Medieval Caesarean
Illegal English Bible
Chaucer, Canterbury Tales
Monsters in hell
Ptolemy's World Map
Medieval woman poet
Old Hall manuscript
Bedford Hours
Medicinal plants
Chess playing
Medical Treatise by John Aderne
Recipe for 'custarde'
Gutenberg Bible
The Temptation of Eve
Pregnancy
The Legend of King Arthur
Caxton's Chaucer
Valentine's day love letter
Medieval zodiac chart
Heretics burned at the stake
Royal feast
Courtly love
Columbus in America
In 1476, Caxton introduced the printing press to England, revolutionising forever the way that books were created. This book, produced in the same year, is the first printed edition of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Caxton printed all kinds of texts: mythic tales, popular stories, poems, phrasebooks, devotional pieces and grammars. Thanks to the invention of printing, books became quicker to produce and cheaper to purchase - although they were still a luxury. An ever-increasing number of writers were able to publish their works, literacy rates rose, language gradually became more uniform, and an early form of modern English began to emerge.