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18th Century Ligatures and Fonts

by David Manthey Copyright 2001 by David Manthey

On Ligatures
When uÉng an 18th century font, there are Çeveral Çpecial charaÀers. There
is the long Ç that occurs in the middle of words, plus there are ligatures, which
are combinations of two or more charaÀers. Proper uÇe of ligatures is eËential
to make an authentic looking document.
Generally, whatever 18th century font you uÇe will have the following 12
ligature charaÀers.
ct À ff Á ffi Â
ffl à fi Ä fl Å
long s Çú sh È si É
sl Ê ss Ëú st Ì
Depending on the font, theÇe Çpecial charaÀers may appear in diÁerent
places. If you are uÉng Windows, you can uÇe the CharaÀer Map acceËory to
Çee the available ligatures. Additionally, for foreign or Latin words, the
ligatures
ae æ oe œ
may be neceËary.
The Ìandard ligatures are only uÇed on lower caÇe letters; never on
uppercaÇe. Some of the foreign ligatures may be uÇed in both an upper- and
lowercaÇe verÉon, however.

Rules for uÉng ligatures:

1. The long s ( Ç ) is uÇed in place of a lower caÇe s, however

(a) never uÇe the long s at the end of a word or immediately before an
apoÌrophe
(b) never uÇe the long s immediately after an f (e.g., oÁset).
(c) never uÇe the long s immediately before an f (e.g., transfer).
(d) never uÇe the long s immediately before a b (e.g., husbandry).
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(e) never uÇe the long s immediately before a k (e.g., task).
2. UÇe a ligature where ever poËible.
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This rule is not followed in Çome books I have examined. For example, GeodæÉa by John
Love (1768) uÇes the long s before k, whilÌ The PraÀical Surveyor by Samuel Wyld (both the
1725 and 1760 editions) does not uÇe the long s before k.
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3. UÇe the longeÌ poËible ligature (e.g., uÇe  in ÇuÂcient, not Á followed by
the letter i).
4. If two ligatures would be of the Çame length, uÇe the one that comes earlier
in the word (e.g., uÇe Ëúfollowed by i in poËible, not Ç followed by É).
5. Only uÇe a ligature containing the long s if a long s belongs in that location
(e.g., uÇe Ëúin neceËary, but not in receÇs).

Examples:
Here are Çome example words Èowing each of the 12 ligature charaÀers. Each
line liÌs Éx words which uÇe the Çame ligature.
À praÀical exaÀ objeÀion ÇeÀions direÀions ÇubtraÀ
Á oÁended oÁset diÁerent ÌaÁ eÁeÀ aÁabrous
 ÇuÂcient diÂcult oÂcers aÂance chaÂng muÂn
à aÃiÀ oÃet ruÃe aÃation ÇaÃower ÇnaÃe
Ä Änding beneÄcial Äeld deÄcient ÇuperÄcies conÄne
Å chieÅy reÅeÀ Åower Åat deÅy riÅing
Çú eaÇy Çurvey preÇent inÇpeÀs alÇo uÇes
È Èewing Èilling publiÈ cruÈ lordÈip waÈ
É curiouÉty Énce beÉdes buÉneÇs deÉgn conÉder
Ê aÊeep Êope Êuice tranÊate Êight iÊe
Ëú neceËary groËly aËign paËing poËeÇs leËer
Ì ÄrÌ Ìretch inÌrument moÌ waÌe diÌance

On Fonts
PraÀically all American and EngliÈ printing from 1735 to 1800 was done
uÉng the CaÊon font. This font was created by William CaÊon (1692-1766),
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Çometime around 1722 . Around 1754, the Baskerville font was introduced by
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John Baskerville (1706-1775). This font was uÇed for Çome fancier documents
and bibles, but many printers didn’t care for it and claimed that it was hard to
read and bad for the eyes. As a reference, Benjamin Franklin uÇed both of

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Sources claim any date between 1716 and 1734, but there is at leaÌ one book from 1725 that
I have perÇonally inÇpeÀed that uÇes CaÊon. William CaÊon Ìarted in the engraving
buÉneÇs around 1716, and Çeems to have oÁered a Çample type Èeet of his font in 1722.
BaÇed on my limited reÇearch, I ÇuÇpeÀ that the true date lies between 1720 and 1722.
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There is another font called Baskerville Old Face, which was introduced by IÇaac Moore in
1768. In addition to a new font, John Baskerville alÇo invented many improvements to the
printing proceÇs, including woven paper (to replace laid paper).
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theÇe fonts in his print Èop.

The CaÊon font has three Ìyles: roman, italic, and ÇwaÈ. The italic form
of CaÊon does not include italic numerals. Numerals were written in one of
two ways: 0123456789 in Ìandard text, and 0123456789 for Ägure captions
and drawings. The ÇwaÈ form is a fancier verÉon of italic that is uÇed only in
principal titles. The ÇwaÈ form was not in general uÇe in the early 1700s.
CaÊon Èould not be uÇed bolded; rather, a larger point Éze Èould be uÇed.

Computer Fonts
There are many verÉons of CaÊon that are available for the computer.
TheÇe range from free fonts to ones that coÌ a ÉgniÄcant amount of money.
Of the various fonts that are available, very few completely match period text.
In general, although Çome of the Èapes of individual charaÀers are diÁerent,
the biggeÌ variation is in line Çpacing and charaÀer Éze. CharaÀers Èould
appear about the Çame height as the equivalent charaÀer in the Times font,
and the line Çpacing Èould be Êightly tighter than Times.
I have created a CaÊon which is intended to exaÀly match the typeface
found in The PraÀical Surveyor, by Samuel Wyld, publiÈed in London in 1725.
I have called this font Wyld. This is uÇed in my reprint of the aforementioned
book. It can be found at http://www.orbitals.com/programs/wyld.zip, and
includes a roman and italic form of CaÊon. It does not include a ÇwaÈ form, as
the ÇwaÈ form was not in uÇe in 1725. This font is very cloÇe to the exaÀ letter
and line Çpacing of the original. The font may be adjuÌed Êightly in the
future. The Wyld font may be uÇed freely, but it may not be diÌributed
without written permiËion.
I have alÇo written a pair of MS Word macros which will automatically add
or remove ligatures from a document written uÉng the Wyld font. TheÇe are
alÇo included in the wyld.zip Äle.
After unzipping the wyld.zip Äle, inÌall the two font Äles from the control
panel. To inÌall the Word macros, copy the WyldMacros.dot Äle to the
MicroÇoft Word Ìartup direÀory. By default this direÀory is located at:
For Word95: C:\MSOffice\Winword\Startup\
For Word97: C:\Program Files\MS Office\Office\Startup\
For Word2000: C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office\Startup\
The Ìartup direÀory may be in a diÁerent location. After copying this Äle to
the Ìartup direÀory, the next time Word is Ìarted, there will be an additional
toolbar containing a and a tool. The tool adds ligatures, while the
tool removes them.