Typography
Typography1:1:: History
In the beginning there was communication
Lecture from Mastering Type by Denise Bosler
Cave Paintings in Zimbabwe
Typography 1: History
In the beginning there was communication. Found all over the world,
symbols painted on walls and carved rock represent early means of
recording information.
Pictographs are images that represent their literal meanings. Pictographs
work well for materials that need to communicate to nonliterate audiences
or speakers of a variety of languages.
Two exampes of pictographs (L)The Chauvet-Pont-d’Arc Cave (R) Signage for wheelchair access
Typography 1: History
Modern day pictographs
Canadian Signage
Typography 1: History
Egyptians systemized pictographs into a language of hieroglyphics
Hieroglyphic carvings on a wall at the Egyptian Temple of Khnum in Esna
Typography 1: History
Egyptians systemized pictographs into a language of hieroglyphics
Hieroglyphics incorporate phonograms—images that represent sounds—
and pictographs creating a written form of language.
Pierre-Francois-Xavier Bouchard, a French captain discovered the Rosetta
stone. The same text carved in hieroglyphics and Greek.
A section of the Papyrus of Ani showing cursive hieroglyphics.
Typography 1: History
Simultaneous to the use of hieroglyphics by Egyptians, Summerians
in Mesopotamia were writing on tablets by pressing wedge shaped
stylus into the wet clay.
Akkadian cuneiform.
Typography 1: History
The Summerian’s written language was called cunneiform.
Cunneiform used both phongrams and ideograms.
Ideograms are symbols or a combination of symbols that represent
a concept.
The dog illustration is a Pictogram. The red circle and bar is an Ideogram representing the idea of “no” or “not allowed”.
Typography 1: History
Birth of the Modern Written Language: 15th century, BCE
Phoenician alphabet -- note their writing reads right to left, and that some symbols were later re-used and made into
vowels. © http://www.phoenician.org/alphabet.htm
Typography 1: History
During the 15th century, BCE the Phoenicians developed an alphabet with
twenty-two characters (all consonants) They were the first to combine
the letters to form words, writing from right to left. This alphabet spread
throughout the Mediterranean region and became the precursor to the
Greek, Latin, Arabic and Hebrew alphabets.
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The image above is of a stone that has letters of the Phoenician alphabet carved into it.
Typography 1: History
Around 8 B.C.E, the Greeks adopted and revised the Phoenician
alphabet. Some consonants were dropped and a few vowels added.
Introduction to writing left to right..
Greek text engraved in stone
Typography 1: History
The Roman alphabet evolved from the Greek alphabet
Roman Text engraved in stone
Typography 1: History
The Roman alphabet evolved from the Greek alphabet. Composed of all
uppercase letters and used primarily for carving inscriptions on stone. Also
called Latin, it is recognized as today’s modern Western written loggias.
We attribute serifs, baselines and ligatures to the Romans.
114 AD - Roman Alphabet
Typography 1: : History
The spread of written texts was accelerated with the invention of
papyrus and parchment
Papyrus—a paper-like material from the papyrus plant (fragile)
Few examples of illustrated papyri remain, and those only in fragments. One example is the so-called Heracles Papyrus. It
consists of two columns of text which have three quick sketches of Heracles fighting the The Nemean lion.
Typography 1: : History
Parchment—a thin material made from the skins of animals (durable)
Section (juz’) from a Koran, Sura 2, verses 200-203 | Origin: Probably Iraq | Period: 9th-10th century
Abbasid period | Details: Most Korans from the late ninth and early tenth centuries are written with a reed
pen in dark brown or black ink on a horizontally oriented parchment.
Typography 1: History
Illuminated Manuscripts
Illuminated Manuscripts. Book of Hours Valencia, c. 1460
Typography 1: History
Lower case letters originated from manuscript writing in the Middle Ages.
Writing with pens caused the original, largely angular, characters to become
rounder and simpler, and it also resulted in some of them extending beyond
the lower boundary that restrained capital letters. Lower case became
irresistible to manuscript writers because it was faster to write, it was easier
to read and it conserved space on the costly parchment
example of an illuminated manuscript
Typography 1: : History
Invention of the Printing Press. The Chinese used woodblock printing for
years, but in 1452, Johannes Gutenberg developed a new printing process,
the letterpress.
Video of current letterpress
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iv69kB_e9KY