In the treatise on Printing the reader will find that the invention of the art of type-founding was a very early consequence of the discovery of the rude art of taking impressions from laboriously excised letters of wood and metal; and that, after an investigation of the statements of various authors, the honour of the invention has been given to the illustrious partnership of Gutenberg, Fust, and Schoeffer, the larger share being allowed to the latter, as having had practice in the design and proportioning of letters in his original employment of an illuminator; that the place of the invention was the city of Mentz, and that the time was about the year 1467. Nor, upon examination, will it appear that any other can dispute the honour with these worthies, inasmuch as they indisputably used cast-metal types before the secession of Gutenberg from his associates, and consequently before the dispersion of their workmen by the capture of Mentz in the year 1462; nor will the claims of Koster of Haarlem in any case interfere with these, the most sanguine of his supporters carrying his pretensions no farther than the art of taking impressions from excised characters of wood, of lead, and lastly of tin. The necessity of some improvement upon the original method of forming types, even on the very limited scale upon which the first efforts of typography were conducted, must be obvious, and it appears to have advanced in a natural and rapid course. The first step seems to have been the striking of a letter of approved cut, answering in some degree to the modern punch, into soft clay or plaster, and the infusion of metal into the mould thus formed; the shaft or body, which by so rude and uncertain a method must necessarily have been rough and untrue, being dressed into correctness by manual labour. The art of casting and working metals, however, being at that time by no means defective, and Fust being by profession a worker in gold and silver, it is probable that a process not unlike the modern was soon invented; but of this we have no certain evidence, the whole art of printing being carefully kept a "mystery" by the initiated until about half a century after the probable date of the invention. That the mould was an early invention is shown by the device of Badius Ascensius, an eminent printer of Paris and Lyon in the beginning of the sixteenth century, and also by that of an English printer, Anthony Scoloker of Ipswich, who modified and adopted the device of Ascensius, as indeed did many other printers of various countries. This curious design exhibits in one apartment the various processes of printing; the foreground presenting a press in full work, the background on the left the cases and the compositor, and on the right the foundry, in which a workman is casting types by means of a mould, bearing a precise resemblance to those at present in use. This introduces to observation the fact that the earlier printers generally combined all the various processes of their profession in their own offices; although it would appear, that as the art spread over Europe, and secrecy became less and less necessary, the most enterprising speedily began to furnish their distant brethren with types from their respective foundries. Thus it would appear that the first types of the English archtypographer Caxton were supplied by Ulric Zell, and that it was not until the establishment of his printing-house at Westminster that he began to cut letter in imitation of his own handwriting, and more agreeable to the fashion of writing at that time in use in England. Letton and Machlinia are supposed to have purchased their types from foreign foundries, perhaps from Lyon or Milan. But Wynkyn de Worde discarded that jealousy which had hitherto obstructed the progress of the art in England, and having cut many fonts of considerable beauty, supplied his contemporary typographers. His black letter in especial was so much esteemed as to have been in use to a very late period, and it is said that remnants of his fonts are to be found in some of the most ancient printing establishments; nay, it is even possible that some of his original punches or matrices might yet by a diligent antiquary be discovered—a valuable and interesting addition to our many curious relics of the art.
The first record of the separation of the art of type-founding from that of printing would appear to be a decree of the Star-Chamber in the reign of Charles I., dated 11th July 1637. This was probably one of the attempts to suppress the printing of seditious works by the rising Puritans, who, after establishing secret printing-offices in various parts of the kingdom, found it necessary for secrecy to cut their fonts themselves. The decree seems to have been in some degree a revival of one of the same nature, 28 Elizabeth, limiting the number of printers to twenty. By the first-mentioned decree it was ordered,
That there shall be four founders of letters for printing, and no more.
That the Archbishop of Canterbury, or the Bishop of London, with six other high commissioners, shall supply the places of those four as they shall become void.
That no master founder shall keep above two apprentices at one time.
That all journeymen founders be employed by the masters of the trade, and that idle journeymen be compelled to work, upon pain of imprisonment, and such other punishment as the court shall think fit.
That no master founder of letters shall employ any other person in any work belonging to the casting and founding of letters than freemen or apprentices to the trade, save only in pulling off the knots of metal hanging at the end of the letters when they are first cast, in which work every master founder may employ one boy only not bound to the trade.
The four founders appointed by this decree to serve the whole kingdom were John Grismand, Thomas Wright, Arthur Nicholas, and Alexander Fifield.
This decree was revived 14th Charles II., renewed 16th Charles II., and again for seven years 1st James II., at which term it expired, and was never renewed.
The fonts in use in English printing-offices may be divided into two kinds; those used for book, and those for job printing; that is, hand and posting bills, &c. Of book types there are twelve regular bodies—viz., Great Primer, English, Pica, Small Pica, Long Primer, Bourgeois, Brevis, Minion, Nonpareil, Ruby, Pearl, and Diamond. Besides these, Minion-Nonpareil is a good deal used; and some founders have introduced intermediate fonts, as Emerald.
It is much to be regretted that no uniform standard has been adopted by letter-founders for their fonts of the same-named letter; they vary not only from those of other founders, but even from their own, owing to which it seldom happens that any two fonts stand together. This is the cause of much inconvenience, as in the instance of capitals and small capitals, accented letters, signs, and other sorts introduced into common matter; the printer being obliged to purchase a small quantity of each with every font, whereas, were there any uniformity, he might have a considerable quantity to be used with any font as occasion required.
Great Primer (Fr. Gros Romain; Ger. Tertia) is the largest type in use in book printing, being chiefly for large Bibles, on which account it is sometimes called Bible Text; but it is very seldom employed. There are about 61\(\frac{1}{2}\) ms to a foot; it is double the body of Bourgeois.
English (Fr. St Augustin; Ger. Mittel) is much used for church Bibles, and for works in folio and quarto. The French name is probably derived from its being first used to print the works of St Augustin; the German from its being the middle of seven standard fonts used by the early German printers. There are about 64 ms to a foot; its body is equal to two Minions.
Pica (Fr. and Ger. Cicero, from its having been first used for Cicero's Epistles) is the font which is used as the general standard of measurement in casting leads, quotations, cutting rule, and regulating the price of press-work, &c. It is in very extensive use for works of a standard character, history, art, and other library works; it is sufficiently large for weak eyes, and not too great for moderately sized 8vo pages, being in fact the just medium. There are 71 ms to a foot, and it is equal to two Nonpareils.
Small Pica (Fr. Philosophie; Ger. Brevier) is perhaps the most extensively used of all the fonts, being a very useful and well-proportioned letter. Novels are almost always printed in this body. 83 ms to a foot, equal to two Rubies.
Long Primer (Fr. Petit Romain; Ger. Corpus) is likewise much used, being very well adapted for works in 12mo, dictionaries, and other works in which much matter is to be got into a small space; it is the type of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. 89 ms = 1 foot: two Pearls.
Bourgeois (Fr. Gaillarde; the Germans have none to correspond) is much used for the same purposes as Long Primer, and in solid matter is difficult to distinguish by the eye from that body. 102 ms = 1 foot: two Diamonds.
Brevis (Fr. Petite Texte; Ger. Petit or Jungfer) is so called from its having been much used for printing breviaries. It is much employed for small works, and for notes. 112\(\frac{1}{2}\) ms = 1 foot.
Minion (Fr. Mignonne; Ger. Colonel) is chiefly in use for newspaper advertisements; it is a very pretty font, and
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1 A copy of the Speculum Humanae Salvationis, in the library of the late Duke of Marlborough, presents probably the earliest specimen of cast types, twenty-five of its leaves being printed from solid wooden blocks, or perhaps from wooden blocks on which the designs have been so cut that the scrolls, cut upon other blocks, were inserted in spaces left for them; while, in thirty-eight leaves, the scrolls are in cast type, inserted in the designs in lieu of the engraved scrolls. (See PRINTING.) well adapted for pocket editions, prayer-books, and Bibles; it is perhaps the smallest of readable sizes. 128 ms = 1 foot: half English.
Nonpareil (Fr. and Ger. Nonpareille), used for the same purposes as Minion. 143 ms = 1 foot: half Pica.
Ruby (no body to correspond in France or Germany), used for pocket dictionaries, prayer-books, &c.; but it is too small for any but the strongest sight. 163 ms = 1 foot: half Small Pica.
Pearl (Fr. Parisienne; Ger. Perl), used for the same purposes. 178 ms = 1 foot: half Long Primer.
Diamond (Fr. and Ger. Diamond) is the smallest body cut; it is distressingly small, and is used mostly for notes to works in Nonpareil and the descending bodies. The French have succeeded in cutting the face so small as to be illegible, and an annual lately sold in London in this letter was accompanied with a magnifying glass. 205 ms = 1 foot: half Bourgeois.
The principal apparatus in the casting of type are the punch, the matrix, and the mould. The punch (or puncheon) is a piece of steel bearing upon one end a single letter, which is formed by hammering, filing, and other processes, and differs in no other respect from ordinary punches than the unusual care and accuracy with which it is worked. It must be remembered, that as each letter is but one of a large number with which it is to harmonise, the height must be obtained with the greatest precision, the breadth both of the heavy and the fine strokes must be carefully proportioned, the turns graceful. This general harmony is not very difficult to attain in the coarser fancy type, there being in this, as in other arts, little merit in imitating the vulgar or the grotesque; but the elegant and symmetrical face of book type is as difficult to attain as the exquisite grace of the higher productions of the arts; and yet, to such perfection have modern artists attained, that the practised eye has little difficulty in assigning an individual letter to its proper fount, and even if the printer has turned his attention to the particulars of his art, to the foundry and the artist, the punch-cutter of a foundry of character having a professional reputation, like a painter or engraver. Mr Moxon, a mechanician of great ingenuity, in his Mechanical Exercises, has the credit of first assigning rules for the shaping of letters, laying down geometrical rules for the angles of inclination, the curves, and for adjusting the base from which the shoulders of the letter should rise to obtain the greatest strength. From this the modern artists have varied, obtaining great sharpness of appearance combined with strength and durability. Although beyond a doubt Mr Moxon's formulae have been of great advantage to subsequent punch-cutters, he was by no means a successful artist himself; his type, cut upon the most philosophical principles, being uglier than that of his contemporaries.
The matrix is a small piece of copper into which the punch is struck. Much care is also requisite in doing this, although, provided it be struck sufficiently deep, the surface of the copper may be filed down so as to leave the impress of the exact depth. It has been explained in the treatise on Printing, that to obtain equality of impression, the face of the composed type must be in an exact plane, from which it will be easily understood that the just depth of the impression in the matrix is a matter of much importance. The copper must now be carefully dressed at the ends and sides, in order that, when adjusted in the mould, the character, when cast, may be so placed upon its body that it shall stand exactly even with its brother characters; the nicety required in this is surprising.
The mould is a very simple but very ingenious apparatus, consisting of two parts, so contrived that, being properly placed together (viz., a 2 in a 1, b 1 in b 2, c 2 on c 1, and d 1 on d 2), they form in the centre e a space which is geometrically described as a parallelopiped, being, in fact, the mould in which the type is formed; the matrix f is placed at the bottom; the metal is poured in at the top. compass upon a piece of copper or brass, the part so marked out is cut away, care being taken to cut the back somewhat wider than the front, the sloping edge forming the shoulder of the future type. The piece of brass now very much resembles the plates used for stencilling the large headings of legal forms; it is next riveted upon a smooth surface of brass, which forms the face of the letter.
Such was the method of casting type invented by the earliest typographers, and continued to the present day by modern type-founders. But the large founds and frequent renewals required by the modern system of literary enterprise have produced many ingenious plans for superseding hand-casting by machinery. The invention which has come into use, and is adopted in most large foundries, is of American origin, but was patented by Mr E. Newton in 1850. It may be described as the primitive mould worked by machinery. The mould-blocks are opened, closed, and adjusted by means of a crank-pin, which works in a slot, formed in an arm connected with the standard of the mould-blocks. The matrix is presented to and withdrawn from the mould-blocks by means of levers. The matrix being in its place, and the mould-blocks adjusted, a jet of molten type-metal is forced through a nipple into the mould by a plunger working in a piston-box inserted in the fusing-pot. The injective force drives the metal into the matrix, so as to form a cast of great sharpness and accuracy, and the metal sets instantaneously. The machinery now opens the mould-blocks and withdraws the matrix; and in the movement the new type, which is made to adhere to one side of the mould-block by a slight projection, is brought under the point of a rod, which picks it from its place. The whole apparatus is set in motion by a small hand fly-wheel. The types are cast with a rapidity varying with the size. The large 3-line and 4-line letters require a slight pause at each stroke of the pump to allow the metal to set; but the smaller types, such as pica, small pica, and long primer, are cast with a continuous motion, at the rate of from 80 to 120 a minute: 10,000 may be easily cast in a day. Quadrats and spaces are thrown down with wonderful rapidity. The types cast by the machine require precisely the same dressing as those cast by hand. Machine-cast types are of somewhat less specific gravity.
The ordinary ingredients of type-metal are lead, antimony, and a small proportion of tin. Each foundry has its own secret, either as to the proportions of these articles, or as to other materials added. Some are known to add arsenic, others copper, in small proportions. Much of the durability of type is also known to depend upon the degree of heat applied, and to the rapidity with which crystallization takes place. A very hard type-metal has been patented, composed of 75 per cent. of tin and 25 per cent. of antimony; or if any lead be added, it must be in very small proportion. Type of this composition is more expensive than that of common metal, but it is specifically lighter, and is said to be durable. Another metal patented by an experienced firm is composed of zinc, nickel, and copper, to which, when fused, a small quantity of lead is added. This mixture is then combined with a fusion of lead and antimony, and the whole subjected to a very high heat.
There have been some so-called improvements in type, which not having proved practically useful, are mentioned only as matters of curiosity. Such is the process of coating the face of type with copper by electro-deposition. Type so treated is of course much more expensive than type plain; but although perhaps electro-faced type may be more enduring of friction, it has proved unable to withstand planing-down and other practical treatment, or the alternations of temperature; and the facing is apt to scale off. If a small portion of the found becomes thus affected, the whole becomes useless.
Type has been formed of cold metal by pressing the ends of square shanks into dies (aprototype). This, as regards type-metal, is a more expensive and less perfect process than casting; and as to copper, its greater durability is more than counterbalanced by the great value of the material, the rapid destruction of the dies, and the temptation to the workmen.
SPECIMEN OF TYPES.
Although in the treatise on Type-Founding the names of the different sizes of type used in the printing of books have been given, yet it has been deemed advisable to append here a specimen of the founds which are more commonly in use, with their names affixed, in order that authors may be enabled more readily to point out the type on which they wish any work or part of a work to be printed.
ENGLISH.
"Every printing-house is, by the custom of time out of mind, called a Chapel, and all the workmen that belong to it are members of the Chapel; and the oldest freeman is father of the Chapel. I suppose the style was originally conferred upon it by the courtesie of some great church-man, or men (doubtless when chapels were in more veneration than of late years they have been here in England), who, for the books of divinity that proceeded from a printing-house, gave it the reverend title of Chapel."
LONG PRIMER.
BOURGEOIS.
MINION.
PEARL.
DIAMOND.