Porson (typeface)

Porson was a classicist with very careful Greek handwriting. His biographer wrote that he "excelled ... in writing with neatness and beauty" and "wrote notes on the margins of books with such studied accuracy that they rivalled print". The punchcutter Richard Austin was commissioned by the Cambridge University Press to cut a type based on his handwriting, probably from 1806 onwards. It was cast by the Caslon foundry, but it never appeared in their specimens, seemingly as the type was proprietary to Cambridge. It was completed and used only after Porson's death in 1808, seemingly first in 1809 and more in 1810. ==Legacy==

After its first appearance, it was soon copied by other founders. By the end of the 19th century, it has become the predominant Greek type used in Britain, It has been described as "calm yet energetic", and was used by the Oxford Classical Texts for over a century. John Bowman describes it as "the single most important contribution to Greek type design in Britain" and two designs based on it by from the Figgins foundry as "the most beautiful Greek type ever". An open-source digitisation has been published by the Greek Font Society. ==Notes==