/kloc-At the beginning of the 9th century, lithography technology has been popularized in Europe. 1834 (14th year of Qing Daoguang), notices printed with lithographs posted by foreigners appeared in Guangzhou, China (13th year of Tongzhi). Tushanwan Press, affiliated to Shanghai Xujiahui Catholic Church, started to set up lithograph printing department on 1876 to print church publicity materials. Ernest Major, an Englishman, founded the Shen Bao Museum and opened the Dianshizhai Lithography Museum in Shanghai. Subsequently, Xu He, a native of China, opened a bookstore and a Baishishan bookstore in 188 1 and printed twenty-four histories, a collection of ancient and modern books, Kangxi Dictionary, Pei Wenzhai's calligraphy and painting spectrum and other ancient books. Many lithographic bookstores, such as Li Shengduo's famous British Pavilion and Ling Biqing's Hong Wen Bookstore, have also appeared one after another. The earliest lithograph printing of color pictures was the Hongwentang Multicolor Bookstore opened by foreigners in China, which specialized in printing color banknotes, and its manager was Wu Jinting. Since then, Wei and Wei Tiansheng, from China, founded the Chinese and Western Multicolored Bookstore at 1882 to print colorful pictures. Wenfu Museum, Jujube Literature Bureau and later Color Literature Bureau, Chongwen Bookstore, etc. Also deals in color printing. The Civilization Bookstore founded by Yu Fu and Lian Quan opened a color lithograph department at 1904 to print colorful teaching materials, pictures and maps. China Book Company also published color lithograph maps and teaching wall charts. 1920, Shanghai Commercial Press began to use direct photo lithography, and the following year it adopted color photo lithography (also called photocopying).
From the late Qing Dynasty to the Republic of China, there were more than 100 lithographic bookstores, all over the country, with Shanghai as the center. Lithographic printing and lead printing once took the place of block printing in ancient China, occupying a dominant position. After 1930s, the position of lithograph was gradually replaced by more perfect lead printing.
Lithographic documents, words and pictures are exactly the same as the original, most of the words are small and the strokes are clear. Documentary with color lithographs, the color of the picture is bright and dark with the original, which can almost be confused. Photographic lithographs and color photographic lithographs are both exquisite, fast and better. Modern lithographs in China are mostly ancient books, covering four subsets: classics, series, popular novels and songbooks. Among them, Four Series, Piece Together Twenty-four History by Commercial Press and Integration of Ancient and Modern Books by Zhonghua Book Company have great influence. In addition, maps, illustrated magazines, newspapers and periodicals, and new works of contemporary people are also published in the form of lithographs.