SCIENCE IN THE INDUSTRIAL WORLD 



in printing were simply wood -engravings made by dig- 

 ging out the wood about the letter, either separately 

 or in words or sentences. 



A simple illustration of the way in which a crude 

 woodcut may be made is to write any word written in 

 the ordinary manner with pen or pencil upon a block of 

 wood having a perfectly even surface. If, now, the sur- 

 face of wood about the letters is dug away, leaving the 

 letters standing out in relief, it is obvious that a facsimile 

 impression may be taken from this primitive woodcut 

 by inking the surface of the letters and pressing a piece 

 of paper upon them. An impression so made will of 

 course be reversed, so that in order to have the woodcut 

 reproduce the word in its correct form when printed, it 

 is necessary that the word be reversed in writing it upon 

 the block. This simple principle holds true in all wood- 

 engravings, and for that matter practically all processes 

 of reproduction, ancient or modern. 



For many years a woodcut representing a picture of 

 St. Christopher and dated 1423 was considered the 

 oldest woodcut in existence. It seems practically certain, 

 however, that there are a few examples of even earlier 

 work than this, some of them having a date as early as 

 1406. In these woodcuts little attempt is made to repro- 

 duce lights and shadows, the figures being represented 

 mostly by simple outlines. But in the woodcuts which 

 appeared in great numbers shortly after this time, 

 fairly successful attempts were made to represent lights 

 and shadows of various gradations by the use of finer 

 or closer lines, just as in modern wood-engravings. 



It is obvious that if the surface of the block of wood 

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