Calligraphy Alphabets And Historical Handwriting

Isn't 'calligraphy' almost the same as 'historical handwriting'? Yes and no.

There were several forces at work in historical scripts which we don't usually feel in calligraphy today, unless we're professionals earning our living by it. One such force, economy, pushed towards smaller, simpler letterforms written faster and more efficiently. Another force, the client's desire for a display piece, pushed towards larger and more elaborate letterforms carefully drawn and highly decorated. Historically, scribes always had to take into account client budget, deadline, legibility and fit-for-purpose.

Ongoing demand for luxury letterforms at economical prices helped bring into being new alphabets -- smaller, more cursive, easier-to-produce versions of the grand scripts. Ultimately, the printing press took over mass production, and client status perhaps began to be reflected more in bookbindings than in script.

Today, the practical, business side of the written word is taken care of by machine alphabets and hardly at all by our (often nondescript) personal handwriting. Calligraphy is a leisured luxury: using nibs, inkwells and parchment to produce books is almost unimaginably laborious and time-consuming compared with digital print-to-demand. Yet calligraphy flourishes as an art and hobby, and the practice of reproducing calligraphy alphabets is still the foundation of a good hand.

A 'calligraphy alphabet' is an alphabet intended to be handwritten for aesthetic effect. It is modelled on the most successful historical alphabets but its purpose and context have changed significantly. A calligraphy alphabet today may not even work as an alphabet per se; some modern calligraphers have created alphabet display pieces the individual letters of which are impractical to use for writing out a text.

'Historical handwriting', by contrast, is the script which was used during a given period in time for the practical production of documents and books. It can nearly always be thought of as 'the best that could be done in the circumstances'. Sometimes 'the best that could be done' was a spectacular Book of Kells. Sometimes, too, it was rushed, sloppy, wavery, cramped, irregular - the historical equivalent of a bad photocopy - and nevertheless remains as a faithful example of its kind.

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There are many examples of both calligraphy alphabets and historical handwriting online, some with guidelines on how to write them yourself along with references to further resources. A good place to start is http://www.calligraphy-skills.com 's first training page on the basic skills which apply to any hand.


Harriet Shead writes on arts, education and healthy living. She is an amateur calligrapher with a particular interest in gothic scripts.

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