英语视频畅谈欧美人文风情94：西方印刷术和字体的历史

Type is power: the power to express words and ideas visually. It's timeless but always changing. And that's what we're going to explore.

字体就是力量：在视觉上表达字句和想法的力量。它是永恒的但总是在改变。而那就是我们要去探究的东西。

Most people agree that the creator of typography was a German man named Johannes Gutenberg, and yes, he wore a hat like that. Before Gutenberg came along and revolutionized the world of communication, books needed to be scribed by hand, usually by months. It was very time-consuming and expensive. So Gutenberg created Blackletter, the first ever typeface, modeled after the writing of the scribes.

大部分的人同意印刷术的创造者是一位叫做古腾堡的德国人，还有是的，他戴像那样的一顶帽子。在古腾堡出现并彻底改革了通讯的世界之前，书籍必须以手缮写，通常要花上数个月。它非常耗时且昂贵。所以古腾堡创造出“黑体字”， 至今第一种字体，模仿抄写员的笔迹。

Blackletter has thick vertical lines and thin horizontal connecters, which made it great for scribing, but they look very dense and squished together when printed. Something needed to change.

“黑体字”有粗的垂直线以及细瘦的水平连结，那让它很好刻出来，但它们印出来的时候看起来非常浓密还压扁在一起。某些东西需要改变。

Enter Roman Type.

进入“罗马字体”。

This particular typeface is Cambria, which you're probably used to seeing on your word processor. But the first ever Roman typeface was created in the fifteenth century by the Frenchman Nicolas Jenson. This is his typeface right here.

这特别的字体是“Cambria”，这你大概在你的文字处理器上很习惯看到。但有史以来第一个“罗马字体”是由法国人Nicolas Jenson在十五世纪时所创造。这里就是他的字体。

Jenson worked mainly in Venice, Italy and was inspired by the lettering found on ancient Roman buildings. His letterforms were based on straight lines and regular curves. This made them very clear legible compared to the dense darkness of Blackletter. This legible new typeface was an instant success and quickly spread across Europe, riding on the coattails of the Renaissance.

Jenson主要在意大利威尼斯工作，他是受到古罗马建筑物上所发现的刻文所启发。他的字体是基于直线和标准的弧形。这使得它们和“黑体字”的浓密黑色相比非常地清晰易读。这清楚易读的新字体是个瞬间的成功，搭上文艺复兴的便车，迅速地散布在欧洲。

The next major innovation in typography after Roman letters was Italics, which are like slanted and stylized versions of Roman Type. They were created in the late fifteenth century by all these Venetians from Italy as a way of fitting more letters onto the page and saving money. Now we use Italics interspersed in Roman Type for emphasis. All these Venetians also created the modern comma and semicolon, but that's another story.

“罗马字体”之后，在印刷术上的下一个主要创新是“斜体字”，它像是“罗马字体”倾斜的、格式化的版本。它们在十五世纪晚期被所有这些从意大利来的威尼斯人给创造出来，作为一个在页面上装进更多字并省钱的方法。现在我们用散布在罗马字体中的斜体字以示强调。所有这些威尼斯人也创造出了现代的逗号和分号，但那是另一个故事了。

Type development stayed fairly stagnant until the eighteenth century in England when William Caslon created the typeface that set a new standard for legibility. Well, it wasn't anything radical. It was just what the world was looking for. The style of Caslon's typeface is now referred to as Old Style.

字体发展保持颇为停滞不前，直至十八世纪在英国，当William Caslon创造出为易读性定下了新标准的字体。这个嘛，它不是什么极端的东西。它只是世界那时正在寻找的东西。Caslon字体的风格现在被称为“旧风格体”。

A few decades later, another brick named John Baskerville created a new variety of typeface, which we called Transitional. Later still, a Frenchman named Didot and an Italian named Bodoni created typefaces that we've classified as Modern. Most serif typefaces fit into one of these three categories, but what does each category mean?

数十年后，另一位叫做John Baskerville的好人创造了一个新种的字体，我们称之为“过渡时期体”。之后还有，一位叫Didot的法国人和一位叫Bodoni的意大利人创造了我们分类为“现代体”的字体。大多数的衬线字体符合这三个类别之一，但每个类别的意义何在?

An Old Style typeface has letters that have fixed serifs and low contrast between thick and thin strokes. A Transitional typeface has letters with thinner serifs and a higher contrast between thick and thin strokes. And a Modern typeface has letters with very thin serifs and extreme contrast between thick and thin strokes.

一个“旧风格体”字体有着拥有固定衬线的字母以及粗细笔画间的低对比。一个“过渡时期体”字体有着拥有较细的衬线的字母以及粗细笔画间较高的对比。而一个“现代体”字体有着拥有非常细的衬线的字母以及粗细笔画间极端的对比。

Next, William Caslon's great grandson, named William Caslon IV, got sick of all these serifs, so he dicided to remove them entirely and made a new kind of typeface, called the Sans Serif. It didn't catch on immediately but would eventually get really big.

接着，William Caslon的曾孙，叫做William Caslon四世，厌倦了所有这些衬线，于是他决定了完全拿掉它们并做了个新种的字体，叫做“无衬线体”。它并没有立刻流行起来但最终会变得非常大受欢迎。

During the Second Industrial Revolution, advertising created the need for new typefaces. Letter were made taller and wider, mainly used in large sizes on posters and billboards. Things got pretty weird, but one happy result of all of this experimentation is Egyptian or Slab Serif. It has really thick serifs, and it's usually used for titles.

在第二次工业革命期间，广告创造出对新字体的需求。文字被做得更高而且更宽了，主要以大型字体被用在海报以及告示牌上。事情变得很奇怪，但所有这些实验的一个快乐结局是“埃及体”或是“Slab Serif体”。它有非常粗的衬线，而且通常是被用在标题上。

As a backlash to the complexity found in typefaces of the nineteenth century, the early twentieth century brought something simple.

作为对于在十九世纪字体中所发现的复杂性的强烈反对，二十世纪初产生了某种简单的东西。

Paul Renner from Germany created a typeface called Futura, and it was based on simple geometric shapes. This is called the Geometric Sans. Around the same time, a British man Eric Gill, created the typeface called Gill Sans that was similar to the Geometric Sans but with gentler and more natural curves, and this is called the Humanist Sans.

德国的Paul Renner创造出了一个叫做“Futura体”的字体，它是根基于简单的几何形状。这叫做“几何无衬线体”。约莫在同一个时间，一位英国人Eric Gill创造出了叫做“Gill Sans体”的字体，它类似“几何无衬线体”但有着较和缓且更天然的弧线，这个叫做“Humanist Sans体”。

The next major step in the world of Sans Serif happened in Switzerland in 1957 with the introduction of Helvetica. It has simple curves and is available in many different widths. And someone called it the world's favorite typeface.

“无衬线体”世界中接下来主要的一步，随着“Helvetica”字体的采用，于1957年发生在瑞士。它拥有简单的弧线，适用于许多不同的宽度。而有人称之为世人最喜欢的字体。

The world of typography changed forever with the introduction of the computer. There were a few difficult years of crude Pixel Type due to the primitive screen technology. But then technology evolved, and computers began to allow for the creation of thousands of beautiful typefaces, and the other...done.

印刷术的世界因电脑的使用而永远地改变了。因为早期的荧幕技术，曾有一小段属于粗糙“像素体”的艰困时代。但接着科技进步，电脑开始允许数以千计美丽字体的创作，还有其他的...结束。

But now anyone has the freedom to create their own unique typeface. And that is the history of typography.

但现在任何人都有创造他们自己独特字体的自由。那是印刷术的历史。