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Latin Antique

McGrew writes: Latin is a general name for a number of typefaces which originated in the 1880s or earlier. Most of them were made by various foundries, sometimes under other names. Some had little or no apparent design relationship to each other. ATF's Latin Antique No. 520 was Marder, Luse's Latin Antique No. 12O. Other founders had it simply as Latin Antique, though BB&S originally called it Latin No.5. It is a wide, medium-weight typeface with very small, rounded serifs, and lacks the curlicues of Latin Modern or Modern Antique. Latin Bold Condensed is now the most common name of the most prominent survivor of this group, but most recent fonts were imported from England, although ATF had at least two sets of matrices in its vaults for many years. ATF formerly made the typeface as Modern Antique No.2, originating at Cincinnati Type Foundry. BB&S in its later years called the same typeface Latin Modern, but earlier had also called it Latin Antique. Inland simply called it Latin series. From whatever source, it is a bold, compact display face, characterized by heavy, triangular serifs. The strokes of several lowercase letters terminate in pointed curlicues. In the 1950s or 1960s, fonts imported from Stephenson Blake achieved some popularity; this is the source of the specimen shown here. Latin Condensed, Extra Condensed, Elongated, and Compressed are much narrower versions of this design, though a little lighter and with fewer curlicues. The New York Times has used a version of Latin Condensed for news heads for many years. In its 1898 book, ATF applied the name "Baskerville" to Latin Condensed! Light Modern has curlicues and long triangular serifs but is much lighter, while Latin Expanded (formerly called Guard) is the same but wider. ATF called the latter design Lightface Celtic No. 40, shown in 1886 by Marder, Luse, while Keystone had a similar Keystone Expanded, and Linotype had Celtic No.1. The BB&S Latin Lightface is a much lighter version of Latin Antique; it was formerly called Light Latin. Latin Oldstyle Bold has the least relationship to other Latin typefaces. It was formerly known as Modern Title, and before that Monarch, shown in 1893 or earlier; ATF called the same typeface Eastman Oldstyle. Also see Emperor.

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