Italic script, also known aschancery cursive andItalic hand, is a semi-cursive, slightly sloped style ofhandwriting andcalligraphy that was developed during theRenaissance inItaly. It is one of the most popular styles used in contemporary Western calligraphy.
Italic script is based largely onHumanist minuscule, which itself draws onCarolingian minuscule. The capital letters are the same as the Humanist capitals, modeled onRoman square capitals. The Italian scholarNiccolò de' Niccoli was dissatisfied with the lowercase forms of Humanist minuscule, finding it too slow to write. In response, he created the Italic script, which incorporates features and techniques characteristic of a quickly written hand: oblique forms, fewer strokes per character, and the joining of letters. Perhaps the most significant change to any single character was to the form of thea, which he simplified from the two-story form to the one-story form ⟨ɑ⟩ now common to most handwriting styles.
Under the influence of Italic movable type used withprinting presses, the style of handwritten Italic script moved toward disjoined, more mannered characters. By the 1550s the Italic script had become so laborious that it fell out of use with scribes.
The style became increasingly influenced by the development ofCopperplate writing styles in the eighteenth century. The style of Italic script used today is often heavily influenced by developments made as late as the early 20th century. In the past few decades, the italic script has been promoted in English-speaking countries as an easier-to-learn alternative to traditional styles of cursive handwriting.
In the UK this revival was due in part to the 19th-century artistWilliam Morris.[citation needed] In 1905Monica Bridges’ book,A New Handwriting for Teachers was published.[1] She was a skilled calligrapher and this book is credited with making italic handwriting fashionable in British schools.[2]
Edward Johnston's bookWriting & Illumination & Lettering was published in 1906,Alfred Fairbank's bookA Handwriting Manual in 1932 and theDryad Writing Cards in 1935. These Dryad cards were used for teaching young school children to write an italic hand.[citation needed]
Italics script is considered one of the best examples of Latin cursive writing, and had a great influence on the calligraphic styles that followed throughout Europe. It was developed at a time when the spread of printing technology had already decreed the fall into disuse of manuscript books, consequently shifting the calligraphic attention from the books to the production of single papers and documents, for which handwriting remained an irreplaceable tool. For these needs, it was necessary to write faster than how humanistic script originally allowed, yet just as elegantly, hence the birth of the Italic script with a thinner and slightly inclined style that made it adaptable to more rapid execution. This period also gave birth to the first treatises on calligraphy: among them stands out "La Operina" byLudovico Vicentino degli Arrighi (c.1475-c.1527).
A modern version calledGetty-Dubay Italic was introduced in 1976.
Types ofhandwritten Europeanscripts | ||
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| Ancient and medieval |  | |
| Modern | ||
| Teaching scripts | ||
