In 1453, when the Turks took Constantinople, Pope Nicky 5 wanted a crusade and authorized the sale of letters of indulgence—religious documents that released the buyers from penalties for their sins. And guess who printed them?
Then he finally got around to working on his masterpiece and the book he is most remembered for – the “42-line Bible,” aka the Gutenberg Bible. But just before the printing of the bibles was finished, his investor, Fust, took him to court and sued him for overdue repayment of the investment. And Gutenberg was ruined.
He eventually recovered and printed an even more complicated work – The Catholicon, a Latin grammar and a very detailed dictionary.
But the, in the early 1460s, an outright war between two contenders for the seat of archbishop of Mainz got in the way. And Gutenberg was ruined yet again.
He died in 1468, his contributions to printing pretty much forgotten.
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