typographical enthusiasms

syntax phonetic

proofs of settings in a phonetic font for american indian languages based on hans eduard meier’s syntax antiqua; phonetic sorts designed by bigelow & holmes in conjunction with meier. sent by b&h to swiss typographer max caflisch for appraisal.

well appointed garamond

cancellaresca testeggiata

first page of a letter from gianfranceso cresci to cardinal guglielmo sirleto; written by gianfrancesco cresci, dated from milan 6 august 1572 [Vat. Lat. 6185, f. 134]. collotype facsimile in Signature 5 [london, 1948, before p7].

«Cresci belonged to the age of the Baroque, and his script carries its characteristic impress. The tiny point, which initiates a kerned ascender, had by Cresci’s time been magnified to the dimensions of a crowning feature, soon to become standard, well into the seventeenth century, as cancellaresca testeggiata.» [james wardrop, The Script of Humanism [clarendon press, oxford, 1963, p48.]

set in monotype garamont italic—vide ‹harmony›. headband of monotype 218—vide ‹a london ornament›.

copy from the section on «Metaphor» in The King’s English [h.w. fowler & f.g. fowler, at the clarendon press, oxford, 1931, p210]. presumably, for think the fowlers allude to the latin infinitive putare.

warde’s arrighi

«Lodovico degli Arrighi da Vicenza [more commonly known as ludovico vicentino] was employed at Rome as ‘scrittore de’ brevi apostolici’ and as a writing master he was the first to print specimens of his hand»;¹ «no details are known as to the date upon which he entered this post»; ² «The writer of apostolic briefs in 1522 had by 1524 become printer and publisher [in rome] to a gifted group of humanists and writers.»³ arrighi had two italic founts based on his calligraphic models cut for his printing/publishing venture at rome:  the first (≅16pt), modelled on arrighi’s cancelleresca corisvo, having kerned projectors with pear-shaped terminals & upright roman capitals «is assumed to have been cut for Arrighi by his partner Lautizio Perugino (who is generally equated with Lautizio Bartolomeo dei Rotelli, the goldsmith praised by Cellini). It includes a large number of variant sorts, including a number devised by Arrighi’s patron Giangiorgio Trissino as part of his phonetic spelling reform.»⁴ [4th image] «He [arrighi] was first to found those free letters which we know as ‘swash capitals’».⁵ «…poor sorts were to some extent replaced [presumably by lautizio] during the nine or ten months during which the type was used.» & it is characterized by «predominance of cursive g».⁶ The last book containing the name of lautizio perugino was published in april of 1525.  «The second type [slightly larger than the first] is altogether different. If the first is what one might expect from a goldsmith instructed by a calligrapher, elegant in mass but irregular and uncomprehending in detail, the second is a thoroughly professional design, with a sharper angle of stress and serifed ascenders and descenders (including long s and f).» & is characterized by «more frequent antica g».⁷ this 2nd fount appears in two states/versions spanning 1526–7; the cutter remains unknown.

in 1925 frederic warde organized a revival of the lautizio fount—he called it «arrighi». a 2nd version having serifed ascenders (presumably modeled on those of arrighi’s 2nd fount) he came to call «vicenza». he also sorted six ornaments, these not from arrighi’s oeuvre. punches were engraved for warde by charles plumet of g&h plumet, paris; with matrices struck & founts cast by p. ribadeau-dumas, also of paris . the arrighi types were first used by warde & stanley morison in a private printing of selected robert bridges’ poems.⁸ after which warde took founts to switzerland for the printing of The Calligraphic Models of Ludovico Degli Arrighi [1st image shows vicenza, 2nd arrighi].⁹ warde set one further edition in the vicenza version & later sold arrighi: the material—punches, matrices, types, along with documentation—was acquired in 1934 by henry watson kent of the metropolitan museum of art for use at their museum press.¹⁰  much of the history of warde’s arrighi is recorded by will carter in his «Typographical Note» appended to a poem printed by will & sebastien carter [3rd image] at their rampant lions press:¹¹ the book was set in a last casting of vicenza (matrices borrowed from the metropolitan museum of art & cast at oxford university press, 1962). confusion still exists as to the originator of the idea for the arrighi revival, but, given morison’s copious research into the origins of italic type at the time, i must agree with carter’s opinion «that the type is plainly another, little-known triumph of Stanley Morison’s, for I am convinced that it was he and not Warde who was the moving force behind the whole project.»¹²  the final journey leg of warde’s arrighi is given in the comprehensive account by herbert h. johnson,¹³ who received the donation of the arrighi material that now reposes in the cary collection at rochester institute of technology. johnson takes the view opposite to carter: he is unsympathetic to morison—arrighi was warde’s alone.

early woodcut print

william blades tells us: «Typography, or the art of combining separate letters and taking from them an impression, was a growth of the fifteenth century.» [The Pentateuch of Printing, elliot stock, london, 1891, p4.] blades’ definition still apt in the age of digital typography. «Printing from engraved blocks of wood [xylography] or soft metal was practised [in europe] in the fourteenth century, when rude figures of the Virgin and other saints, often coarsely coloured by hand, made their appearance.» [ibid. p6.] «The next step was the making of that interesting class of books called ‘Block-books’.» [ibid. p7.] blades’ analysis is cogent: these early engraved blocks, the cutting away of sections for recombination into new compositions, & development of suitable relief-printing inks likely inspired gutenberg & certainly engendered the typographic art.

harmony

harmonious of letter & ornament. copy set in garamont italic [lanston monotype 2481], frederic goudy’s adaptation of the «caractères de l'université» italic engraved by jean jannon in sedan, 1621—high quality engravings after the style of renaissance italics by robert granjon. headband arabesque composition of monotype’s recutting [english monotype 230-1] of a fleuron pair reliably attributed to robert granjon, circa 1557; vervliet names the exemplars «Granjon’s two-piece combinable flower on Small Pica» [hendrik d.l. vervliet, Granjon’s Flowers, oak knoll press, new castle (de), 2016, p48].

george w. jones 2

opening & laid-in note from the luxurious specimen of linotype granjon, Robert Granjon: Sixteenth Century Type Founder and Printer [mergenthaler linotype, co., brooklyn, 1931], printed by george w. jones [at the sign of the dolphin in gough square, london england].

bounded in a nutshell

some dialogue from shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, act 2, scene 2. this setting not intended for direction of players, but as display. lines set in monotype garamond italic. ſ (long-s) & its mates are set for period flavor. personae set in digital reissue of linotype garamond no. 3.  garamond no. 3 was linotype’s 1936 recutting of the «garamond» issued by american type founders corporation (atf) in 1917, morris fuller benton’s adaptation of the caractères de l'université held at the imprimerie natioanale. the original material had long since been attributed to claude garamont († 1561): it was, however, revealed in a paper by paul beaujon [beatrice warde] that the caractères de l'université were not the work of claude garamont, but later, high-quality engravings, after the style of garamont, by jean jannon of sedan, 1621. [‘The Garamond Type, Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century Sources Considered’, The Fleuron: A Journal of Typography, no. 5, cambridge university press, 1926].

for details of the frame composition arabesque units vide ‹a granjon arabesque›.

george w. jones

three pages from a pretty piece of ephemera: programme printed by george w. jones—intaglio cover, title page, menu.* jones was consultant to the british branch of mergenthaler linotype & consequently expert in obtaining excellent composition from the machine—not an easy thing, especially with italic. i expected to discover that this programme was set on a linotype; however the linotype recutting of atf garamond, called garamond no.3 [vide ‹bounded in a nutshell›], was not issued until 1936: therefore the programme must have been handset throughout in atf garamond, atf’s «garamond» revival that issued in 1917.

happy lupercalia!

cover vignette abstracted from Mars and Venus Surprised by Vulcan [1585] by hendrik goltzius—another version.

greeting set in the goudy garamont italic—vide ‹harmony›. tailpiece of fleuron pair [lanston monotype 294-5]—with whom these cuts originate, no clue.

we may wish to know by whom it had been said, but apt dictum from alfred forbes johnson. his text continues: «This may very well be done in the case of Petrarch in the sixteenth century, of whom there were scores of editions.» [Periods of Typography | The Italian Sixteenth Century, ernest benn, london, 1926, p7.]

set in bembo italic—vide ‹tagliente italic›.

o lovely hand

happy b’day wolfgang!

born this day [27 january] 1756.

three stanzas from ‹Non più andrai›, aria from mozart's opera Le nozze di Figaro [k492]; libretto by lorenzo da ponte.