Reading Early Printed Books

Type evidence can help identify the time period or printer when direct evidence is lacking.

Early printers followed practices in use by scribes creating manuscripts. Common among these practices were:

1. the use of the elongated "s", similarly shaped like an "f"
2. the abbreviation of Latin words (carried over from manuscript practice as described here)
3. the interchangeable use of the letters "u" and "v", and using two "v"s (vv) to make a "w"

Daldianus Artemidorus' De somniorum interpretatione, Libri Quinque (Basel: Hieronymus Froben and Nicolaus Episcopius,, 1544) BF1080 .A7 1544

Follow the links to find books using the terms below. Click on the "Examples" link to see visual examples of each term.

Special Collections uses only two terms from the Rare Books & Manuscripts Type Terms list:

• Black letter types - such as Gothic types - Examples
• Italic types - Examples