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Art in the Alphabet: What AI Cannot Give Us I am a student of typographic history. In fact, I have pulled together a book on this history ( Typography Through The Years: A Selected History ) available from most booksellers. This book is filled with digitized fonts from earlier years, many not generally available in the open printing and typography trades. They represent hours of careful labor redrawing or copying the pen written works of earlier typographers, like Lewis F. Day (See his Alphabets Old and New, London, 1910 or earlier). Does AI (artificial intelligence) help us or even substitute for us the work and beauty that goes into historic calligraphy and font histories? As with many people in many businesses and professions, I have used AI (especially ChatGPT and Claude) to access information files and reduce the time formerly spent in libraries or even online searches. That has been true even in my preaching and teaching as a theologian and retired pastor and consultant (See my extended BLOGs, “AI and the Ministry: The Uses and Abuses of Artificial Intelligence” and “AI and the Brethren in Christ: Hallucinations & Corrections” in www.carlshankconsulting.com ). Indeed, there are multiple copyright issues associated with AI generated feeds. In my BLOG on “Copyright Do’s and Don’t’s” Oct 23, 2023) I noted the following — “Right now, in the courts, there are lawsuits pending against big time AI players such as GitHub and Microsoft and Open AI seeking to see whether or not AI created materials are subject to copyright violations and piracy on a level not seen since the Napster violations in the 1990s. Getty Images have filed a suit against Stable Diffusion, an AI art developing tool, claiming that its images are too close to the real thing and thus violate copyright laws. This is far from "Fair Use" standards. The Clarkson Law Firm has two class action suits against OpenAI and Google claiming that AI "stole" copyrighted materials from their creators. Moreover, the U.S. Copyright office has ruled that AI cannot be considered an "author," since only a person can be an author. Additionally, Internet Archive ( https://archive.org/ ) has filed with the commission investigating AI and copyrights. They do not support any additional laws specifically targeting AI. They write — "Our high level view is that copyright law has been adapting to disruptive technologies since its earliest days and our existing copyright law is adequate to meet the disruptions of today. In particular, copyright’s flexible fair use provision deals well with the fact-specific nature of new technologies, and has already addressed earlier innovations in machine learning and text-and-data mining. So while Generative AI presents a host of policy challenges that may prompt different kinds of legislative reform, we do not see that new copyright laws are needed to respond to Generative AI today." More courts and Congress will have to argue it out. Suffice it to say at this juncture, that using AI to re-create an illustration or an entire book may involve copyright breaches. Be careful in using the technology to bypass coded laws. There are still many pitfalls, however, and many ways AI cannot help us. There are many who would agree with me in this “short-cutting” our way to beautiful and usable fonts and faces. My recent foray into AI revealed the following about developing historic early fonts, say from a craftsman like Lewis F. Day, by ChatGPT — “To create a typeface inspired by Lewis F. Day's decorative design style and the typography of sixteenth and seventeenth-century printing, we'd need to combine key elements from both sources. 1. Lewis F. Day's Influence: Ornamentation: Lewis F. Day was known for his intricate decorative designs, inspired by Gothic and Renaissance motifs. His work often emphasized geometric and nature-inspired patterns. Flourishes: Day's aesthetic would inspire flourishes around characters, especially in capital letters or title work, where borders or embellishments could be incorporated. Symmetry and Balance: His designs usually kept a strong sense of order and symmetry, meaning that the typeface could integrate balanced, stylized serifs or carefully positioned decorations. 2. Sixteenth and Seventeenth-Century Printing Influences: Old Style Serifs: Early printing typefaces like Garamond or Caslon, which were common in this period, feature elegant, moderate contrast between thick and thin strokes, and serifs with soft, rounded edges. These fonts have a warm and timeless feel. Ligatures: In keeping with old typesetting practices, ligatures (like "fi", "fl", etc.) would be an essential feature. Hand-Pressed Imperfections: The text could have slight irregularities to evoke the hand-pressed, metal-type printing look of that era, with slight ink spread or irregular edges on the characters. Decorative Initials: Sixteenth and seventeenth-century printing often incorporated large, intricate drop capitals, which can be revisited with ornamentation similar to Lewis F. Day’s floral or geometric designs. Key Elements for Typeface: Character Design: Incorporate Old Style serif structure with moderate contrast in stroke weights. Slight ink spread effect for a hand-pressed look. Ornamentation: Incorporate Day's floral and geometric patterns as flourishes on capital letters. Consider decorative borders on certain initials or for titles. Ligatures & Swashes: Use swashes on certain letterforms, especially for f, g, h, k, and long descenders. Drop Caps: Design large, decorative drop caps that feature intricate floral or scroll designs, combining Day’s Victorian influence with sixteenth-century engravings. This typeface would feel both classic and ornamental, paying homage to the elegance of early print typography with the decorative touch that Lewis F. Day often brought to his work.” While a sample of Day’s work in generalized pre-Victorian and Victorian era times can be previewed (badly, I would say) on AI (through Claude.ai, for instance), an actual typeface and its construction eludes AI, at least for now. First, the description above makes little sense unless I have been immersed in viewing Lewis F. Day's samples and history. And then, secondly, the descriptors are too vague and undefined. There is not merely one typestyle either in Victorian England or in Day's works. Take a look at the uncials (alphabetic capitals) below for a wide variety of what AI has tried to describe. The penned and hand drawn letters represented by Day and digitized by CARE Typography cannot be reproduced by AI, no matter how precise the tool. Moreover, accurate letter spacing and hinting and all the features that make up even a hand drawn font are not AI reproducible, nor in the range of AI generated feeds. And, to do so, would probably violate image-drawn copyrightable feeds. Conclusions. What does all of this mean for the typographer or printer or publisher? Do the hard work! Type formation takes significant time and effort and drawing and re-drawing, tweaking until the letters and letter spacings and kerning and everything is right and readable. AI will not do such work for you. Seek permission for its use . This is always the best and most honorable course of action. You may have to contact the publisher, who then in turn may contact the writer. I did this for a study guide I wrote on a book from Oxford Press in England on the life and work of Jonathan Edwards, the great early American theologian in New England. While it was only a study guide with excerpts on which to comment, and for church study and use exclusively, the Press required a contractural engagement that lasted for one year with a limited number of copies that could be printed and made available, even for religious study and use. It would have cost me hundreds of dollars. I declined and went another route with some of the material. Use legitimate free sources for photos and images . I use dreamstime.com in their free portfolios for the background photos and images for a number of book covers I have crafted. There are other legitimate sources in iStock, for instance. Licensing uses and rules apply to most of these freebies. And give credit for where credit is due, even for the freebies. The Lewis F. Day’s Alphabets Old and New and its samples are in the public domain now. Use your own work and photos . I know this requires substantial time and effort, but it is usually the right thing to do. I put together a historical calendar of the Lancaster PA area using photos I personally took. Use the old "buyer beware" adage here . Are you willing to risk your site being taken down, or getting a cease and desist letter, a bill or actually being sued through the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which can be very, very costly. People actually make a living on book royalties and selling or licensing their work. Poaching their work for pleasure or profit is unacceptable. Extensis has an entire section on font use and licensing (www.extensis.com). Conclusion #2. For all Christians and people of faith, we need to heed the apostle Paul’s admonition in the Bible that “Everything is permissible, but not everything is beneficial. Everything is permissible but not everything is constructive.” (1 Corinthians 10:23) Yes, Paul is talking about Christian liberty and eating of food that was devoted to idols of his day, but the principle remains. What we CAN do is not always what we SHOULD do. This involves the use of AI in our churches and ministries. Second, beware of the “Babel influence.” You do remember the construction of a tower built by early peoples to reach to heaven in Genesis 11 — “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth.” Christopher Watkin notes in his massive study, Biblical Critical Theory: How The Bible’s Unfolding Story Makes Sense of Modern Life and Culture , “rather than playing a role in God’s story (filling the earth and subduing it), these people want God to play a supporting role in their story, as the heavenly antagonist who is ultimately beholden to, or vanquished through, their heroic self-aggrandizement.” (208-9) This is sinful autonomy. This is humankind globalization of power and wealth and achievement. This is what AI could promise if misused and misapplied. We need to always see the inherent temptation in AI drawing us away from God and dependence on God. Third, know the times and the promises and pitfalls of artificial intelligence. Get on ChatGPT 4 and Claude.ai and other AI tools. Find out how they work and can work for you. Use them biblically and intelligently and wisely. Be aware that your people are using AI all the time where they live and work, even if you don’t. In other words, be “smart” about AI and its growing use and influence — and keep the dependence on God strong and sure. Sources Lewis F. Day’s Alphabets Old and New , London, 1910 edition. Sara Hawkins, “Copyright Fair Use and How It Works for Online Images,” https://bit.ly/3YyNMCW Lucie Růžičková , "Ai and Copyright: The Legal Landscape," https://bit.ly/3Ao5zDw . Gibble, Kraybill & Hess, Attorneys in Lancaster, PA, https://gkh.com/protecting-copyrights-vs-protecting-trademarks/

Lewis F. Day's Alphabetic Summary . This is the last post of Day's Alphabets Old and New (London, 1910), highlighting a summary picture of his alphabetic font offerings in the book. Other Blogs investigate the font backgrounds and development of Day's fonts. CARE Typography has meticulously digitized many of Day's typographic offerings. They are available, either individually, or as a set for a modest cost. Contact cshanktype@gmail.com for prices and ordering. Additionally, CARE Typography is offering a beautifully crafted printed summary in a font binder, along with their newest book, Typography Through the Years: A Selected History . This selection gives a carefully researched history of typography and an extensive sampling of historic faces, both old and new. Lewis Foreman Day (1845-1910) was an influential English designer, author, and lecturer who played a significant role in the Arts and Crafts movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He became a prolific designer, working across various mediums including wallpaper, textiles, stained glass, pottery, and metalwork. Day advocated for the integration of form and function, emphasizing the importance of practicality in design alongside aesthetic considerations. His work and writings contributed significantly to the development of British design education and theory in the late Victorian era. His book, Alphabets Old and New , published in London, in 1910 gives sterling examples of his typography work. Day's approach to design, blending traditional craftsmanship with modern industrial techniques, helped shape the transition from Victorian aesthetics to more modern design principles. CARE Typography has digitized a number of the font faces in the book for modern use and aesthetic appeal. The typefaces below illustrate the beauty and craftsmanship of Day which can contribute to modern typography. These mostly pen drawn typefaces have been digitized by CARE Typography using Fontographer to make them available as usable fonts. Caps or Unicals are often used in display faces and advertising. Some of these classic faces can enliven your printing and advertising projects.

Reviving Old Fonts . Lewis Foreman Day (1845-1910) was an influential English designer, author, and lecturer who played a significant role in the Arts and Crafts movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He became a prolific designer, working across various mediums including wallpaper, textiles, stained glass, pottery, and metalwork. Day advocated for the integration of form and function, emphasizing the importance of practicality in design alongside aesthetic considerations. His work and writings contributed significantly to the development of British design education and theory in the late Victorian era. His book, Alphabets Old and New , published in London, in 1910 gives sterling examples of his typography work. Day's approach to design, blending traditional craftsmanship with modern industrial techniques, helped shape the transition from Victorian aesthetics to more modern design principles. CARE Typography has digitized a number of the font faces in the book for modern use and aesthetic appeal. The typefaces below illustrate the beauty and craftsmanship of Day which can contribute to modern typography. These mostly pen drawn typefaces have been digitized by CARE Typography using Fontographer to make them available as usable fonts. Caps or Unicals are often used in display faces and advertising. Some of these classic faces can enliven your printing and advertising projects. They are available, either individually, or as a set, for a modest fee. Contact CARE Typography for more information and ordering, email cshanktype@gmail.com . 

An Art Nouveau Font. Grasset Regular. Eugène Samuel Grasset (25 May 1845 – 23 October 1917) was a Swiss decorative artist who worked in Paris, France in a variety of creative design fields during the Belle Époque . He is considered a pioneer in Art Nouveau design. Art Nouveau is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art , especially the decorative arts . It was often inspired by natural forms such as the sinuous curves of plants and flowers. Other characteristics of Art Nouveau were a sense of dynamism and movement, often given by asymmetry or whiplash lines , and the use of modern materials, particularly iron, glass, ceramics and later concrete, to create unusual forms and larger open spaces. It was popular between 1890 and 1910 during the Belle Époque period, and was a reaction against the academicism , eclecticism and historicism of 19th century architecture and decorative art. The new art movement had its roots in Britain, in the floral designs of William Morris , and in the Arts and Crafts movement founded by the pupils of Morris. New technologies in printing and publishing allowed Art Nouveau to quickly reach a global audience. Art magazines, illustrated with photographs and colour lithographs , played an essential role in popularizing the new style. The Studio in England, Arts et idèes and Art et décoration in France, and Jugend in Germany allowed the style to spread rapidly to all corners of Europe. Aubrey Beardsley in England, and Eugène Grasset , Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec , and Félix Vallotton achieved international recognition as illustrators. Grasset taught design at the École Guérin from 1890 to 1903, at the École d’Art graphique in the rue Madame from 1903 to 1904, at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière from 1904 to 1913, and at the École Estienne in Paris. Grasset had freely adapted the alphabet of Nicolas Jenson (1471) with the intention of using it to print a book on his own method for ornamental composition, inspired by the courses he gave to the Guérin school. Georges Peignot acquired Grasset's alphabet and obtained an official patent on 7 October 1897 for the typeface under the name, "Grasset". He then gave Henri Parmentier, the workshop's punchcutter, the mission to engrave it. (Wikipedia) Maurice Pillard Verneuil (29 April 1869 – 21 September 1942) was a French artist and decorator in the Art nouveau movement. He was born in Saint-Quentin, France . Maurice Pillard Verneuil learned his trade from the Swiss designer Eugène Grasset . Maurice Pillard Verneuil then went on to become a well-known artist and designer . He was inspired by Japanese art and nature, particularly the sea. He is known for his contribution to the art deco movement and, in particular, his use of bold, floral designs in ceramic tiles , wallpapers and other furnishing textiles . His designs covered both the Art Nouveau and Art Deco periods subsequently transitioning into his much acclaimed geometric patterns. Verneuil also produced numerous poster works in France alongside the well-known artists such as Toulouse-Lautrec and Chéret. Other collaborators included Armand Point , René Juste, Alfons Mucha and Mathurin Méheut . (Wikipedia) The Grasset Typeface below from Lewis F.Day's Alphabets Old and New, London, 1910, shows that art nouveau flair for which these men were famous. The font has been digitized by CARE Typography and is offered with a number of other historic fonts for a modest fee. Contact cshanktype@gmail.com for details.

Lewis F. Day's book, Alphabets Old and New , published in London, in 1910 gives sterling examples of his typography work. Day's approach to design, blending traditional craftsmanship with modern industrial techniques, helped shape the transition from Victorian aesthetics to more modern design principles. CARE Typography has digitized a number of the font faces in the book for modern use and aesthetic appeal. The typefaces below illustrate the beauty and craftsmanship of Day which can contribute to modern typography. These carefully drawn typefaces have been digitized by CARE Typography using Fontographer to make them available as usable fonts. Caps or Unicals are often used in display faces and advertising. These usable font sets, with both caps and lower case letters, are available. Some of these classic faces can enliven your printing and advertising projects. They are available, either individually, or as a set, for a modest fee. Contact CARE Typography cshanktype@gmail.com for more information and ordering.

Classic Caps. Lewis Foreman Day (1845-1910) was an influential English designer, author, and lecturer who played a significant role in the Arts and Crafts movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He became a prolific designer, working across various mediums including wallpaper, textiles, stained glass, pottery, and metalwork. He authored numerous books on design, including The Anatomy of Pattern (1887), The Planning of Ornament (1887), and Nature in Ornament (1892), which became important references for designers and students. Day advocated for the integration of form and function, emphasizing the importance of practicality in design alongside aesthetic considerations. His work and writings contributed significantly to the development of British design education and theory in the late Victorian era. His book, Alphabets Old and New , published in London, in 1910 gives sterling examples of his typography work. Day's approach to design, blending traditional craftsmanship with modern industrial techniques, helped shape the transition from Victorian aesthetics to more modern design principles. CARE Typography has digitized a number of the font faces in the book for modern use and aesthetic appeal. The typefaces below illustrate the beauty and craftsmanship of Day which can contribute to modern typography. These mostly pen drawn typefaces have been digitized by CARE Typography using Fontographer to make them available as usable fonts. Caps or Unicals are often used in display faces and advertising. Some of these classic faces can enliven your printing and advertising projects. They are available, either individually, or as a set, for a modest fee. Contact CARE Typography cshanktype@gmail.com for more information and ordering.

Numbers In Typography Personal Background . I am a minister by calling and a self-trained typographer. Yet, I was also trained to be a mathematician by my college degree in mathematics. Indeed, before seminary days, I was a mathematics teaching assistant at the University of Maryland for a season. Numbers have played a significant role in my training and development, both as a theologian and typographer. It is for this reason that I found the sample numerals in Lewis F. Day’s Alphabets Old and New (London, 1910) fascinating and important to the development of type and fonts. Numbers and Numerals. First things first. We must distinguish between “numbers” and the symbols that represent them as “numerals.” A number is a mathematical object used to count , measure , and label . The most basic examples are the natural numbers 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , and so forth. Numbers can be represented in language with number words . More universally, individual numbers can be represented by symbols , called numerals; for example, "5" is a numeral that represents the number five . The current symbols we use for numbers, namely 0,1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. 9, only came about in practice in the late 14th and early 15th century in Western European civilization. Before these Arabic symbols, the Egyptians invented the first ciphered numeral system, and the Greeks followed by mapping their counting numbers onto Ionian and Doric alphabets. Roman numerals, a system that used combinations of letters from the Roman alphabet, remained dominant in Europe until the spread of the superior Hindu–Arabic numeral system around the late 14th century, and the Hindu–Arabic numeral system remains the most common system for representing numbers in the world today. Numbers were indicated by Egyptian hieroglyphics, Hebrew and Greek letters and the classic Roman numerals. As a schoolboy, I had to learn the Roman numeral system, thus, 1= I, 5 = V, 10 = X, L = 50, C = 100, D = 500, M = 1000. Such a numeral system only gradually faded over time, with Roman numerals often seen on current day clock faces, monuments and buildings and copyright dates on the title screens of movies and television programs. MCM, signifying "a thousand, and a hundred less than another thousand", means 1900, so 1912 is written MCMXII. For the years of the current (21st) century, MM indicates 2000; this year is MMXXIV (2024).

Typographic Signposts Reading the history of typography and writing has become a fascinating joy for me. The richness and diversity of typographic innovation is marvelous and instructive and often mirrors the cultural milieu of the period. One fascinating book I recently read is the 1910 Alphabets Old And New by Lewis F. Day (B.T. Batsford, London, 1910). Lewis F. Day (1845–1910) was a prominent British designer and author known for his contributions to decorative arts and design during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He is best remembered for his work in the Arts and Crafts Movement, a design philosophy that emphasized craftsmanship, simplicity, and the beauty of natural materials. Day was educated at the South Kensington School of Art, where he honed his skills and developed a deep appreciation for historical design styles. He became well-versed in a variety of design techniques and materials, which he employed in his own work as well as in his writings. One of his most significant contributions was his writing. Day authored several influential books on design, including "The Book of Ornament" and "The Grammar of Ornament," which were widely read and respected in design circles. These works provided detailed insights into the principles of design, drawing on a range of historical styles and cultural influences. In addition to his written work, Day was involved in various design projects, including ceramics and textiles. His designs were characterized by their careful attention to detail and a deep understanding of historical and contemporary styles. Day's legacy is evident in the continued relevance of his design principles and writings, which have influenced subsequent generations of designers and craftsmen. His work remains an important reference for those interested in the intersection of history, aesthetics, and craftsmanship in design. In his Alphabets Old and New , Day provides typographic examples and traces the development of the typographical alphabet from earliest times. Starting with the 6th century lettering, Day provides examples of alphabetic lettering through the 14th, 16th, 17th and on into modern typography of his period. The digitized samples below are drawn from Day's book and provide a visually satisfying typographic history.

To help pay my way through seminary, I painted the outsides of old Philadelphia homes in the summers. During those months of fighting off bees and wasps and enduring the heat of summer work, I often ran across very intricate fascia trim designs from the Victorian era. These fascinating and complex designs represented the work of the craftsmen of older days and required time intensive sanding and repainting. I usually ignored, and sometimes complained, about such fancy decorative pieces. Ampersand History. Like these carefully crafted pieces, ampersands, symbols derived from the Latin or French et , meaning and , are one of the oldest alphabetic abbreviations. In The Printer's Handbook of Trade Recipes (Charles Thomas Jacobi, London, 1891), t he “character and ” or “ short and ” as it is known among printers, has the title "ampersand" in the dictionaries, where it is said to be “a corruption of and , per se and , ie. and , by itself and .” It was originally formed as may be seen in some old-style italic fonts of today — of a combination of the capitals E and T, making the French and Latin word “et,“ signifying “and.” Its preferred use is in connecting firm and corporation names, and it is sometimes permitted in display lines where the whole word cannot be inserted. The famous typographer, Robert Bringhurst, notes that "since the ampersand is more often used in display work than in ordinary text, the more creative versions are often the more useful." ( The Elements of Typographic Style ) One of the first examples of an ampersand appears on a piece of papyrus from about 45 A.D. Written in an early Roman capital cursive (the handwriting of the time), it shows the ligature ET. A sample of Pompeian graffiti from 79 A.D. also shows a combination of the capitals E and T, and is again written in early Roman script. The ampersand is generally interchangeable with "and." This is why “etc.” can sometimes be seen written as “&c.” Interestingly, there are a number of versions of the word in various British dialects: ampussy, ampusand, amsiam . The Ligature ET Actually, the ampersand is what is called a ligature , first adopted with the invention of printing in the early 15th century, which occurs when two or more letterforms are written or printed as one unit. Generally, ligatures replace characters that occur next to each other when they overlap. One of the most common ligatures is “fi" (f plus i). Because the dot of the i interferes with the loop of the lowercase f, when they are printed next to each other, the two letters are combined into a single glyph with the dot absorbed into the f, or eliminated. Frank Romano in the August 2004 Issue of Electronic Publishing notes that "ligatures were originally used by medieval scribes to increase writing speed. A 14th century manuscript included hundreds of ligatures and early typefaces used ligatures to emulate the appearance of hand-lettered manuscripts. Gutenberg’s font had 292 glyphs—most of them 2- and 3-letter ligatures to fool Bible buyers into thinking it was handwritten. Most ligatures fell out of common use except for the five f-ligtures (fi, ff, fl, ffi, ffl), and the two dipthongs in upper- and lowercase (Æ and Œ). Only recently has computer-based typesetting had automated ligatures." Bringhurst notes in his callout about ampersands that earlier typographers made liberal use of them — "The 16th century French printer Christophe Plantin sometimes uses four quite different ampersands in the course of a single paragraph, even when setting something as unwhimsical as the eight-volume polylingual Bible on which he risked his fortune and to which he devoted more than six years of his life." (Elements of Typographic Style, 78) (For more on Plantin, See my Blog on "Early Printing and Typography — An Extended Early History," July 10, 2024) But even earlier than the printed page were scribal calligraphic writings, in which the combination E T was a ligature from the 8th century onward, depending on the calligrapher's handwriting style. We see an early form of the ligature in the Cancellaresca fonts used by calligraphers in the 1400s, In one of its historically five variants, Cancellaresca was the handwriting of Titian, Michelangelo and Raphael, of Bembo, Aldus, Lorenzo de Medici and many others. Arnold Bank notes in his lecture, From Calligraphy and Its Influence in the Time of Plantin , that this well-used calligraphic font "was also the official business and correspondence script of the scholars and writers engaged in the secretarial departments of those court and papal chanceries requiring at this time a literary style of Latin composition for which the usual secretary and mercantile hands were considered unsuited." Encyclopedia Britannica notes that "cancellaresca corsiva, in calligraphy, script that in the 16th century became the vehicle of the New Learning throughout Christendom. It developed during the preceding century out of the antica corsiva, which had been perfected by the scribes of the papal chancery. As written by the calligrapher and printer Ludovico degli Arrighi of Vicenza in the early decades of the 16th century, the cancellaresca corsiva can range from eye-arresting contrasts of Gothic-like thick and thin strokes to a delicate, supple monotone tracery. Arrighi’s ascending letters, rather than terminating in serifs as in earlier versions, wave plumelike to the right, offset by the leftward swing of the descenders. Lively yet disciplined, responsive to various cuts of nib and speeds of movement, the cancellaresca corsiva was revived under the popular name italic in the 20th century for personal, primarily decorative purposes." (Britannica.com) Gilles Le Corre, born in 1950 in Nantes, France, is an engraver and calligrapher who rediscovered this typeface and gave us the 1491 Cancellaresca font family. The 1610 Cancellaresca font family was " inspired by the “Cancellaresca moderna ” type, which was calligraphed by Francesco Periccioli (published in 1610 in Siena, Italy). It was entirely handwritten by the designer for each circumstance, using quill pen and medieval ink on a rough paper, with added characters as accented ones and a lot of ligatures with respect for the original design." (MyFonts.com) Alan Meeks designed Cancellaresca Script, a decorative typeface in 1982, The 2010 Cancellaresca font family was inspired by the Cancellaresca pattern (look at the 1491 Cancellaresca and 1610 Cancellaresca), in particular Spanish one, from Francisco Lucas, who was working in the late 1500s. It is a modern variation, including West European accented characters and a lot of initial and final alternates. The sampling below shows the ampersand choices redrafted by Gilles Le Corre (GLC). Along with the opening selection of digitally reproduced ampersands of the 7th–16th centuries, we have a choice selection of ET ligatures, ampersands, that have survived the test of time. The Poetica typeface family, designed by Robert Slimbach of Adobe and based on Cancelleresca, has 58 ampersands (one more than Heinz catsup). Some typefaces have especially beautiful ampersands—the italic ampersands for Garamond, Minion, Janson, Meridien, Baskerville, and Caslon are gorgeous. With the appearance of slab serif and sans serif typefaces in the 19th century, typefounders preferred the roman version of the ampersand in italic as well as roman styles. Ampersand usage varies from language to language. Sources Arnold Bank, Calligraphy and Its Influence in the Time of Plantin , Visiting Lecturer at the Royal College of Art, London, www.dbnl.org . Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style , Hartley & Marks, 1992, 1996, 2004, 2005. Charles Thomas Jacobi, compiler, The Printers’ Handbook of Trade Recipes, Hints & Suggestions Relating to Letterpress and Lithographic Printing, Bookbinding, Stationery, Engraving, Etc. , London, 1891 Frank Romano, From Ampersands to Interrobangs, Electronic Publishing , August 2004 Stephen Moye, Fontographer: Type By Design (MIS Press:1995) Various font articles from MyFonts.com