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Garamond is a group of many serif typefaces, named for sixteenth-century Parisian engraver Claude Garamond, generally spelled as Garamont in his lifetime. Garamond-style typefaces are popular and particularly often used for book printing and body text. Garamond's types followed the model of an influential typeface cut for Venetian printer Aldus Manutius by his punchcutter Francesco Griffo in 1495, and are in what is now called the old-style of serif letter design, letters with a relatively organic structure resembling handwriting with a pen, but with a slightly more structured, upright design. Following an eclipse in popularity in the eighteenth and nineteenth century, many modern revival faces in the Garamond style have been developed. It is common to pair these with italics based on those created by his contemporary Robert Granjon, who was well known for his proficiency in this genre. However, although Garamond himself remains considered a major figure in French printing of the sixteenth century, historical research has increasingly placed him in context as one artisan punchcutter among many active at a time of rapid production of new typefaces in sixteenth-century France, and research has only slowly developed into which fonts were cut by him and which by contemporaries; Robert Bringhurst commented that "it was a widespread custom for many years to attribute almost any good sixteenth-century French font" to Garamond. As a result, while "Garamond" is a common term in the printing industry, the terms "French Renaissance antiqua" and "Garalde" have been used in academic writing to refer generally to fonts on the Aldus-French Renaissance model by Garamond and others. In particular, many 'Garamond' revivals of the early twentieth century are actually based on the work of a later punchcutter, Jean Jannon, whose noticeably different work was for some years misattributed to Garamond. The most common digital font named Garamond is Monotype Garamond. Developed in the early 1920s and bundled with Microsoft Office, it is a revival of Jannon's work. Characteristics Some distinctive characteristics in Garamond's letterforms are an 'e' with a small eye and the bowl of the 'a' which has a sharp turn at top left. Other general features are limited but clear stroke contrast and capital letters on the model of Roman square capitals. The 'M' is slightly splayed with outward-facing serifs at the top (sometimes only on the left) and the leg of the 'R' extends outwards from the letter. The x-height (height of lower-case letters) is low, especially at larger sizes, making the capitals large relative to the lower case, while the top serifs on the ascenders of letters like 'd' have a downward slope and ride above the cap height. The axis of letters like the ‘o’ is diagonal and the bottom right of the italic 'h' bends inwards. Garamond types have quite expansive ascenders and descenders; printers at the time did not use leading. Besides general characteristics, writers on type have generally praised the even quality of Garamond's type: John A. Lane describes his work as "elegant and executed with consummate skill...to a higher standard than commercial interest demanded"; H. D. L. Vervliet wrote that in his later Gros-Canon and Parangonne types (meaning sizes of around 40pt and 18pt respectively) he had achieved "a culmination of Renaissance design. The elegant line and subdued emphasis show the classic search for silent and transparent form". Modern Garamond revivals also often add a matching bold and 'lining' numbers at the height of capital letters, neither of which were used during the Renaissance; Arabic numerals in Garamond's time were engraved as what are now called text figures, styled with variable height like lower-case letters. History Garamond’s life and his roman type Garamond worked as an engraver of punches, the masters used to stamp matrices, the moulds used to cast metal type. Garamond cut types in the 'roman', or upright style, in italic, and Greek. In the period of Garamond's early life roman type had been displacing the blackletter or Gothic type which was used in some (although not all) early French printing. Though his name was generally written as 'Garamont' in his lifetime, the spelling 'Garamond' became the most commonly used form after his death. H. D. L. Vervliet, the leading contemporary expert on French Renaissance printing, uses Garamont consistently. The roman designs of Garamond which are his most imitated were based on a font cut around 1495 for the Venetian printer Aldus Manutius by engraver Francesco Griffo. This was first used in the book De Aetna, a short work by poet and cleric Pietro Bembo which was Manutius' first printing in the Latin alphabet. Historian Beatrice Warde has assessed De Aetna as something of a pilot project, a small book printed to a higher standard than Manutius' norm. Among other details, this font popularised the idea that in printing the cross-stroke of the 'e' should be level instead of slanting upwards to the right like handwriting, something imitated in almost all type designs since. French typefounders of the 16th century assiduously examined Manutius's work (and, it is thought, De Aetna in particular) as a source of inspiration: Garamond's roman, italic and Greek typefaces were all influenced by types used by Manutius. An event which was to particularly define the course of the rest of Garamond's career came starting on 6 September 1530, when the printer Robert Estienne began to introduce a set of three roman types adapting the single roman type used in De Aetna to a range of sizes. These typefaces, with their "light colour and precise cut" were extremely influential and other Parisian printers immediately introduced copies. The largest size "Gros-canon" (42.5pt) particularly became a "phenomenon" in Paris: never before had a roman type been cut in so large a size. The designs copied Manutius's type even to the extent of copying the 'M' shown in De Aetna which, whether intentionally or due to a casting defect, had no serif pointing out of the letter at top right. This form was to appear in many fonts of the period, including Garamond's earlier ones, although by the end of his career he had switched to mostly using an M on the Roman capital model with a serif at top right. The period from 1520 to around 1560, encompassing Garamond's career, was an extremely busy period for typeface creation. Many fonts were cut, some such as Robert Estienne's for a single printer's exclusive use, others sold or traded between them (increasingly over time). The many active engravers included Garamond himself, Granjon, Guillaume Le Bé, particularly respected for his Hebrew fonts, Pierre Haultin, Antoine Augereau (who may have been Garamond's master), Estienne's stepfather Simon de Colines and others. This period saw the creation of a pool of high-quality punches and matrices, many of which would remain used for the next two centuri.... Discover the Garamond Press popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Garamond Press books.