Field Journal 3

It was interesting to learn about the process used to develop the new font, Romain du Roi in 1692 in France.

French king Louis XIV ordered a committee of scholars to develop new font for royal printing office. The main idea was that the new font should be developed using scientific principles. The head of the committee of scholars was a mathematician Nicolas Jaugeon.

The committee studied all previous alphabets and type designs before developing the new font. They created a grid with a total of 2304 little squares, which is very interesting when taking in account how computer fonts were initially developed a few years back. When developing new font, the committee relied on mathematical harmony verified by the use of measurements and drafting tools, rather than calligraphy tools. Of course, a lot of fine details that were visible on the master alphabets did not transfer to the text-size types. Romain du Roi was only allowed to be used by royal printing office, and its use by others was considered to be capital offense. This however did not stop the creation of very similar fonts, which yet had to have significant differences not be confused with Romain du Roi.