Pompeii Amphitheater Inscription: Where Do Serifs Come From?
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During my studies in Italy, I took this photograph of an inscription inside of the Amphitheater of Pompeii. It dates to sometime shortly after the restoration of the Amphitheater after the earthquake of 62 A.D.. This is a fascinating specimen to me because I think it exhibits the relationship between medium and form in type design.
In Fred Smeijers’ Counterpunch: Making Type in the Sixteenth Century, Designing Typefaces Now, he implies that serifs such as those on the typography of Trajan’s Column are a product of the form derived from brushing the letters on the stone (the type was brushed on before being chiseled in), and trying to complement the one-sided serif that inevitably showed up at each stroke’s terminus (p. 53). This may very well be the birth of the serif, but I think at least for this inscription, the limitations of the chisel spawned the serifs.
One reason I believe the form of these letters is derived from the chisel rather than the brush is the lack of weight variation in the strokes that a brush would yield from changes in pressure. Another reason is that the serifs only appear where a stroke doesn’t terminate into another stroke. You can imagine how unsightly the terminals of a stroke formed by a chisel would look if the designer hadn’t turned the chisel perpendicular to the stroke for a finishing touch. Notice how the “D” doesn’t have serifs, such as would be the case on a brush-derived letter such as Trajan. This may have been the first sans-serif type design were it not for the limitations of the chisel.
Of course, a digital type designer doesn’t have this concern, and it makes it easy to wind up designing a typeface that doesn’t have the rational beauty that tool-derived forms have. This can be difficult to achieve when you’re designing by drawing the outline of a type design, rather than using a tool to draw the individual stroke.
Comments (4)
Bennett said:
This is very fascinating, but what I want to know is… Do have any photos from your trips that include BAs? Just kidding. I will have to actually think to say something slightly intelligent on this post some other time.
I wonder if you could get a quick vector version of this file, like George Morgan did on my Price Marker post. Check out the way he made a vector file from a raster image. Maybe that is not your style, but I thought I would mention it.
Posted on September 24, 2004
David said:
That would be a pretty cool font. I could call it “amphitheather,” since “pompeii” is already taken, and that font is more representative of the lettering in Pompeii.
George’s SVG graphic turned out really well. Potrace must be alot like Streamline, what a great program that is (was). I played with the levels on the file, and it looks hopeless unless I really want to trace it by hand. No thanks!
Posted on September 25, 2004
Bennett said:
David,
I know you have this book, but I thought I would share this paragraph from Philip Megg’s A History of Graphic Design. He said some very interesting things in relation to this argument. If you want to read more of this section it is on page 36 of the second edition.
“Much debate has centered on the elegant Romans serifs, which are small lines extending from the ends of the major strokes of a letterform. One theory holds that the serifs were originally chisel marks by the “cleanup” strokes as the stonemason finished carving a letter. Others argue that the inscriptions were first drawn on the stone with a flat signwriter’s brush, and that the signwriter gave a short gesture before lifting the brush to sharpen the termination of the stroke. Regardless of which tool initiated the serif as a design element, we do know that the original letters were drawn on the stone with a brush. The shapes and forms defy mathematical analysis or construction with a T-Square and compass. A letter found several times on an inscription will have subtle differences in width and proportion. In some inscriptions, lines with more letters will have both the letterforms and the negative spaces between them slightly condensed to accommodate the information. This represents and artistic judgment by the brushwriter rather than a measured calculation. Some Roman inscriptions even contain minute particles of red paint that have adhered to the stone through the centuries, leaving little doubt that the letters were painted. Monumental capitals were carved as wedge-shaped throughs. The edges of the letterforms were not sharp 90-degree angles with the flat surface of the stone; rather, a more gentle, angled taper created a shallow edge that resisted chipping and wearing.”
Posted on September 27, 2004
bola said:
I do agree that serifs’ birth is related to chisel use. The capital “D” has a smaller serif, no? Congratulations for the great article.
I’ve put an excerpt from an article that has something to do with yours
Posted on February 20, 2005