Alphabets Old and New: Containing Over One Hundred and Fifty Complete Alphabets, Thirty Series of Numerals, and Numerous Facsimiles of Ancient Dates, ... Introductory Essay On "Art in the Alphabet."

by Lewis Foreman Day

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Genres: Art, Nonfiction

258 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1898

About the author

Lewis Forman Day was an artist and designer who was influential in the Arts and Crafts movement. He produced several books on design.

Reviews

[Abigail Gray]

What a delightful book! The tone and writing were engaging, and the history tidbits were very interesting. Ofc I can for the typography and lettering, and it did not disappoint. I will have to track down a hard copy version of this (thx Internet Archive for the pdf).
There was a good bit of a peek into the mindset of craftsman during this time (early 1900s), and that was appreciate along with the alphabets.

[Loki · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great resource for anyone interested in lettering. I'll be using this for many years to come, I think!

[♥Xeni♥ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not only is this book published in 1898, but it also has some great information in it. Day writes about the Art of Alphabets, and how they developed over the years in a succinct and understandable manner, for all that it's written over 115 years ago.

Little tidbits of information that you'd normally never think about came to the forefront here, such as, "It was not until the 10th century that the custom arose of reserving V for the beginning of a word, and elsewhere using U." That explains why we have so few words beginning with U and so many with V.

Anyway, it was a very informative read, and seeing the alphabets (though I've seen most of them already) was wonderful too.

[Issendai]

A scan of this book is available at http://archive.org/details/alphabetso... .