History Of Advertising

1. For my first blog, I thought it would be most appropriate to give a brief history of how early advertising began in the first three areas of the world that it was discovered.

   
   

   Advertising has been around for as long as people have been selling things. If we take a look at the early advertising methods from pre-modern history, the Egyptians created the very first known advertisement using papyrus leaves. These were made by street vendors to advertise sales messages and prices of food and goods, and hung up in the walls of their shops.

   
   

   In ancient China, the earliest advertising was by street vendors as well, who used bamboo flutes to attract consumers to their food stands. China was also the home of the first printed advertising medium, (which was made for the Liu family’s needle shop) dating back to the Song dynasty which took place from 960-1279. The technique they used to make these ancient advertisements was a copper plate that was used to print posters on square sheet paper. This invention was very important as it gave them the ability to make more advertisements, in a fraction of the time as before.

   
   

   
   

   In Europe during the Middle Ages, as towns and cities began to grow, the general population was unable to read. So, instead of signs that read words, they would use an image to represent the product. Another early advertising tactic in the Middle Ages was for shop owners to hire people as “street callers” or “town criers” to announce the whereabouts of the shop.