Hand (handwriting)
Encyclopedia
A Hand, in calligraphy
Calligraphy
Calligraphy is a type of visual art. It is often called the art of fancy lettering . A contemporary definition of calligraphic practice is "the art of giving form to signs in an expressive, harmonious and skillful manner"...

 and palaeography
Palaeography
Palaeography, also spelt paleography is the study of ancient writing. Included in the discipline is the practice of deciphering, reading, and dating historical manuscripts, and the cultural context of writing, including the methods with which writing and books were produced, and the history of...

 refers to one of several historical varieties of formal, impersonal, generic and exemplary writing styles. Personal variations and idiosyncrasies in writing style departing from the standard hand, which may for example allow the work of a particular scribe
Scribe
A scribe is a person who writes books or documents by hand as a profession and helps the city keep track of its records. The profession, previously found in all literate cultures in some form, lost most of its importance and status with the advent of printing...

 copying or writing a manuscript
Manuscript
A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...

 to be identified, are described by the term handwriting
Handwriting
Handwriting is a person's particular & individual style of writing with pen or pencil, which contrasts with "Hand" which is an impersonal and formalised writing style in several historical varieties...

.

List of hands

  • Chancery hand
    Chancery hand
    The term "chancery hand" can refer to one of two very different styles of historical handwriting.A chancery hand was at first a form of handwriting for business transactions that developed in the Lateran chancelry of the thirteenth century, then spread to France, notably through the Avignon...

  • Round hand
    Round hand
    Round Hand is a type of handwriting and calligraphy originating in England in the 1660s primarily by the writing masters John Ayers and William Banson...

  • Secretary hand
    Secretary hand
    Secretary hand is a style of European handwriting developed in the early sixteenth century that remained common in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries for writing English, German, Welsh and Gaelic....

  • Court hand
    Court hand
    Court hand was a style of handwriting used in medieval English law courts. Originally used by the official courts, it later came into use by professionals such as lawyers and clerks...

  • Library hand
    Library hand
    Library hand is a rounded style of handwriting once taught in library schools. The intention was to ensure uniformity and legibility in the handwritten cards of library catalogs. It was Melvil Dewey and Thomas Edison who developed and perfected the approved library hand to be taught in library...

  • Blackletter
    Blackletter
    Blackletter, also known as Gothic script, Gothic minuscule, or Textura, was a script used throughout Western Europe from approximately 1150 to well into the 17th century. It continued to be used for the German language until the 20th century. Fraktur is a notable script of this type, and sometimes...

  • Humanist minuscule
    Humanist minuscule
    Humanist minuscule is a handwriting or style of script that was invented in secular circles in Italy, at the beginning of the fifteenth century. "Few periods in Western history have produced writing of such great beauty", observes the art historian Millard Meiss...

  • Carolingian minuscule
    Carolingian minuscule
    Carolingian or Caroline minuscule is a script developed as a writing standard in Europe so that the Roman alphabet could be easily recognized by the literate class from one region to another. It was used in Charlemagne's empire between approximately 800 and 1200...

  • Roman cursive
    Roman cursive
    Roman cursive is a form of handwriting used in ancient Rome and to some extent into the Middle Ages. It is customarily divided into old cursive, and new cursive.- Old Roman cursive :...

  • Uncial script
  • Insular script
    Insular script
    Insular script was a medieval script system originally used in Ireland, then Great Britain, that spread to continental Europe under the influence of Celtic Christianity. Irish missionaries also took the script to continental Europe, where they founded monasteries such as Bobbio. The scripts were...

  • Beneventan script
    Beneventan script
    Beneventan script was a medieval script, so called because it originated in the Duchy of Benevento in southern Italy. It was also called Langobarda, Longobarda, Longobardisca , or sometimes Gothica; it was first called Beneventan by palaeographer E. A...

  • Visigothic script
    Visigothic script
    Visigothic script was a type of medieval script that originated in the Visigothic kingdom in Hispania...

  • Merovingian script
    Merovingian script
    Merovingian script was a medieval script so called because it was developed in France during the Merovingian dynasty. It was used in the 7th and 8th centuries before the Carolingian dynasty and the development of Carolingian minuscule.-Script types:...

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