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Four centuries of printing in the Irish character [Brendan Leen]

Dead link. Brendan Leen (St Patrick's College, Drumcondra) writes about the early Irish alphabets. The preface goes as follows: Although the existing roman letter was officially sanctioned as the standard medium for the printing of Irish language documents in the early 1960s, the four preceding centuries had witnessed a rich tradition of printing in the Irish character. The origins of Irish character typography regress to the high standard of calligraphy achieved by the monastic scribes of the fifth century, and to the two discrete styles __ the half-uncial and the minuscule__ that emerged from the scriptorium to subsequently exert a defining influence on the design of Irish printing types. The full, rotund form of the half-uncial was typically used in the transcription of Latin tracts _____ notably, in the earliest known Irish manuscript, the Cathach, and, magisterially, in the Book of Kells. The Irish minuscule, a more angular form with a pronounced vertical emphasis, was often resorted to in manuscripts where vellum, and as a consequence space, would have been premium, and normally for the transcription of Irish as opposed to Latin texts. Although mostly in Latin, early texts in which the Irish minuscule hand appears include the Book of Armagh and the Book of Leinster.

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