a small number of block-printed books were
reaching his country from China, where use of the earthenware
movable type invented by Pi Sheng in the nth century had not
proved practicable. He also acknowledged the fact that "the
books printed from blocks are often imperfect, and moreover it
is difficult to print in their entirety all the books that exist. I
ordain therefore that characters be formed of bronze and that
everything without exception upon which I can lay my hands
be printed, in order to pass on the tradition of what these works
contain." The royal family, along with others who wished to
contribute privately, assumed the costs. The best of calligraphers
designed the "several hundred thousand" characters making up
the font. T'ai Tsung's son, Shih Tsung (reigned 1419-1451) is
credited with improving the process. By the time the third font
had been cast in 1434—before the invention of printing in
Europe, as Mr. Carter points out—classical literature and books
of history and morals were being put out at a rate of "more than
forty sheets" a day.

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