Utopia is printed at Louvain in 1516 as a dated humanist book
In 1516 De optimo rei publicae statu deque nova insula Utopia was printed at Louvain. In the causal graph this event strengthens Digital Learning Access, a driver that weakens Learning Poverty Rate (low- and middle-income countries) — an improving welfare path.
Read the full account
In 1516 De optimo rei publicae statu deque nova insula Utopia was printed at Louvain. It is not a later saint’s halo and not a recovered diary of any English village.
Context
The Yale-linked Essential More site and Gutenberg’s English independently make Utopia a public file.
Thomas More’s documented role is bounded by other offices and collaborators named in the sources below.
Conventional years are 1478–1535. Surviving public files are later parliamentary biographies, TNA calendars, HRP Tower pages, the Yale More tradition, and encyclopedias. More did not typeset those later pages. 1935 canonisation is posthumous and is not a Fact.
Why it matters
Knowledge-access path. High confidence on the 1516 book.
Who was responsible
Contribution type and responsibility level for each recorded actor — not sole-author shorthand.
Thomas More
PersonDirect responsibility
responsibility level 0.4 · verified
He wrote the Latin book. Louvain printers issued it. Erasmus’s circle publicised it.
What changed
Fact → Driver → Indicator. Relationship strength orders the paths; it is not the observed indicator movement.
- FactUtopia is printed at Louvain in 1516 as a dated humanist book
- strengthensDriverDigital Learning Access
- weakensIndicators (3)Learning Poverty Rate (low- and middle-income countries)
impact weight 0.5 · Effect from 1 January 1516 · verified
A dated political fiction increased public access to a critique of enclosure, counsel, and punishment as literature.
Weakens · Relationship strength 0.2 (weight 0.5 × strength 0.4)
Observed
70% of 10-year-olds · 70 above the normal line (2022)
Worse than normalTwo readings: 57% of 10-year-olds (2019) and 70% of 10-year-olds (2022).
20192022 Above normal = worse
Strengthens · Relationship strength 0.17 (weight 0.5 × strength 0.35)
Observed
472 PISA score points · 28 below the normal line (2022)
Worse than normal7 readings, 2003–2022: fell from 499 PISA score points to 472 PISA score points.
Above normal = better
Weakens · Relationship strength 0.15 (weight 0.5 × strength 0.3)
Observed
11% of primary-school-age children · 11 above the normal line (2023)
Worse than normalAbove normal = worse
Evidence
The sources behind this fact and its verification state.
- 1.Utopia — public-domain English textProject Gutenberg · High credibility · verified
- 2.Essential Works of Thomas More — Yale-linked public siteYale University Press / Essential More · High credibility · verified
What the sources establish
Essential More (Yale tradition) and Gutenberg independently document Utopia as a 1516 print.
Established: Utopia was printed in 1516. Not established: a unique enclosure-statute coefficient from the tale.
Thomas More did not file a later UNESCO form, a later Loeb colophon, or a later museum label as a personal act. A book is not a heresy burning. Keep chancellorship enforcement on 1529–32. Louvain 1516 remains the colophon; later English at Gutenberg is a carrier of that Latin book, not a Chelsea household register.
Causal path
How this event connects to drivers and indicators in the graph.
- ActorThomas More
- contributed toFactUtopia is printed at Louvain in 1516 as a dated humanist book
- strengthensDriverDigital Learning Access
- weakensIndicatorLearning Poverty Rate (low- and middle-income countries)
Cite this page
Factrail. (2026). Utopia is printed at Louvain in 1516 as a dated humanist book. Factrail. https://factrail.ai/facts/tm-utopia-1516
https://factrail.ai/facts/tm-utopia-1516
Accessed 15 October 2026.
By the Factrail desk · Method: how we source and score · Last reviewed
Dispute this factNamed here, or represent someone who is? Request a right of reply.