The statement ignores the fact that Schwabacher originated from the earlier Rotunda blackletter script and late medieval Bastarda types. Bormann refers to Fraktur as Schwabacher Judenlettern ('Jew-letters of Schwabach'). In January 1941, the Government of Nazi Germany officially abandoned the Fraktur type, following Martin Bormann's Normalschrifterlass ('Normal type') decree. It was still used occasionally until the mid 20th century. Schwabacher became widely known with the spread of Luther Bibles from 1522.Īfter Schwabacher was displaced by Fraktur as the most-used German language type style from about 1530, it remained in common use as a secondary typeface for emphasis in a similar way to italic. 1440–1513) used them for the publication of the Nuremberg Chronicle (in both Latin and German) in 1493, and Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528) for his Apocalypse series in 1498. Schwabacher types appeared in the Free Imperial City of Nuremberg from about 1485: Anton Koberger ( c. While the Latin Gutenberg Bible was still set in Textualis type, the oldest preserved Schwabacher incunable dates from 1472, and was printed in Augsburg. In the context of German language texts, Schwabacher appeared vibrant and popular. The lower-case g and upper-case H have particularly distinctive forms. Similar to Rotunda, the rounded Schwabacher types were nearer to handwriting than the former Textualis style, though it also includes sharp edges. The term may derive from the Franconian town of Schwabach, where, in 1529, the Articles of Schwabach, a Lutheran creed, were adopted the Articles became the basis of the 1530 Confessio Augustana, and possibly also promoted the use of Schwabacher types. In the course of the 18th and 19th centuries (but in Germany not until 1941), Fraktur gave way in turn to Antiqua.

Schwabacher typesetting was the most common typeface in Germany, until it was replaced by Fraktur from the mid 16th century onwards. The German word Schwabacher (pronounced ) refers to a specific style of blackletter typefaces which evolved from Gothic Textualis ( Textura) under the influence of Humanist type design in Italy during the 15th century. JSTOR ( November 2009) ( Learn how and when to remove this message)Ī page from the Nuremberg Chronicle ( Schedelsche Weltchronik), 1493.Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. This article needs additional citations for verification.

Blackletter typeface alphabet