Fraktur: Difference between revisions

Latin script (Fraktur variant)
Latin script (Fraktur variant);
Script type	Alphabet
Time period	16th century – 1946
Direction	Left-to-right
Languages	German¹ and some other European languages
Related scripts
Parent systems	Blackletter Latin script (Fraktur variant);
Child systems	Kurrentschrift, including Sütterlin
Sister systems	See Blackletter
ISO 15924
ISO 15924	Latf (217), Latin (Fraktur variant)
Unicode
Unicode range	0020–00FF²
	1: And related languages.; 2: normal Latin range; see below
	This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨ ⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters.

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The German word Fraktur ([frakˈtuːr]^ⓘ ) refers to a specific sub-group of blackletter typefaces. The word derives from the past participle fractus (“broken”) of Latin frangere (“to break”). As opposed to Antiqua (common) typefaces, which were modelled after antique Roman square capitals and Carolingian minuscule, the blackletter lines are broken up.

The term fraktur is sometimes applied to all of the blackletter typefaces.

Characteristics

One difference between the Fraktur and other blackletter scripts is that in the small-letter o, the left part of the bow is broken, but the right part is not.

Besides the 26 letters of the Latin alphabet, and the ß (ess-zet) and vowels with umlauts as well, Fraktur typefaces include the ſ (long s), sometimes a variant form of the letter r, and a variety of ligatures once intended to aid the typesetter and which have specialized rules for their use. Most older Fraktur typefaces make no distinction between the majuscules "I" and "J" (where the common shape is more suggestive of a "J"), even though the minuscules "i" and "j" are differentiated.

Origin

The first Fraktur typeface was designed when Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (c. 1493–1519) established a series of books and had a new typeface created specifically for this purpose. Fraktur quickly overtook the earlier Schwabacher and Textualis typefaces in popularity, and a wide variety of Fraktur fonts were carved.

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 ==Origin==
 The first Fraktur typeface was designed when [[Holy Roman Emperor]] [[Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor|Maximilian I]] (c. 1493–1519) established a series of books and had a new typeface created specifically for this purpose. Fraktur quickly overtook the earlier [[Schwabacher]] and [[Textualis]] typefaces in popularity, and a wide variety of Fraktur fonts were carved.
-==Use==
-[[Image:Gebrochene Schriften.png|thumb|200px|Overview of some blackletter typefaces]]
-Typesetting in Fraktur was still very common in the early 20th century in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland as opposed to other countries that typeset in [[Antiqua]] in the early 20th century. Some books from the time used related blackletter fonts such as ''Schwabacher''; however, the predominant typeface was the ''Normalfraktur'' (Fig. 1), which came in various slight variations.
-Since the late 18th century, Fraktur began to be replaced by [[antiqua]] as a symbol of the classicist age and emerging cosmopolitanism. The debate surrounding this move is known as the [[Antiqua-Fraktur dispute]]. However, the shift mostly affected scientific writing, while most belletristic literature and newspapers continued to be printed in broken fonts. This radically changed when on [[January 3]], [[1941]] [[Martin Bormann]] issued a circular letter to all public offices which declared Fraktur (and its corollary, the [[Sütterlin]]-based handwriting) to be ''Judenlettern'' (Jewish letters) and prohibited further use. It has been speculated that the régime had realized that Fraktur would inhibit communication in the territories occupied during [[World War II]]. Fraktur saw a short resurgence after the War, but quickly disappeared in a Germany keen on modernising its appearance.
-Fraktur is today used mostly for decorative typesetting; for example, a number of traditional German newspapers still print their name in Fraktur on the first page, and it is also popular for pub signs and the like. In this modern decorative use the Fraktur rules about [[long s]] and short s or about [[ligature (typography)|ligature]]s are often disregarded.
-Individual Fraktur letters are also widely used in [[mathematics]], e.g., to denote [[Lie algebra]]s, [[Sigma-algebra|σ-algebra]]s or [[ring ideal|ideal]]s.
-==Fraktur in Unicode==
-In [[Unicode]], Fraktur is considered a font of the Latin script, and is not encoded separately. However, Fraktur symbols for mathematics are encoded in the '''[[Supplementary Multilingual Plane]]''' (SMP). Bold Fraktur letters (sans ß, as it's not used in mathematics) are encoded from <code>1D56C</code>–<code>1D59F</code> in the Mathematical Alphanumeric Symbols area. Regular Fraktur letters are encoded from <code>1D504</code>–<code>1D537<code> with the following exceptions: Capital C is encoded <code>0212D</code>, H <code>0210C</code>, I <code>02111</code>, R <code>0211C</code>, Z <code>02128</code> and long s with <code>017F</code>. Fraktur numerals are not encoded as of Unicode 5.0. Fraktur symbols are supported in the [[freeware]] Unicode font [[Code2001]].
-==Samples==
-''(The German sentence in the figures [after the name of the font, '''Walbaum-Fraktur:''' or '''Humboldfraktur:'''] reads: "Victor jagt zwölf Boxkämpfer quer über den Sylter Deich". This is a nonsense sentence meaning "Victor chases twelve box fighters across the dike of [[Sylt]]", but contains all 26 letters of the alphabet plus the German [[Umlaut (diacritic)|umlauts]] and is thus an example of a [[pangram]].)''
-[[Image:Fraktur walbaum.png|center|frame|'''Fig. 1:''' Walbaum-Fraktur (1800)]]
-[[Image:Fraktur humboldtfraktur.png|center|frame|'''Fig. 2:''' Humboldtfraktur<br>(Hiero Rhode, 1938)]]
-==See also==
-* [[Sütterlin]]
-* [[long s]]
-* [[Eszett]]
-* [[Emphasis (typography)]]
-* [[Blackletter]]
-* [[Fette Fraktur]]
-* [[Antiqua-Fraktur dispute]]
-* [[Fraktur (Pennsylvania German folk art)]]
-* [[Pennsylvania German]]
-* [[Gaelic script]]
-==References and further reading==
-{{Commons|Fraktur}}
-* [http://www.library.yale.edu/cataloging/music/fraktur.htm A complete Fraktur chart]
-* [http://www.steffmann.de/ Website of Dieter Steffmann] (in German), which has a large number of [http://moorstation.org/typoasis/designers/steffmann/index.htm digitized Fraktur fonts]
-* [http://www.asherwin.com/frakturscript2.html Fraktur and German Script]
-* [http://www.waldenfont.com/products/kur/history.asp The Walden Font Co. &ndash; Purveyors of old and historic fonts and clip-art]
-* [http://www.cooper.edu/art/lubalin/bletterpub.html Blackletter: Type and National Identity]
-* [http://www.fraktur.com Delbanco: German Purveyors of Fraktur fonts] {{De icon}}
-*Bain, Peter and Paul Shaw. ''Blackletter: Type and National Identity.'' Princeton Architectural Press: 1998. ISBN 1-56898-125-2.
-*Fiedl, Frederich, Nicholas Ott and Bernard Stein. ''Typography: An Encyclopedic Survey of Type Design and Techniques Through History.'' Black Dog & Leventhal: 1998. ISBN 1-57912-023-7.
-*Macmillan, Neil. ''An A–Z of Type Designers.'' Yale University Press: 2006. ISBN 0-300-11151-7.
-*[http://www.i18nguy.com/surrogates.html Setting up Microsoft Windows NT, 2000 or Windows XP to support Unicode supplementary characters]
-* Eberhard Dilba: ''Typographie-Lexikon'' und Lesebuch für alle, 2. Auflage, Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2008, ISBN 978-3-8334-2522-6.
-* [http://eberhard-dilba.homepage.t-online.de/ Typographie-Lexikon von Eberhard Dilba] (PDF in German), Fraktur and Gebrochene Schriften.
-[[Category:Blackletter]]
-[[cs:Fraktura (písmo)]]
-[[da:Fraktur (typografi)]]
-[[de:Fraktur (Schrift)]]
-[[es:Fraktur]]
-[[fr:Fraktur]]
-[[it:Fraktur]]
-[[hu:Fraktur]]
-[[nl:Fraktur]]
-[[ja:フラクトゥール]]
-[[no:Fraktur (skrift)]]
-[[ru:Фрактура]]
-[[fi:Fraktuura]]
-[[sv:Frakturstil]]
-[[uk:Фрактура]]