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Although invented earlier, the typewriter was patented in 1868. It was a crude machine. The first machines were unwieldy and without a shift key. They could write only capital letters. Improvements came only gradually. It is an interesting connection that the calligraphic revival was started in 1870 by the English writer and artist William Morris. The interest in lettering as an art for art's sake came about just as the need for lettering as an everyday practical skill was declining. Penmanship was part of the normal means of communication, but when an old media becomes somewhat obsolete, it acquires a new life as a fine art.
The Oxford English Dictionary, whose multiple volumes give the history of our words, gives some clues to this transformation. "Calligraphy" appears in 1613 as "faire writing". It was writing or penmanship of a professional quality, as in a phrase of Ben Jonson, "my kalligraphy, a fair hand, fit for a secretary". The calligrapher was the professional "transcriber of manuscripts", a copyist with a flair. By 1866, one author was led to lament that " the age of calligraphy is gone".
While through the ages, scribes took pride in their work, as does any craftsman, calligraphy was a technical skill rather than a fine art. Decorations, flourishes and knotwork were added to a work, but were not the main point. In the Moslem world, however, the calligraphy early appeared as an art for is own sake. One of the reasons would be an Islamic rule called hadith, which forbade representations of man or animals, although sometimes interpreted as allowing images of plants (because an image of a plant could not lead to idol worship). Yet human beings have to have art.
The Moslems directed their artistic drive toward creating intricate and symmetrical geometrical patterns, often involving plant motifs. The written word was itself used decoratively, and inscriptions would weave in and out of the inlay work on religious buildings.
One form of artistic lettering was called the tughra: the sultans of the Ottoman turks would have their scribes create a complex monogram out of their name and various titles, with great flourishes and knotwork. The tughra would be copied on official documents. The same sultans collected outstanding examples of lettering in art portfolios, which might show their high regard for lettering as pure art.
by Hugh MacDonald