Origins of Journalism

There are different views about the origins of journalism but, I would say that the first features that resemble what today we call journalism, were in the Ancient History, in Greece and Rome; after this, there were other milestones which developed the concept of journalism.

In Greece, a historian called Thucydides (460 B.C. – 390 B.C.) recounted the war between Sparta and Athens in a narrative full of immediate present, as a war correspondent would do today.

In Rome, the emperor of the Roman Empire Julius Cesar (100 B.C. – 44 B.C.), wanted sheets of news every day. They called this sheets the ‘Acta Diurna’. These gathered daily Roman official news, such as, births, marriages, deaths, public notes…

Historically, the next milestone in journalism was in the Early Modern Age (from the 15th century to the 17th century. In this era there were many happenings that helped in the formation of the concept of journalism:

• The invention of mechanical printing press by Gutenberg (1389-1468) in the 15th century.
• The establishment of a stable mail system.

Also, before the “jump to periodicity” there were sporadic printed journalistic materials, such as:

·         News sheets, from 4 to 16 pages; they covered one piece of news and did not appear any more.

·         Polemical pamphlets: they defended a point of view in a public controversy. They published 2 or 3 issues and there were 2 or 3 replies. They were used in the Reformation.

·         Fantastic stories. About miracles, murders, natural disasters, etc. 

In these 3 types of printed material we find the 3 aims of today’s journalism: inform, influence in society and entertain. So, we can say that the concept of journalism started taking shape.

An important point of this era is the “jump to periodicity”. Some people gave the “jump to periodicity” with regular publications. The first were regular chronologies which were reviews of the main events in a city, for example. There were published yearly or half-yearly.

In the 17th century, The Gazettes appeared. There were published weekly. They had foreign and domestic news. There were gazettes or journals which focused on politics, science, literature.

Finally, the newspaper appeared in the 18th century. The Daily Courant, founded in London in 1702, was the first newspaper.

So, the Early Modern Age and the 18th century were important periods in the origins of journalism. The facts occurred in these periods developed the idea of journalism and approached it to the concept we have today about journalism.

In the 19th century, this concept continued developing. The newspaper industry experienced its first industrialization. For instance, the steam printing press multiplied the copies. Thanks to this industrialization, the popular press reached millions of people by the end of the 19th century. Such newspapers had similar features, in broad terms, to current newspapers.

Under these circumstances, the modern advertising was born and supported the press financially. Nowadays the advertising is the main source of income of not only newspapers but magazines, the radio, the TV. A new media business appeared, essential today: the international news agencies.

Finally, driven by this advances, the profession was consolidated.

As a conclusion, I would highlight that the concept today we have of journalism emerged through a long process which had its origins in the Ancient History with Thucydides and Julio Cesar; developed greatly in the Early Modern Age and ran into the 19th century.