Sans-serif font
	Serif font
	Serif font (red serifs)

In typography, serifs are non-structural details on the ends of some of the strokes that make up letters and symbols. A font that has serifs is called a serif font (or seriffed font). A font without serifs is called sans-serif, from the French sans="without". Some typography sources refer to sans serif typefaces as "grotesque" (in German "grotesk") or "gothic", and serif types as "roman". These terms are no longer commonly used however, except in specific font names. Part of image series demonstrating serif vs sans-serif. ... Part of image series demonstrating serif vs sans-serif. ... Part of image series demonstrating serif vs sans-serif. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... A font can mean: A member of a typeface family; or digital font - file format that encapsulates a typeface family in a database. ... In typography, serifs are the small features at the end of strokes within letters. ... Mother Nature is surrounded by grottesche in this fresco detail from Villa dEste When commonly used in conversation, grotesque means strange, fantastic, ugly or bizarre, and thus is often used to describe weird shapes and distorted forms such as Halloween masks or gargoyles on churches. ... Look up Gothic in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Roman type has two separate meanings in typography, both of which refer to the fact that the capital letters of a Roman font have an appearance similar to those used for lettering stone in ancient Rome: Roman type can refer to one of the major families of traditional typefaces as...

Origins & etymology

Serifs are thought to have originated in the Roman alphabet with inscriptional lettering—words carved into stone in Roman antiquity. The explanation proposed by Father Edward Catich in his 1968 book The Origin of the Serif is now broadly but not universally accepted: the Roman letter outlines were first brushed onto stone, and the stone carvers followed the brush marks which flared at stroke ends and corners, creating serifs. The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world today. ... The Arch of Titus, with an inscription in Roman square capitals Roman square capitals, also called elegant capitals and quadrata, are an ancient Roman form of writing, and the basis for modern capital letters. ... Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, which begins roughly with the earliest-recorded Greek poetry of Homer (7th century BC), and continues through the rise of Christianity and the fall of the Western Roman Empire (5th century AD...

Look up serif in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

The origin of the word "serif" is obscure, but apparently almost as recent as the type style. The oldest citations in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) are 1841 for "sans serif", given as sanserif, and 1830 for "serif". The OED speculates that "serif" was a back-formation from "sanserif". Webster's Third New International Dictionary traces "serif" to the Dutch schreef, meaning wrote, and ultimately through Dutch schrijven, German schreiben and Latin scribere, all meaning "to write". Schreef now also means "serif" in Dutch. Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Wiktionary is a multilingual, Web-based project to create a free content dictionary, available in over 150 languages. ... The Oxford English Dictionary print set The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is a dictionary published by the Oxford University Press (OUP), and is generally regarded as the most comprehensive and scholarly dictionary of the English language. ... In etymology, the process of back-formation is the creation of a neologism by reinterpreting an earlier word as a compound and removing the spuriously supposed affixes. ... 1888 advertisement for Websters Dictionary Websters Dictionary is a common title given to English language dictionaries in the United States, deriving its name from American lexicographer Noah Webster. ... Latin is an ancient Indo-European language originally spoken in Latium, the region immediately surrounding Rome. ...

The OED's earliest citation for "grotesque" in this sense is 1875, giving stone-letter as a synonym. It would seem to mean "out of the ordinary" in this usage, as in art grotesque usually means "elaborately decorated". Other synonyms include "Doric" and "Gothic", commonly used for Japanese Gothic typefaces. 1875 (MDCCCLXXV) was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... Look up Synonym in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Gothic Gothic typeface (ゴシック体, goshikku-tai) is the second most commonly used style of printed Japanese characters, after Mincho. ...

Serif (top) and sans-serif (bottom) typefaces exist for Chinese characters as well.

In the Chinese and Japanese languages, there are two common typefaces based on the regular script for Chinese characters akin to serif and sans serif fonts in the West. The most popular for body text is a family of fonts called the Song typeface (宋体, Songti), also known as Minchō (明朝) in Japan, and Ming typeface (明體, Mingti) in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The names of these fonts come from the Song and Ming dynasties, when block printing flourished in China. Because the wood grain on printing blocks ran horizontally, it was fairly easy to carve horizontal lines with the grain. However, carving vertical or slanted patterns was difficult because those patterns intersect with the grain and break easily. This resulted in a typeface that has thin horizontal strokes and thick vertical strokes. To prevent wear and tear, the ending of horizontal strokes are also thickened. These design forces resulted in the current Song typeface characterized by thick vertical strokes contrasted with thin horizontal strokes; triangular ornaments at the end of single horizontal strokes; and overall geometrical regularity. Image File history File links Hanzitypefaces. ... Image File history File links Hanzitypefaces. ... Technical note: Due to technical limitations, some web browsers may not display some special characters in this article. ... Japanese (,  ) is a language spoken by over 130 million people, mainly in Japan, but also by Japanese emigrant communities around the world. ... Sheng Jiao Xu by Chu Suiliang: calligraphy of the Kaishu style The Regular Script, or in Chinese Kaishu (楷書 Pinyin: kÇŽishÅ«) and Japanese Kaisho, also commonly known as Standard Regular (正楷), is the newest of the Chinese calligraphy styles (peaked at the 7th century), hence most common in modern writings and... Technical note: Due to technical limitations, some web browsers may not display some special characters in this article. ... fig. ... The Song Dynasty (Chinese: ; pinyin: ) was a ruling dynasty in China from 960-1279. ... For other uses, see Ming. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Woodblock printing. ... Wood grain describes the alignment, texture and appearance of the wood fibres. ...

The other common group of fonts is called the black typeface (黑体/體, Heiti) in Chinese and Gothic typeface (ゴシック体, Goshikku-tai^?) in Japanese. This group is characterized by straight lines of even thickness for each stroke, akin to sans serif styles. This group of fonts, first introduced on newspaper headlines, is commonly used on headings, websites, signs and billboards. Gothic Gothic typeface (ゴシック体, goshikku-tai) is the second most commonly used style of printed Japanese characters, after Mincho. ...

In Japanese typography, the equivalent of serifs on kanji and kana characters are called uroko—"fish scales." In Chinese, the serifs are called either youjiaoti (有脚体, lit. "forms with legs") or youchunxianti (有衬线体, lit. "forms with ornamental lines"). Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji Kanji (Japanese:  ) are the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and the Arabic numerals. ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Manyogana 万葉仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 For other meanings of Kana, see Kana (disambiguation). ...

Usage

In traditional printing seriffed fonts are used for body text because they are widely believed to be easier to read than sans-serif fonts for this purpose. Sans-serif fonts are used for shorter pieces of text and subject matter requiring a more casual feel than the formal look of seriffed types. Sans serif types have recently begun to supplant seriffed types for headings with a 'cleaner' look. Body text is the text on an web page which appears between the opening <body> and closing </body> tags that delimit the body section of the document. ...

Seriffed fonts are the overwhelming typeface choice for lengthy text printed in books, newspapers and magazines. For such purposes sans serif fonts are more acceptable in Europe than in North America, but still less common than seriffed typefaces.

While in print seriffed fonts are considered more readable, sans-serif is considered more legible on computer screens. For this reason the majority of web pages employ sans-serif type. Hinting information, anti-aliased and sub-pixel rendering technologies have partially mitigated the legibility problem of serif fonts, but the basic constraint of coarse screen resolution—typically 100 pixels per inch or less—continues to limit their readability on screen. On statistics, signal processing, and related disciplines, aliasing is an effect that causes different continuous signals to become indistinguishable (or aliases of one another) when sampled. ... Subpixel rendering works by increasing the luminance reconstruction points of a color subpixelated screen, such as a liquid crystal display (LCD). ...

Classification

Serif fonts can be broadly classified into one of four subgroups: old style, transitional, slab serif, or modern.

The Garamond typeface, an example of an old-style serif

Image File history File links Garamond_sample. ... Image File history File links Garamond_sample. ...

Old Style

Old style typefaces date back to 1465, and are characterized by a diagonal stress (the thinnest parts of letters are at an angle rather than at the top and bottom), subtle differences between thick and thin lines (low line contrast), and excellent readability. Old style typefaces are reminiscent of the humanist calligraphy from which their forms were derived. In typography, serifs are the small features at the end of strokes within letters. ...

It has been said that the angled stressing of old style faces generates diagonal lock, which, when combined with their bracket serifs creates detailed, positive word-pictures (see bouma) for ease of reading. However, this theory is mostly contradicted by the parallel letterwise recognition model, which is widely accepted by cognitive psychologists who study reading. Calligraphy in a Latin Bible of AD 1407 on display in Malmesbury Abbey, Wiltshire, England. ... The term bouma (pronounced bowma) is sometimes used in the work of cognitive psychology to mean the shape of a cluster of letters, often a whole word. ...

Old style faces are sub-divided into Venetian and Aldine or Garalde. Examples of old style typefaces include Jenson (Venetian), Garamond, Bembo, Goudy Old Style, and Palatino (all Aldine or Garalde). Nicolaus Jenson (1420 - 1480) was a French engraver, typographer and printer who did most of his work in Venice. ... Various examples of Garamond There are several typefaces called Garamond. ... Bembo was a Monotype “recutting” (in effect a revival and reworking) of type used by Aldus Manutius. ... Goudy Old Style, is an old style serif typefaces originally created by Frederic W. Goudy for American Type Founders (ATF) in 1916. ... Palatino is a serif typeface created by Hermann Zapf in 1948. ...

The Times New Roman typeface, an example of a transitional serif

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Transitional

Transitional (or "baroque") serif typefaces first appeared in the mid-18th century. They are among the most common, including such widespread typefaces as Times Roman (1932) and Baskerville (1757). They are in between modern and old style, thus the name "transitional." Differences between thick and thin lines are more pronounced than they are in old style, but they are still less dramatic than they are in modern serif fonts. Times New Roman is a serif typeface commissioned by The Times (London) newspaper in 1931 and designed by Stanley Morison together with Starling Burgess and Victor Lardent. ... Baskerville is a “transitional” typeface, designed by John Baskerville in England in the mid-18th century, revived in the early 20th century and widely used for books and other long texts. ...

The Rockwell typeface, an example of a slab serif

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Slab Serif

Main article: Slab serif

Slab serif (a.k.a. "Egyptian") typefaces usually have little if any contrast between thick and thin lines. Serifs tend to be as thick as the vertical lines themselves and usually have no bracket. Slab serif fonts have a bold, rectangular appearance and sometimes have fixed widths, meaning that all characters occupy the same amount of horizontal space (as in a typewriter). They are sometimes described as sans-serif fonts with serifs because the underlying character shapes are often similar to sans serif typefaces, with less variation between thin and thick shapes on the character. (A subcategory of slab serif is the Clarendon typefaces, which do have small but significant brackets, and structures more similar to seriffed typefaces.) Slab serif typefaces date to around 1800. Examples of slab serif typefaces include Clarendon, Rockwell and Courier. A sample of the Rockwell typeface, a slab serif font In typography, a slab serif (also called mechanistic, square serif or egyptian) typeface is a type of serif typeface characterized by thick, block-like serifs. ... Mechanical desktop typewriters, such as this Underwood Five, were long time standards of government agencies, newsrooms, and sales offices. ... Rockwell is a serif typeface belonging to the family of slab serif (or egyptian) typefaces, where the serifs are about as thick as the main strokes in each letter. ... Courier is a monospace slab serif font that resembles the output from a typewriter. ...

The Bodoni typeface, an example of a modern serif

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Modern

Modern serif typefaces, which first emerged in the late 18th century, are characterized by extreme contrast between thick and thin lines. Modern typefaces have a vertical stress, long and fine serifs, with minimal brackets. Serifs tend to be very thin and vertical lines are very heavy. Most modern fonts are less readable than transitional or old style serif typefaces. Common examples include Bodoni, Century Schoolbook and Computer Modern (the font family that comes with the TeX and LaTeX open-source computer typography systems). Bodoni is a typeface designed by Giambattista Bodoni (February 16, 1740 in Saluzzo – November 29, 1813 in Parma), an Italian engraver, publisher, printer and typographer of high repute. ... Century Schoolbook is an American serif typeface. ... Sample text in Computer Modern Computer Modern is the family of typefaces used by default by the typesetting program TeX. It was created by Donald Knuth with his METAFONT program, and was most recently updated in 1992. ... TeX (IPA: as in Greek, often in English; sometimes written TEX in imitation of the logo) is a typesetting system created by Donald Knuth. ... The LaTeX logo, typeset with LaTeX LATEX, written as LaTeX in plain text, is a document markup language and document preparation system for the TeX typesetting program. ...

See also

• Typography
• Typeface
• Sans-serif
• Petit-serif
• San Serriffe, an elaborate typographic joke.

This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... For the origin and evolution of fonts, see History of western typography. ... In typography, serifs are the small features at the end of strokes within letters. ... Petit-serifs are small serifs, which are attached to regular sans-serif fonts. ... San Serriffe is a fictional island nation created in the spirit of April Fools Day. ...

References

• Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style (version 3.0), 2004, Hartley & Marks, Publishers, Vancouver, BC, Canada
• Father Edward Catich, The Origin of the Serif: Brush writing and Roman letters, 1991,Hartley & Marks, Publishers, Vancouver, BC, Canada
• Ellen Lupton, Thinking with Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students, 2004, Princeton Architectural Press, New York
• "The Serif is Dying" discussion at Typographica on the merits and popularity of sans & seriffed type.
• "Serifs—What's the point? discussion at Typophile on the role & function of serifs.
• "Serif vs. Sans Serif", a discussion on Blogdorf about serif versus sans serif type.