Inventions & Discoveries · Communication and computing

Lithography

1796 · 18th century

Lithography is a planographic method of printing based on the immiscibility of oil and water: an image drawn with a greasy substance on smooth limestone or a metal plate takes the oily ink, while the wetted, etched surface around it repels it. The German author and actor Alois Senefelder invented it in the Electorate of Bavaria in 1796, and it was first used mostly for musical scores and maps. Godefroy Engelmann introduced multicolour printing, chromolithography, in 1837, and offset lithography, in which a rubber cylinder carries the ink from plate to paper, has printed most books and magazines since the 1960s.

Lithography
Image: Pierre Puvis de Chavannes. Imprimerie Lemercier, 57 Rue de Seine, Paris. · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

On the inventions tree

First known
1796
Where
Electorate of Bavaria
Credited to
Alois Senefelder

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See also

Cite this entry
APA
The Epoch Institute. (2026). Lithography. In The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/lithography
MLA
“Lithography.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/lithography. Accessed .
Chicago
The Epoch Institute. “Lithography.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/lithography.
Harvard
The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Lithography’, The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/lithography (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random entry ↻