The history of the record player begins with the 1857 phonautograph, a device that could only record sound visually, not play it back. The first device to both record and play back sound was Thomas Edison's 1877 phonograph, which used a stylus to trace vibrations on a tin foil-wrapped cylinder. Over time, developments like Emile Berliner's 1887 gramophone, which used flat discs, and the introduction of the more durable and better-sounding vinyl records in the mid-20th century, led to the record player's golden age, though it has since seen a modern resurgence.