ENCHANTING GUIDE

Enchanting was added with the minecraft 1.0 update. You collected expirience orbs fromk combat collecting ores and cooking. With enchanting you could put some effects on your items that would improve them. You could enchant stuff with the enchanting table. The best you could do is surround the Enchanting table with bookshelfs crafted from 3 pieces of paper and a piece of leather.

Later Anvils were added in which you could use Enchanting books to enchant stuff and repair it. It would use a few expirience orbs depending on the material.

In 1.8 update Enchanting changed. Now you also needed a few pieces of lapis lazuli to enchant. Here is a full tutorial how to do it.