HALF-UNCIALS

Early in the sixth century, a writing style
now known as the half-uncial came into
general use. Despite its name, this style did
not evolve from the uncial, but developed at
the same time, out of the need for an easier,
more condensed, and more readable writ¬
ing style for secular documents. The half¬
uncials embodied further advances toward
our lowercase letters, as the scribes took
more and more liberties with the capital let-
terforms. In fact, the half-uncials are often
categorized as small letters, and some claim
that they represent the invention of the first
lowercase alphabet. Except for the letters J,
U, and W, the basic Latin alphabet was
established by that time. But the widespread
adoption of small letters in a uniform way
was quite another matter. In fact, matters
got worse before they got better. What uni¬
formity in lettering there was began to dis¬
appear in the fifth century, following the
disintegration of the Roman Empire.

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Half-Uncials

National Hands

As Christian missionaries spread out over
Europe from Rome, they carried with them
Bibles and other religious writings. The
missionaries soon had local monks at work
producing new copies in the monasteries
they established. The uncials and half¬

uncials generally served as the basis for the
letters used to copy the manuscripts, but
the monks were influenced by local tastes,
customs, art, and styles of decoration. Out
of this mixture came what we today call the
various “national hands.” These styles of
writing were particular to each geographic
location, and although they are referred to
as “national,” many times writing styles
varied within just a few miles of each other.

The most beautiful of the national
hands was the Irish. Because Ireland had
never been occupied by the Romans, its
predominant writing style exhibited no
direct influence of the Roman hands. St.
Patrick is credited with introducing this
writing style to the tiny island country. The
Irish hand in turn influenced the Anglo-
Saxon national hand, when Irish mission¬
aries traveled into Scotland in about A.D.
650. One of the most beautiful works of
calligraphic art, The Book of Kells, was pro¬
duced in the Irish hand in about a.d. 800.

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Irish National Hand

A Point of
Demarcation

When Charlemagne ascended the throne of
the Holy Roman Empire in the late eighth
century, he expanded reforms begun earlier
by his father, Pepin, and intended to imple¬
ment sweeping changes in learning and

civic life. During a visit to Parma, Charle¬
magne met Alcuin, a well-known English
scholar. Impressed with Alcuin’s scholar¬
ship, Charlemagne invited him to organize
the educational system of his domain.
Alcuin accepted the challenge and began
his task by standardizing a copying style for
the many new versions of the Vulgate Bible
that were required. One of the results of the
search for a clear copying style was the Car¬
oline minuscule, the forerunner of our own
modern lowercase letters.

Caroline Minuscules

In general, the Caroline minuscules
eliminated cursive forms and avoided liga¬
tures, making letters independent of one
another. When ligatures were used, they
resulted in only slight changes in form.
Also, these letters were drawn more full-
bodied than their predecessors. All these
characteristics adapted themselves easily to
the invention of movable type by Johann
Gutenberg in the mid-fourteenth century.

The Design of the
Lowercase Letters

One of the first decisions a type designer
makes when designing a lowercase alpha¬
bet is its x-height: How tall should letters
like а, с, i, m, n, o, and x be in relation to

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the capitals? Some typefaces, like Nicholas
Cochin, have very small x-heights, while
others, such as Americana and Antique
Olive, have x-heights whose proportions
border on the heroic. Old style designs
tend to have relatively small x-heights,
while those of more recent designs are gen¬
erally larger. During the 1960s and ’70s it
was popular to design typefaces with
exceptionally large x-heights. The theory
was that since lowercase letters were the
most important for text composition, the
bigger they were, the more readable the
typeface would be. The premise of the
argument is sound—over 90 percent of
text composition is set in lowercase letters
—but the inference is not necessarily true.
If the lowercase alphabet’s x-height
becomes too large, readability can actually
be impaired. A general guideline for com¬
puting a sensible x-height is that it should
be between 56 and 72 percent of the height
of its capital letters.

Next, the designer establishes the height
of the ascenders and the length of the
descenders. These measurements can be
the same, though sometimes ascenders are
longer than descenders. In some alphabets
the ascenders are the same height as the
capitals, but in many instances they are
slightly taller.

Finally, the designer determines the
weight of the characters—one of the most
important decisions he or she makes. If
over 90 percent of the letters we read are
lowercase, then their weight and how they
“color” a page are critical to the overall
design of a typeface.

Square Capital

Roman Cursive

Half-Uncial

Uncial

Caroline Minuscule

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