A history of alphabets from around the world

The Alphabet and Elements of Lettering by Frederic W. Goudy Chapter 7: The Development of Gothic THE FOUR varieties of writings which finally merged into the one we now call "Gothic" are variations upon the Roman capital. The Gothic form is a characteristic one. By the thirteenth century it had become a distinct style, and within the next hundred years it reached its highest perfection, although some individual scribes clung tenaciously to the older forms, which were round & free and easier to write. The later, more regular and straight-backed letter was revived by the early printer after it had gone out of fashion for a time, as he found it simpler to imitate in type. * It was the use of the reed pen by the medieval scribe in writing the Roman letter that gave it its Gothic character. The quill pen which the Italians employed held the ink better & was more pliant than the reed, making the minuscule letter rounder and with greater variety in the thick and thin strokes; it came into general use with the use of paper. * *Not the form of the letter itself; as written, the letters ran together and interlocked in a way too difficult to accomplish with separate type bodies, except by the use of a great many "tied" characters [two or more letters on one type body]. This leads to the statement that the character of all lettering is directly due to the tool employed. The stylus merely scratched the surface of the clay or wax, and gave us the cuneiform character; the chisel gave us the clear-cut classic inscriptions in stone; the reed pen, blunt strokes with thick ink on papyrus; the quill, the round full-bodied form. In the stone-cut capital the cutter felt the need of a neat square cut to end the stem of his letter. To define the free end, a sharp cut was made across it with the chisel, and as the chisel was usually wider than the thin line, this cut extended beyond it on each side. Probably for the sake of uniformity, corresponding extensions were added to the thick strokes, & what was at first merely an attempt on the part of the craftsman toward neat workmanship later became an essential part of the letter itself. These endings are called "serifs" or "cornua." With the pen the serif definitely finished the FIG. 33 MEDIEVAL GOTHIC MINUSCULES free endings & added to the squareness and finish of the letter, but as the fluid ink was inclined to drag and bracket at the junction of the stem on the side toward the direction of the stroke, the scribe deliberately added to the opposite side to make both uniform in shape. Serifs preserve and accentuate the regularity of the line of lettering. Continue to page 2

Sign up for our weekly newsletter Email: The Alphabet and Elements of Lettering by Frederic W. Goudy Introduction What Letters Are Letters in General The Development of the Roman Capital Letters Before Printing The National Hands The Development of Gothic The Beginnings of Types The Qualities of Lettering Some Practical Considerations Notes on the Plates Greek alphabet Hebrew alphabet Sign language alphabet Cherokee alphabet Russian alphabet Phonetic alphabet Braille alphabet Egyptian alphabet Cyrillic alphabet Aramaic alphabet Morse code alphabet Runic alphabet