4. The History of Western Handwriting ✍️ 📚

In this week’s episodes, I share about the western lineage of handwriting from the Sumerians in Uruk to modern day handwriting in America. I mention two books in this episode, “Paper” by Mark Kurlansky (https://amzn.to/3jeHa5i) and “Mastering copperplate calligraphy” by Eleanor Winters. (https://amzn.to/3luVngu) Here’s the general timeline (with some points of history I didn’t mention): * 50,000 BCE - Humans start drawing lines * 15,000 BCE - Humans have learned to paint with dynamism with cave painting at Lascoix, France * 3000 BCE - Mesopotamian cuneiform, including Sumatran, which included the first phonetic characters. * 2400 BCE - Egyptians began using parchment * 1500 BCE - Phoenician alphabet create with 22 phonetic letters, first fully phonetic alphabet * Around 400 BCE - The Athenians declare the Ionian alphabet the official alphabet * By 146 BCE - the Roman Empire conquers the Greek empire and borrows for their own alphabet of 23 characters * Late 700s CE - Charlemagne standardizes writing through standard teaching for scribes * 10th Century CE - U added to the alphabet * 12th Century CE - W added to the alphabet * 15th Century CE - J added to the alphabet * 1588 CE- England defeats the Spanish Armada and takes control of the seas * 17th Century CE - Expansion of English economy through trade causes for an increase in scribe and tutors. * Mid-1880’s CE- Spencerian method develop and taught widely in the US * Late 1880s CE - New methods, including Palmer and Zaner-Bloser methods developed * 1970’s CE - D’Nealian® style developed