May 19, 2026
Pressing drama since 1600
The two oldest printing presses
These 400-year-old presses wowed readers, but the comments turned into a history fight
TLDR: The Plantin-Moretus Museum houses two wooden presses from around 1600 that are considered the oldest surviving printing presses in the world. Readers were impressed, but the comments quickly spiraled into debates about earlier Chinese inventions, collector envy, and whether printing accidentally made German harder forever.
A museum in Antwerp is showing off what it says are the two oldest printing presses in the world: giant wooden workhorses from around 1600, sitting inside the Plantin-Moretus Museum. Back in their glory days, this place was basically the content factory of its era, with more than 50 workers, 16 presses, and a brutal 14-hour workday cranking out 1,250 sheets a day. In other words: before the internet, this was the internet.
But the real action was in the community reaction, where readers instantly swerved from "wow, cool museum" into history fact-checking, humblebragging, and a surprise language war. One commenter immediately asked the obvious buzzkill question: if movable type existed in China centuries earlier, are there even older presses out there? Suddenly, the cozy museum story became a global receipts hunt. Another reader jumped in with the extremely relatable collector flex: their 1947 press felt ancient... until this article made it look like a toddler.
Then came the wildest hot take of all: that the printing press may have locked German into being more complicated than it might have become otherwise. Yes, a story about wooden machines somehow turned into people imagining an alternate timeline where German grammar got a glow-up. The mood was half awe, half nerdy chaos, with a side of "please do not start rewriting all of European history in the comments". Naturally, that is exactly what happened.
Key Points
- •The Museum Plantin-Moretus houses what the article describes as the two oldest printing presses in the world, dating from around 1600.
- •Around 1575, Christoffel Plantin’s print shop operated at least 16 presses and employed 56 people, making it the largest of its kind at the time.
- •Seven presses still stand in the printing room today, and five remain operational.
- •The two oldest presses are no longer in use and are described as the most worn.
- •These presses produced about 1,250 sheets per day on both sides during average 14-hour workdays, while printers were often paid by output.