Re: Why blackletter letters?

Hi Gerrit,

> I have been aiming at creating a blackletter font
> (http://unifraktur.sourceforge.net/maguntia.html)
Cool!

> • The four “required” ligatures ch, ck, ſt and tz, which were never
> separated in typesetting. These can be realised in the very same way
> as antiqua ligatures.
Your page draws my attention to "ſch". To typeset this as "ſ ch" in
circumstances where spacing-out (positive tracking; German: "gesperrt")
is used for emphasis has always irritated me, but I guess that's just
how it's mostly been done ... do you have more information on this? How
often was the entire "ſch" kept together in such circumstances?

> there were many [long s (ſ)] [in] Antiqua text
Historically yes, but in the end, long s was considered restricted to
blackletter; I think this was even written into the orthographic rules
from 1901.

Stephan
Received on Wed Sep 11 2013 - 06:15:02 CDT