Secretary hand
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2020}}
{{short description|Style of European handwriting}}
File:Secretary hand.jpg showing the forms of the letters used in secretary hand, from a penmanship book by Jehan de Beau-Chesne and John Baildon, 1570.]]
Secretary hand or script is a style of European handwriting developed in the early sixteenth century that remained common in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries for writing English, German, Welsh and Gaelic.[http://www.scottishhandwriting.com/1hour.asp Scottish handwriting: Secretary hand: one hour basic tutorial].
History
Predominating before the dominance of Italic script, it arose out of the need for a hand more legible and universally recognizable than the book hand of the High Middle Ages, in order to cope with the increase in long-distance business and personal correspondence, in cities, chanceries and courts. The hand thus used by secretaries was developed from cursive business hands and was in common use throughout the British Isles through the seventeenth century. In spite of its loops and flourishes it was widely used by scriveners and others whose daily employment comprised hours of writing. By 1618 the writing-master Martin Billingsley in his The Pen's Excellency, 1618,{{sfn|Ioppolo |2010|p=177}} distinguished three forms of secretary hand, as well as "mixed" hands that employed some Roman letterforms, and the specialised hands, the "court hand" used only in the courts of the King's Bench and Common Pleas and the archaic hands used for engrossing pipe rolls and other documents.
At the time of Henry VII, many writers began to use the "Italian" style instead, a cursive script developed from the humanist minuscule or "Roman" hand which was easier to read but also easier to forge. English ladies were often taught an "Italian hand", suitable for the occasional writing that they were expected to do.{{sfn|Ioppolo |2010|pp=178f}} Grace Ioppolo notes{{sfn|Ioppolo |2010|p=177}} that the convention in writing the texts of dramas was to write act and scene settings, characters' names and stage directions in italic, and the dialogue in secretary hand. The modern use of italic font stems from these distinctions.{{fact|date=May 2021}}
Aside from palaeographers themselves, genealogists, social historians and scholars of Early Modern literature have become accustomed to reading secretary hand.{{webarchive | url =https://web.archive.org/web/20101202091758/http://genealogy.about.com/od/paleography/ig/old_handwriting/Secretary-Hand.htm | date =2 December 2010 |title=Genealogy: Secretary hand }}{{cite web|url=http://penroom.co.uk/The_secretary_hand.aspx |publisher=University of Leicester|website= The Pen Room|title= Secretary hand|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110301112622/http://penroom.co.uk/The_secretary_hand.aspx |archive-date=2011-03-01}}
{{Clear}}
{{gallery |title=Notable examples of secretary hand in use |height=400 |width=300
|File:Secretary hand bond 1623.jpg
|Covenant bond from 1623 written in Latin and English
|File:Book of Dean of Lismore page.jpg
|Book of the Dean of Lismore (16th century), written in Scottish Gaelic
|File:Shakespeare-Testament.jpg
|William Shakespeare's will, written in 1616{{sfn|Shakespeare|Hamilton|Fletcher|1994|pp=131–33}}
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See also
{{portal|Writing}}
{{div col|colwidth=30em}}
- {{Annotated link |Bastarda}}
- {{Annotated link |Blackletter}}
- {{Annotated link |Book hand}}
- {{Annotated link |Calligraphy}}
- {{anli|Chancery hand}} (used in the records of the Court of Common Pleas)
- {{anli|Court hand}} (also known as law hand, Anglicana, cursiva antiquior, or charter hand)
- {{Annotated link |Cursive}}
- {{Annotated link |Hand (writing style)}}
- {{Annotated link |Handwriting}}
- {{Annotated link |History of writing}}
- {{Annotated link |Italic script}}
- {{Annotated link |Palaeography}}
- {{Annotated link |Penmanship}}
- {{Annotated link |Ronde script (calligraphy)}}
- {{Annotated link |Rotunda (script)}}
- {{Annotated link |Round hand}}
{{div col end}}
==References==
=Notes=
{{reflist}}
=Bibliography=
{{refbegin}}
- {{cite book|title=Cardenio, Or, the Second Maiden's Tragedy|first1= William |last1=Shakespeare|author2-link=Charles Hamilton (handwriting expert)|first2=Charles |last2=Hamilton|first3= John |last3=Fletcher |publisher=Glenbridge |date= 1994|isbn=0-944435-24-6|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Y5s_dLBFBlsC&pg=PA131}}
- {{cite book|last=Ioppolo|first=Grace |editor=Michael Hattaway|title=A New Companion to English Renaissance Literature and Culture|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ir--jdx7ldgC&pg=PA177|year=2010|publisher=John Wiley & Sons|isbn=978-1-4443-1902-6|chapter=Early modern handwriting}}
- {{cite book|title=A Secretary Hand ABC Book|last=Ison|first=Alf|year=1990}}
- {{cite book|title=Secretary Hand: a beginner's introduction|last=Munby|first=Lionel M.|year=1984|publisher=British Association for Local History}}
{{refend}}
External links
{{Commons category|Secretary hand}}
- [https://www.english.cam.ac.uk/ceres/ehoc/index.html English Handwriting 1500-1700: An Online Course] from Cambridge University
- [https://www.thoughtco.com/reading-old-handwriting-1422260 Reading Old Handwriting]
- [https://www.typofonts.com/LATIN_PALEOGRAPHY.pdf Fonts for Latin Palaeography], A comprehensive PDF file containing 82 pages profusely illustrated. January 2024.
{{European calligraphy}}