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Roman Square Capitals
Roman square capitals, also called ''capitalis monumentalis'', inscriptional capitals, elegant capitals and ''capitalis quadrata'', are an ancient Roman form of writing, and the basis for modern capital letters. Square capitals are characterized by sharp, straight lines, supple curves, thick and thin strokes, angled stressing and incised serifs. When written in documents this style is known as Latin book hand. History Antiquity Square capitals were used to write inscriptions, and less often to supplement everyday handwriting as Latin book hand. For everyday writing the Romans used a current cursive hand known as Latin cursive. Notable examples of square capitals used for inscriptions are found on the Roman Pantheon, Trajan's Column, and the Arch of Titus, all in Rome. These Roman capitals are also called majuscules, as a counterpart to minuscule letters such as Merovingian and Carolingian. Before the 4th century CE, square capitals were used to write ''de luxe'' copies ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Trajan (2959610060)
Trajan ( ; la, Caesar Nerva Traianus; 18 September 539/11 August 117) was Roman emperor from 98 to 117. Officially declared ''optimus princeps'' ("best ruler") by the senate, Trajan is remembered as a successful soldier-emperor who presided over one of the greatest military expansions in Roman history and led the empire to attain its greatest territorial extent by the time of his death. He is also known for his philanthropic rule, overseeing extensive public building programs and implementing social welfare policies, which earned him his enduring reputation as the second of the Five Good Emperors who presided over an era of peace within the Empire and prosperity in the Mediterranean world. Trajan was born in Italica, close to modern Seville in present-day Spain, a small Roman ''municipium'' founded by Italic settlers in the province of Hispania Baetica. He came from a branch of the gens Ulpia, the ''Ulpi Traiani'', that originated in the Umbrian town of Tuder. His fat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vergilius Augusteus
The Vergilius Augusteus is a manuscript from late antiquity, containing the works of the Roman author Virgil, written probably around the 4th century. There are two other collections of Virgil manuscripts, the Vergilius Vaticanus and the Vergilius Romanus. They are early examples of illuminated manuscripts; the Augusteus is not illuminated but has decorated initial letters at the top of each page. These letters do not mark divisions of the text, but rather are used at the beginning of whatever line happened to fall at the top of the page. These decorated initials are the earliest surviving such initials. Only seven leaves of the manuscript survive, four of which are in the Vatican Library (MS Vat. lat. 3256), and the remaining three in the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin (Lat. fol. 416). The leaves contain fragments of Virgil's ''Georgics'' and the ''Aeneid''. The fragments themselves are unremarkable, but they are written in Roman square capitals, which shows that square capitals w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Printing Press
A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a printing, print medium (such as paper or cloth), thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in which the cloth, paper or other medium was brushed or rubbed repeatedly to achieve the transfer of ink, and accelerated the process. Typically used for texts, the invention and global spread of the printing press was one of the most influential events in the second millennium. In Germany, around 1440, goldsmith Johannes Gutenberg invented the movable-type printing press, which started the Printing Revolution. Modelled on the design of existing screw presses, a single Renaissance movable-type printing press could produce up to 3,600 pages per workday, compared to forty by History of typography in East Asia, hand-printing and a few by scribe, hand-copying. Gutenberg's newly devised matrix (printing), hand mould made possible the precise and ra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Movable Type
Movable type (US English; moveable type in British English) is the system and technology of printing and typography that uses movable components to reproduce the elements of a document (usually individual alphanumeric characters or punctuation marks) usually on the medium of paper. The world's first movable type printing technology for paper books was made of porcelain materials and was invented around AD 1040 in China during the Northern Song dynasty by the inventor Bi Sheng (990–1051). The earliest printed paper money with movable metal type to print the identifying code of the money was made in 1161 during the Song dynasty. In 1193, a book in the Song dynasty documented how to use the copper movable type. The oldest extant book printed with movable metal type, Jikji, was printed in Korea in 1377 during the Goryeo dynasty. The spread of both movable-type systems was, to some degree, limited to primarily East Asia. The development of the printing press in Europe may have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eric Gill
Arthur Eric Rowton Gill, (22 February 1882 – 17 November 1940) was an English sculptor, letter cutter, typeface designer, and printmaker. Although the ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' describes Gill as ″the greatest artist-craftsman of the twentieth century: a letter-cutter and type designer of genius″, he is also a figure of considerable controversy following revelations of his sexual abuse of two of his daughters. Gill was born in Brighton and grew up in Chichester, where he attended the local college before moving to London. There he became an apprentice with a firm of ecclesiastical architects and took evening classes in stone masonry and calligraphy. Gill abandoned his architectural training and set up a business cutting memorial inscriptions for buildings and headstones. He also began designing chapter headings and title pages for books. As a young man, Gill was a member of the Fabian Society, but later resigned. Initially identifying with the Arts an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Johnston
Edward Johnston, CBE (11 February 1872 – 26 November 1944) was a British craftsman who is regarded, with Rudolf Koch, as the father of modern calligraphy, in the particular form of the broad-edged pen as a writing tool. He is most famous for designing the sans-serif Johnston typeface that was used throughout the London Underground system until it was redesigned in the 1980s. He also redesigned the famous roundel symbol used throughout the system. Early life Johnston was born in San José de Mayo, Uruguay. His father, Fowell Buxton Johnston (born 1839), was an officer in the 3rd Dragoon Guards, and the younger son of Scottish MP Andrew Johnston and his second wife, abolitionist Priscilla Buxton, daughter of Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, 1st Baronet. Johnston's uncle (his father's elder brother), also Andrew Johnston, became an MP in Essex in the 1860s. The family returned to England in 1875. With his father seeking work, and his mother ill, Johnston was raised by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Felice Feliciano
Felice Feliciano (Verona 1433 - Rome 1479) was a fifteenth-century calligrapher, composer of alchemical sonnets, collector of drawings and expert on Roman antiquity, especially inscriptions on stone. Biography He lived just long enough to see printing arrive in Italy. He was the first to recreate geometrically the alphabet of Roman inscriptions, in 1463. The original copy of '' Alphabetum Romanum'', his treatise on the geometrical construction of Roman capital letters using the square and circle, is preserved in the Vatican Library ( Codex Vat. lat. 6852). In 1470 while in Bologna as ''Vicario di Castel San Giorgio'', he became acquainted with Sabadino degli Arienti, who mentioned him in his III and IV '' Porretane''. He started printing in 1476 in Poiano, near Verona. In 1478, he traveled to Rome, visiting his friend Francesco Porcari. Felix Titling font Monotype Monotyping is a type of printmaking made by drawing or painting on a smooth, non-absorbent surface. The surface ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Geoffroy Tory
Geoffroy Tory (also Geofroy, Latin "Godofredus Torinus") was born in Bourges around 1480 and died in Paris before 14 October 1533. He was a French humanist and an engraver, best known for adding accents on letters in French. His life's work has heavily influenced French publishing to this day. Life Geoffroy Tory was born in Bourges in 1480, a decade after the first printing press arrived in Paris. He attended the local university, where he developed an interest in Latin literature. After completing his studies, Tory left Bourges for Italy, where he studied at two additional universities: first, the Sapienza at Rome, and then Bologna, where he studied under Philip Beroaldus, a well-known Latinist. The exact date of Tory's death is unknown, however, it is said in a lease that in 1533 his wife was a widow. Career Around 1505, Tory left for Paris after completing his studies in Italy. He worked there as a bookbinder, editor of texts, and corrector for the press, serving such cli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas and achievements of classical antiquity. It occurred after the Crisis of the Late Middle Ages and was associated with great social change. In addition to the standard periodization, proponents of a "long Renaissance" may put its beginning in the 14th century and its end in the 17th century. The traditional view focuses more on the early modern aspects of the Renaissance and argues that it was a break from the past, but many historians today focus more on its medieval aspects and argue that it was an extension of the Middle Ages. However, the beginnings of the period – the early Renaissance of the 15th century and the Italian Proto-Renaissance from around 1250 or 1300 – overlap considerably with the Late Middle Ages, conventionally da ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lyon Tablet
The Lyon Tablet is an ancient bronze tablet that bears the transcript of a speech given by the Roman emperor Claudius. The surviving bottom portion of the tablet was discovered in 1528 by a draper in his vineyard on Croix-Rousse Hill (on the site of the Sanctuary of the Three Gauls) in Lyon, France. It currently resides in the Gallo-Roman Museum of Lyon. Claudius had particular affinities with Lugdunum (Lyon). He was born there, and it housed the Imperial cult centre: as both Emperor and a "native" of the city, he was probably seen as its patron. He made the inscribed speech before the Roman Senate in 48 AD. It was a proposal to allow monied, landed citizens from further Gaul to enter the Senatorial class, and thus the Senate itself, once they had reached the necessary level of wealth. His argument evoked the Sabine origins of his own family, the gens Claudia, and the recent promotion to senatorial rank of men from Gallia Narbonensis. The text gives important insight into both ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
SPQR
SPQR, an abbreviation for (; en, "The Roman Senate and People"; or more freely "The Senate and People of Rome"), is an emblematic abbreviated phrase referring to the government of the ancient Roman Republic. It appears on Roman currency, at the end of documents made public by an inscription in stone or metal, and in dedications of monuments and public and civil works. The full phrase appears in Roman political, legal, and historical literature, such as the speeches of Cicero and ''Ab Urbe Condita Libri'' ("Books from the Founding of the City") of Livy. Translation In Latin, '' Senātus'' is a nominative singular noun meaning "Senate". ''Populus que'' is compounded from the nominative noun ''Populus'', "the People", and '' -que'', an enclitic particle meaning "and" which connects the two nominative nouns. The last word, '' Rōmānus'' ("Roman") is an adjective modifying the whole of '' Senātus Populusque'': the "Roman Senate and People", taken as a whole. Thus, the phrase ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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