Selected Articles from
The Gull Archives

If you would like to submit an article for The Gull, please contact the Chronicler.

Capitals appropriate to use with this bookhand are uncials & simple versals.

Note especially the long s -- a letter form used in bookhands to the virtual exclusion of the short s until the 13th or 14th century. Even at that time, the difficulty of forming a short s that looked good led to a continuing popularity of the long s until the advent of printing gradually made the calligrapher's skills unnecessary, though still used artistically and until the 19th century, for the production of certain official documents. I would not give the impression that the short s was never used; on the contrary, it was known and used since Roman times, especially in the uncial and semi-uncial hands and in the later blackletter hands it seems a mark of the skill of the calligrapher. Yet in the earlier period bookhands it is not used at all so far as I have been able to discover.

The above alphabet was assembled from a scrutiny of reproductions of Latin manuscripts produced at Tours in the 8th and 9th centuries: from Lettering, by Hermann Degering, for the most part.

NOTE:

Copyright of each article belongs to the original author. Reproduction rights are not given by virtue of their appearance here.

If you wish to reprint any of these articles, in whole or in part, in any medium, you must first get permission from the the author. Please contact the Chronicler, who will forward your request to the appropriate party and respond to you.