History of the Book

Cuneiform tablets

3200 BCE

Cuneiform was developed by the Sumerians in southern Mesopotamia and is believed to be the earliest invented system of writing. It was formed by impressing the tip of a reed or wood stylus into the surface of a clay tablet, which would then be dried in the sun. Initially developed for accounting-based purposes, by the middle of the 3rd millennium BCE, cuneiform was used for an array of economic, religious, and political documents.
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Papyrus rolls

2900 BCE

The use of papyrus as a writing support emerged ca. 3000 BCE in ancient Egypt, where papyrus stalks growing along the Nile River were an abundant and vital resource. Papyrus sheets were produced into and sold as long rolls that typically measured 12 inches tall by about 20 feet long (but could be up to 5x that length), allowing for more efficient storage and portability compared to mediums like the clay tablet. Use of papyrus continued until the 11th c.
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Wax tablets

1250 BCE

Wax tablets were made of wooden boards with wax-filled recesses and were used with a stylus of bone, metal, or wood. Several boards were often bound together, thus introducing the format of the codex (whence the format of the modern book).
Wax tablets enjoyed widespread use from Classical antiquity into the Middle Ages. Their reusability made them popular classroom learning aids and for ephemeral tasks like writing drafts, record keeping and notetaking.
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The Library of Alexandria

300 BCE

Founded and developed under Ancient Egypt's Ptolemaic dynasty, the Great Library of Alexandria was conceived as a "universal library" that would be a repository for all of the world's books. The Library formed part of the research institution in Alexandria known as the Mouseion ("shrine of the muses"), and is estimated to have held up to 700,000 texts at its height (though an exact total is not known).
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Parchment

200 BCE

Parchment first came into use for writing during the final two centuries BCE, and from the late ancient period through the Middle Ages it became the most commonly used surface material. Parchment's rise to prominence was in part due to it being produced from animal skins, a globally available natural resource (unlike papyrus, e.g.). As a writing medium, parchment was valued as durable and reusable, though its manufacture was laborious and very costly.
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Invention of paper

105

Paper was first invented in China, where writing had already been practiced since the mid-2nd millennium BCE. The process for making paper involved soaking natural materials like hemp, silk or tree bark until their fibers broke down into liquid pulp. A mesh screen was dipped into a vat of pulp, which, when dried, resulted in a sheet of paper. Due to its costly and labor-intensive production, paper didn't rise to prominence as a resource till the 19th c.
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Woodblock printing

600

Woodblock printing was invented in China around the 7th c. The process entailed carving text and image in reverse into a block of wood and applying ink to that side. The contents of the inked block were then transferred onto sheets of paper through pressure printing by using a handheld tool called a "baren" to rub or press the paper against the block. The first known dated printed book, the Diamond Sutra (868 CE), was printed on paper using woodblocks.
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