Subject: Re: tc-list Cursive scripts in editions

From: Michael Holmes <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 4 Mar 1999 10:41:03 -0600 (CST)

Re the use of cursive scripts and ligatures in early printed editions of the NT:
Metzger (Text of the NT, pp. 96) writes,
"The attempt was made to reproduce in print the appearance of minuscule
Greek handwriting, with its numerous alternative forms of the same letter,
as well as its many combinations of two or more letters (ligatures).
Instead, therefore, of producing type for merely the twenty-four letters of
the Greek alphabet, printers prepared about 200 different characters.
(Subsequently these variant forms of the same letters were abandoned, until
today there remain only the two forms of the lower-case sigma"

Mike Holmes

At 12:32 PM 3/3/99 -0500, you wrote:
>Hi,
>
>I have recently been making a study of the
>early critical editions.
>
>It struck me as quite remarkable that editions
>as late as Mill in 1707 still used a very cursive
>script and ligatures.
>
>These must have been very difficult to typeset
>and certainly much harder that using a regular
>font - which the Complutasian appears to have.
>
>Apart from conservatism, does any one know why
>they persisted in using this script?
>
>Regards
>
>Mike Bossingham
>[email-masked]
>
>