Buyers Guide > History of Calligraphy
IntroductionCalligraphy is as old as the art of writing itself, and continues to flourish today. A contemporary definition of Calligraphy is ‘the art of giving form to signs in an expressive, harmonious and skilful manner’. Calligraphy is used today in the form of wedding and event invitations, typography, original hand-lettered logo design, religious art, commissioned calligraphic art, cut stone inscriptions and memorial documents. Modern calligraphy ranges from functional hand lettered inscriptions and designs to abstract fine art. Calligraphy characters tend to follow technical guidelines but are also fluid and spontaneous, improvised at the moment of writing. |
 |
History of Western Calligraphy
Western calligraphy is the calligraphy of the Latin writing system, and to a lesser degree the Greek and Cyrillic writing systems. Early alphabets had evolved by about 3000 BC, with capital letters (majuscules) emerging first. Lower case letters (minuscules) followed in the Carolingian period. In the first century calligraphy appeared in 3 typefaces; Roman square capitals carved into stone, Rustic capitals painted on walls, and Roman cursive for daily use. This continued until the end of the third century, whereupon writing withdrew to the monasteries.
When the Roman Empire fell, its literary influence remained and Christian churches promoted the development of writing through copying of the Bible. Two distinct styles of writing known as uncial and half-uncial (from the Latin "uncia," or "inch") developed from a variety of Roman bookhands. Each region seemed to have developed its own standards by following the main monastery of the region (i.e. Visigothic script , Merovingian script, Luxeuil script, Beneventan script, Laon script). The 7th-9th centuries in northern Europe were the height for Celtic illuminated manuscripts, such as the Book of Durrow, Lindisfarne Gospels and the Book of Kells.
The script named ‘Carolingian’ from the monastery ‘Saint Martin de Tours’ was set as the imperial standard in around the 9th century. In the 11th century this developed into the Gothic script which was more cursive and for daily use. Over the next three centuries, the scribes in northern Europe used a more compressed and spiky form of Gothic. Those in Italy and Spain preferred the rounder but still heavy-looking Rotunda. During the 15th century, Italian scribes returned to the Roman and Carolingian models of writing and designed the Italic hand. In the 16th century the discovery of old Carolingian texts encouraged the creation of the Antiqua script. The contemporary typefaces found on every computer owe a considerable debt to the past and to a small number of professional typeface designers. The most common tools used for Calligraphy were the dip pen, which took the form of a wood dip pen or a feather quill pen.
The Resurgence of Calligraphy
At the end of the 19th century, the aesthetics and philosophy of William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement appealed to many calligraphers, including Englishmen Edward Johnston and Eric Gill. Johnston was introduced to 10th-century manuscripts and based his own calligraphy on them. Johnston and his students redefined, revived and popularised English broad-pen calligraphy
At about the same time as Johnston, Austrian Rudolf Larisch was teaching lettering at the Vienna School of Art. He published six books on lettering that greatly influenced German-speaking calligraphers. Because German-speaking countries had not abandoned the Gothic hand in printing, Gothic also had a powerful effect on their styles. Rudolf Koch was a friend and younger contemporary of Larisch. Koch's books, type designs, and teaching made him one of the most influential calligraphers of the 20th century in northern Europe and later in the U.S. Larisch and Koch taught and inspired many European calligraphers, notably Friedrich Neugebauer, Karlgeorg Hoefer, and Hermann Zapf.
