Print Culture and the Modern World quiz

The earliest kind of print technology was developed in:

The oldest Japanese book, printed in AD 868, is:

Gutenberg's first printed book was:

The Ninety-Five Theses were written by:

The first printing press in India was brought by:

The Bengal Gazette was started in 1780 by:

The Vernacular Press Act was passed in:

'Gulamgiri' was written by:

'Amar Jiban', an autobiography, was written by:

Who said, 'Printing is the ultimate and the greatest gift of God'?

Why did Erasmus fear the printing press? (2 marks)

Why was the Roman Catholic Church worried about print? (2 marks)

Who was Menocchio, and why was he punished? (2 marks)

What were penny magazines? (2 marks)

How did print help the Deoband Seminary? (2 marks)

What was the Index of Prohibited Books? (2 marks)

How did the spread of print help women's education in India? (2 marks)

What was the role of print in the religious debates in nineteenth-century India? (2 marks)

Who was Bal Gangadhar Tilak, and why was he imprisoned in 1908? (2 marks)

How did Mercier describe the impact of print? (2 marks)

The Gutenberg press could print about 250 sheets on one side in a day. A book has 300 pages printed on 150 sheets, each sheet printed on both sides. How many days would one press need to print 100 copies of the book? Why did printers start using many presses at once? (3 marks)

A Japanese woodblock print took 3 days to carve and could print 200 copies. A handwritten manuscript took 30 days to copy once. How many days would be needed to produce 200 copies by each method? Comment on the difference. (3 marks)

By 1674 about 50 books had been printed in the Konkani and Kanara languages. If printing began in Goa in about 1556, calculate the number of years and the average number of books per decade. (3 marks)

A colonial official read Indian newspapers and found that 15 of 60 vernacular papers criticised the government. Calculate the percentage. How might such reports have led to the Vernacular Press Act? (3 marks)

The Shri Venkateshwar Press in Bombay printed religious texts for a market of 10 lakh readers. If 25% of readers bought one book each at Rs 2, calculate the revenue. How did cheap print bring religion to common people? (3 marks)

Read the passage and answer the questions. Gutenberg was the son of a merchant and grew up on a large agricultural estate. From his childhood he had seen wine and olive presses. He learnt the art of polishing stones and became a master goldsmith. Using his knowledge, he adapted existing technology to design his innovation. By 1448 he had perfected the system. The first book he printed was the Bible. (i) What technology influenced Gutenberg's press? (ii) What was new in his press? (iii) How did it change book production? (5 marks)

Read the passage and answer the questions. In 1517 the religious reformer Martin Luther wrote Ninety-Five Theses criticising many of the practices and rituals of the Roman Catholic Church. A printed copy of this was posted on a church door in Wittenberg. Luther's writings were immediately reproduced in vast numbers and read widely. This led to a division within the Church and to the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. (i) What did Luther criticise? (ii) How did print help spread his ideas? (iii) What did Luther say about printing? (5 marks)

Read the passage and answer the questions. By the mid-eighteenth century, there was a common conviction that books were a means of spreading progress and enlightenment. Many believed that books could change the world, liberate society from despotism and tyranny, and herald a time when reason and intellect would rule. Writers such as Voltaire and Rousseau were widely read. (i) How did print popularise the ideas of the Enlightenment? (ii) How did print create a new culture of dialogue and debate? (iii) Why do historians say print alone did not cause the French Revolution? (5 marks)

Read the passage and answer the questions. From the 1860s a few Bengali women like Kailashbashini Debi wrote books highlighting the experiences of women. In the 1880s in present-day Maharashtra, Tarabai Shinde and Pandita Ramabai wrote with passionate anger about the miserable lives of upper-caste Hindu women, especially widows. Rashsundari Debi, a young married girl in a very orthodox household, learnt to read in the secrecy of her kitchen. (i) What did women writers highlight? (ii) How did conservatives react to women reading? (iii) Why is Rashsundari Debi's 'Amar Jiban' important? (5 marks)

Read the passage and answer the questions. After the revolt of 1857, the attitude to freedom of the press changed. Enraged Englishmen demanded a clampdown on the native press. In 1878 the Vernacular Press Act was passed, modelled on the Irish Press Laws. It provided the government with extensive rights to censor reports and editorials in the vernacular press. (i) Why was the Act passed? (ii) What powers did it give the government? (iii) How did nationalist newspapers react? (5 marks)

Trace the history of print in East Asia. How was print culture in Japan different from that in China? Draw a flowchart showing the spread of print from China to Europe. (6 marks)

Explain the print revolution in Europe and its impact on religion, reading habits and the spread of new ideas. Why were some people afraid of the effects of print? (6 marks)

Describe how print came to India and developed in the nineteenth century. Explain its role in religious reform and the spread of new ideas. Draw a timeline of print in India. (6 marks)

How did print culture help women, the poor and the lower castes in India? Give examples of writers and their works. (6 marks)

'Print culture helped the growth of nationalism in India.' Explain with examples. Describe the measures the colonial government took to control the press. (6 marks)