Portrait de Lamartine

1799

First commercial use of lithography in Offenbach

The music publisher Johann Anton André buys the patent rights to the new technique, and in Offenbach am Main lithography is first used commercially to print sheet music; Senefelder himself sets up the first five lithographic presses there and trains the staff in person.

1809

Inspector of the Lithographic Institute in Munich

Invited to Munich to organize lithography for the Royal Commission for Map-Making, he receives a lifelong salary, the title of Royal Inspector of Lithography and permission to own his own lithographic press. As Inspector of the new Lithographic Institute, he afterwards supervises the founding of similar institutions in Berlin, Paris, London and Vienna.

1818

The complete textbook of lithography

Publishes “Vollständiges Lehrbuch der Steindruckerey”, which combines the history of his invention with a practical guide to lithography; a second edition appears in 1821, and in 1819 the book is translated into French and English, and in part into Russian. He had secured patent rights across Europe and made his findings public with this book.

1818

Summoned to Vienna: the Lithographic Institute of the land-tax cadastre

A Lithographic Institute for the land-tax cadastre is founded in Vienna on the Munich model; Senefelder is summoned to Vienna for the purpose and takes charge of setting up the institution.

1826

Colour lithographs from several stones

He succeeds in printing colour lithographs from several stones.

26 February 1834

Death in Munich

Dies in Munich and is buried in the Alter Südfriedhof; he lived to see his process become widely adopted both for art printmaking and as the dominant method of pictorial reproduction in the printing industry.