Ah, fonts. Most of us have our favourites. In fact, I once had a wonderful evening with a guy in a bar in New York after we got chatting because he had my then-favourite font (Trebuchet) tattooed on his leg. But that’s a story for another time. Back to business – do you know where the word ‘font’ comes from? Well, it actually goes all the way back to the Middle Ages and the early days of printing.
‘Font’ comes from the Middle French word, ‘fonte’, which means ‘something that’s been melted’. That in turn comes from the Latin verb ‘fundere’, meaning ‘to melt’ or ‘to cast’. So what’s with all the melting? Well, it refers to the traditional process of creating typefaces, where individual letters were cast in metal. A printer would use these metal letters to create a page of text, which they’d then cover in ink and press on paper. Each typeface needed a full set of these metal pieces, which were collectively referred to as, you’ve guessed it, a font.
Bonus word of the week – leading. I’m referring to the one pronounced ‘ledding’, which these days refers to the distance between lines of text. It’s called that because traditionally printers would insert strips of lead between lines of type to increase the spacing. Interesting, right?
(Oh, and if you’ve ever wondered how some of the fonts we use every day got their names, have a read of this blog post. It also explains the difference between ‘font’ and ‘typeface’, if you care about such things.)