Italic script, also known as chancery cursive and Italic hand, is a semi-

cursive Cursive (also known as script, among other names) is any style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster, in contrast to block letters. It varies in functionali ...

, slightly sloped style of

handwriting Handwriting is the writing done with a writing instrument, such as a pen or pencil, in the hand. Handwriting includes both printing and cursive styles and is separate from formal calligraphy or typeface. Because each person's handwriting is u ...

and

calligraphy Calligraphy (from el, link=y, καλλιγραφία) is a visual art related to writing. It is the design and execution of lettering with a pen, ink brush, or other writing instrument. Contemporary calligraphic practice can be defined ...

that was developed during the

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 ide ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

. It is one of the most popular styles used in contemporary Western calligraphy.

History

Italic script is based largely on

Humanist minuscule Humanist minuscule is a handwriting or style of script that was invented in secular circles in Italy, at the beginning of the fifteenth century. "Few periods in Western history have produced writing of such great beauty", observes the art histo ...

, which itself draws on

Carolingian minuscule Carolingian minuscule or Caroline minuscule is a script which developed as a calligraphic standard in the medieval European period so that the Latin alphabet of Jerome's Vulgate Bible could be easily recognized by the literate class from one reg ...

. The capital letters are the same as the Humanist capitals, modeled on

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 characteriz ...

. The Italian scholar

Niccolò de' Niccoli Niccolò de' Niccoli (1364 – 22 January 1437) was an Italian Renaissance humanist. He was born and died in Florence, and was one of the chief figures in the company of learned men which gathered around the patronage of Cosimo de' Medici. Nic ...

was dissatisfied with the lowercase forms of Humanist minuscule, finding it too slow to write. In response, he created the Italic script, which incorporates features and techniques characteristic of a quickly written hand: oblique forms, fewer strokes per character, and the joining of letters. Perhaps the most significant change to any single character was to the form of the ''a'', which he simplified from the two-story form to the one-story form ⟨ɑ⟩ now common to most handwriting styles. Under the influence of Italic movable type used with

printing press A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium (such as paper or cloth), thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in which the ...

es, the style of handwritten Italic script moved toward disjoined, more mannered characters. By the 1550s the Italic script had become so laborious that it fell out of use with scribes. The style became increasingly influenced by the development of Copperplate writing styles in the eighteenth century. The style of Italic script used today is often heavily influenced by developments made as late as the early 20th century. In the past few decades, the italic script has been promoted in English-speaking countries as an easier-to-learn alternative to traditional styles of cursive handwriting. In the UK this revival was due in part to the 19th century artist

William Morris William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist, architectural conservationist, printer, translator and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He w ...

, in the 20th century it was Edward Johnston's book ''Writing & Illumination & Lettering'' (1906) and

Alfred Fairbank Alfred John Fairbank CBE (12 July 1895 – 14 March 1982) was a British calligrapher, palaeographer and author on handwriting. Fairbank was a founding member of the Society of Scribes and Illuminators in 1921, and later became its honourable se ...

's book ''A Handwriting Manual'' (1932) and the ''Dryad Writing Cards'' (1935). These Dryad cards were used for teaching young school children to write an italic hand. Italics script is considered one of the best examples of Latin cursive writing and had a great influence on the calligraphic styles that followed throughout Europe. It was developed at a time when the spread of printing technology had already decreed the fall into disuse of manuscript books, consequently shifting the calligraphic attention from the books to the production of single papers and documents, for which handwriting remained an irreplaceable tool. For these needs, it was necessary to write faster than how humanistic script originally allowed, yet just as elegantly, hence the birth of the Italic script with a thinner and slightly inclined style that made it adaptable to more rapid execution. This period also gave birth to the first treatises on calligraphy: among them stands out "La Operina" by Ludovico Vicentino degli Arrighi. A modern version called

Getty-Dubay Getty-Dubay Italic is a modern teaching script for handwriting based on Latin script, developed in 1976 in Portland, Oregon, by Barbara Getty and Inga Dubay with the aim of allowing learners to make an easier transition from print writing to cu ...

was introduced in 1976.

References

* *

External links

Latin-alphabet handwriting
at

Encyclopædia Britannica The (Latin for "British Encyclopædia") is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It is published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.; the company has existed since the 18th century, although it has changed ownership various t ...

{{European calligraphy Latin-script calligraphy Typography Penmanship Western calligraphy

History

See also

References

External links