Page 46 - DK Children's Encyclopedia
P. 46
Books SEE ALSO
▸ ▸ Storytelling
pp.42–43
Books are collections of written words put together ▸ ▸ Inventions
to tell stories or give you information. Before books were pp.136–137
invented, people shared stories by remembering and ▸ ▸ Language p.144
telling them to each other. Millions of books have been ▸ ▸ Materials p.157
created since paper was invented, and many are now read ▸ ▸ Writing p.280
on electronic devices such as tablets.
Medieval prayer book
Early books
Books have been written
and decorated by hand
for thousands of years.
Pages were often made
from parchment, which is
the thinned skin of an
animal. These books took
a long time to make.
J.K. Rowling’s
first Harry Potter
book has sold more
than 100 million
copies since
1997.
Printing
In around 1440 in Germany, Golden book
In Europe, monks wrote
Johannes Gutenberg invented the first books in Latin. They
the printing press. He carved decorated them with real gold.
single letters onto metal
blocks, then put them
together as words, and
printed them onto pages.
1900s
printing
press Fiction Non-fiction
A book of fiction is a story in A non-fiction book contains facts
which the author writes about about the real world. Dictionaries,
imaginary people and events. atlases, cookbooks, and books
Fiction books can also be about history and animals are all
called novels. examples of non-fiction books.
44
US_044_Books.indd 44 16/05/2017 09:46
