Talk:Gothic script

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Typography

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Writing systems

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Comments

I think this article should be merged with blackletter. It's different names for the same script. The disambiguation page gothic suggest that there were a distinction between the handwriting script called gothic script and a typing script called blackletter, but it seems to me that this distinction is artificial (inexistent outside wikipedia). I believe that the lable blackletter is preferrable because it's less ambiguous: There's no danger of confusion with the gothic alphabet. Additionally, when the term gothic was chosen in the renaissance, it was intended as a despective name for an "outdated" and "ugly" script (in the eyes of a renaissancer). J. 'mach' wust 23:25, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well, I've always seen the script called "Gothic", and "blackletter" to me sounds like a typographical script, or a modern typeface approximating Gothic forms (which we might also call "Old English" or something). What do you think most people would search for, Gothic or blackletter? I guess I don't really mind either way. Adam Bishop 08:09, 2 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If I were German (I am actually), I'd search for Fraktur! :) This is more easily proven not to be accurate, since most sources agree that the fraktur is only a specific style (in typing and in calligraphy) of blackletter/gothic script (the most used one). I'd say the name we choose is not a question of what most people suppose it is, but of what is more accurate.

If the distinction between typographical and handwritten script is usual, then we should point that out. However, my impression is that there isn't much of a difference in use. If there were such a distinction, what is the common term for both?

And I forgot that gothic is also used to refer to sans-serif. J. 'mach' wust 14:22, 2 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think Gothic is a kind of blackletter, but not all blackletter is Gothic. Gothic "script" is handwriting, and blackletter comes after the printing press - although they did use Gothic as a printing type as well. I'm not sure...maybe I have notes about this somewhere... Adam Bishop 15:26, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Not blackletter

Nearly 20 years to late to comment but in case someone sees this discussion and is misled. In type design, Gothic type (or computer font) means sans-serif, not blackletter. See for example Bell Gothic, Century Gothic, Franklin Gothic, Letter Gothic, News Gothic and so on. As the Sans-serif article explains:

Gothic: Popular with American type founders. Perhaps the first use of the term was due to the Boston Type and Stereotype Foundry, which in 1837 published a set of sans-serif typefaces under that name. It is believed that those were the first sans-serif designs to be introduced in America. The term probably derived from the architectural definition, which is neither Greek nor Roman,^[1] and from the extended adjective term of "Germany", which was the place where sans-serif typefaces became popular in the 19th to 20th centuries.^[2] Early adopters for the term include Miller & Richard (1863), J. & R. M. Wood (1865), Lothian, Conner, Bruce McKellar.
— Sans-serif#Other names

The confusion is not unusual and continues with goth culture. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 13:32, 6 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

References

[1] OED Definition of Gothic

[2] The Sans Serif Typefaces

[1]

[2]