Annemarie Schimmel, Islamic Calligraphy (1970), a stimulating introduction with illustrations, including calligraphy in architecture and the decorative arts, as well as a useful bibliography, and Calligraphy and Islamic Culture (1984); Yasin Hamid Safadi, Islamic Calligraphy (1978), on the development of Arabic writing from pre-Islamic times through the 20th century; Nabia Abbott, The Rise of the North Arabic Script and Its Kur’ānic Development (1939), a study of the origins of the Arabic script and its development in the early Islamic period; B. Moritz (ed.), Arabic Palaeography: A Collection of Arabic Texts from the First Century of the Hidjra till the Year 1000 (1905, reprinted 1986), a rich collection of texts on papyrus and paper; Anthony Welch, Calligraphy in the Arts of the Muslim World (1979), essays on aspects of calligraphy in Islam; Arthur Upham Pope and Phyllis Ackerman (eds.), A Survey of Persian Art from Prehistoric Times to the Present, vol. 4, The Ceramic Arts: Calligraphy and Epigraphy, 3rd ed. (1977), on Arabic calligraphy in the art and architecture of Persia; Basil Gray (ed.), The Arts of the Book in Central Asia, 14th–16th Centuries (1979), a work unique in both coverage and scholarship; and V. Minorsky (trans.), Calligraphers and Painters: A Treatise by Qādī Aḥmad… (1959), an important work (written in 1606) that illustrates the Islamic attitude toward calligraphy. Western calligraphy
Dorothy E. Miner, Victor I. Carlson, and P.W. Filby (compilers), 2,000 Years of Calligraphy (1965, reissued 1980), a comprehensive and well-illustrated catalog of an exhibition devoted to regions using the Latin alphabet, with especially valuable notes and references from the 1st to the 19th century; Edward Johnston, Writing & Illuminating, & Lettering (1906, reissued 1995), the gospel of the modern revival by its chief apostle, and Formal Penmanship, and Other Papers, ed. by Heather Child (1971, reissued 1980); David Diringer, The Hand-Produced Book (1953, reprinted as The Book Before Printing: Ancient, Medieval, and Oriental, 1982), a storehouse of information; Jan Tschichold, An Illustrated History of Writing and Lettering (1946), a brief, perceptive, and personal account by an eminent designer; Hermann Degering (ed.), Lettering: A Series of 240 Plates Illustrating Modes of Writing in Western Europe from Antiquity to the End of the 18th Century (1954, reprinted 1965; originally published in German and English, 1929), a standard survey of scripts; Raymond Clemens and Timothy Graham, Introduction to Manuscript Studies (2007), a guide to the making, deciphering, and describing of medieval manuscripts, richly illustrated with examples from the Newberry Library, in Chicago; and B.L. Ullman, The Origin and Development of Humanistic Script (1960, reprinted 1974).
Other useful books include Joyce Irene Whalley, The Pen’s Excellencie: Calligraphy of Western Europe and America (1980); James Wardrop, The Script of Humanism: Some Aspects of Humanistic Script, 1460–1560 (1963); Alfred Fairbank and Berthold Wolpe, Renaissance Handwriting: An Anthology of Italic Scripts (1960); Oscar Ogg (ed.), Three Classics of Italian Calligraphy: An Unabridged Reissue of the Writing Books of Arrighi, Tagliente, Palatino (1953); Ambrose Heal, The English Writing-Masters and Their Copy-Books, 1570–1800 (1931, reprinted 1962), a fundamental biographical and bibliographical work, well illustrated and with an important essay by Stanley Morison; and Ray Nash, American Writing Masters and Copybooks: History and Bibliography Through Colonial Times (1959), and American Penmanship, 1800–1850: A History of Writing and a Bibliography of Copybooks from Jenkins to Spencer (1969), with small reproductions of title pages.
David P. Becker, The Practice of Letters: The Hofer Collection of Writing Manuals, 1514–1800 (1997), an excellent and copiously illustrated bibliography of one of the major collections of European and American writing books; Michelle P. Brown, A Guide to Western Historical Scripts from Antiquity to 1600 (1990), showing both book and document hands and valuable to the paleography student and the calligrapher; Heather Child (ed.), The Calligrapher’s Handbook, 2nd ed. (1986), collected essays by modern scribes and illuminators on all aspects of the practice of calligraphy; Nicolete Gray, A History of Lettering (1986), for the calligrapher as well as the student of lettering (i.e., the careful construction or drawing of shapes); Donald Jackson, The Story of Writing (1981), profusely illustrated; Carla Marzoli (compiler), Calligraphy, 1535–1885 (1962), a catalog of 72 European writing books, including some published after 1800, with bibliographic descriptions; Stanley Morison, Early Italian Writing-Books: Renaissance to Baroque, ed. by Nicolas Barker (1990), tracing the development and decline of italic writing; and Politics and Script: Aspects of Authority and Freedom in the Development of Graeco-Latin Script from the Sixth Century B.C. to the Twentieth Century A.D., ed. and completed by Nicolas Barker (1972), studying the social and political influences that affected the selection and development of Western scripts; A.S. Osley, Luminario: An Introduction to the Italian Writing-Books of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (1972), the most complete survey available in English of Italian Renaissance and Baroque writing books, with biographies of their authors; and A.S. Osley (compiler and trans.), Scribes and Sources: Handbook of the Chancery Hand in the Sixteenth Century (1980), with valuable translations of selected writings from 18 writing masters of the 16th century, with emphasis on the Italian chancery hand and its offshoots. Greek calligraphy
E.G. Turner, Greek Manuscripts of the Ancient World, 2nd ed. (1987), the best general work and also very well illustrated; Bruce M. Metzger, Manuscripts of the Greek Bible: An Introduction to Greek Palaeography (1981); Franchi De’Cavalieri and Johannes Lietzmann, Specimina Codicum Graecorum Vaticanorum (1910, reissued 1929), 50 Greek manuscript specimens in the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vatican City; The Codex Alexandrinus, 5 vol. (1909–57), a facsimile in reduced size, with introductions by F.G. Kenyon, H.J.M. Milne, and T.C. Skeat; The Codex Sinaiticus and the Codex Alexandrinus, prepared by H.J.M. Milne and T.C. Skeat, 2nd ed. (1963), on the origins of the two great Greek uncial Bibles in the British Museum, London; Facsimile of the Washington Manuscript of Deuteronomy and Joshua in the Freer Collection (1910); and Ilias Ambrosiana (1953), a beautiful facsimile of the Homeric codex in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Milan (elegant uncial writing). Latin calligraphy