[B-Greek] Free Polytonic Uncial Greek Unicode Font?

Jim Darlack jdarlack at gcts.edu
Sun Aug 6 20:02:50 EDT 2006


Thanks John, and others for the response.
 
I know that the accents are "anachronistic" with an uncial font, but I am interested in finding a free font, because I'm scanning in some old commentaries and resources that use a polytonic uncial font face to highlight various Greek words.
 
The polytonic uncial font in Antioch is exactly what I'm after, but I'd rather use a "free" font, so that I can point a user to a free download that would let them view the web page with as much clarity as possible.
 
Thanks to all who've responded,
 
Jim
 
________________________________

James M. Darlack
Assistant Librarian for Reference & Bibliographic Instruction
Goddard Library, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary 
130 Essex Street, South Hamilton, MA 01982
http://www.gordonconwell.edu/library/hamilton <http://www.gordonconwell.edu/library/hamilton>  
978.646.4004 Phone - 978.646.4567 Fax 

________________________________

From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org on behalf of John McChesney-Young
Sent: Sun 8/6/2006 11:11 AM
To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Free Polytonic Uncial Greek Unicode Font?



At 9:25 AM -0400 8/6/06, Carl W. Conrad wrote:

>I confess to being puzzled why one would want a POLYTONIC Uncial
>Greek font; isn't that really more or less anachronistic?

To add a minor footnote to "more or less anachronistic":

The invention of the marking of breathings and accents is attributed
to Aristophanes of Byzantium (mid-3rd to early-2nd c. B.C.), and
although only consistently used beginning in the 7th c., sporadic
use, especially to disambiguate problematic words, goes back much
earlier. E. M. Thompson's _Handbook of Greek and Latin Paleography_
refers to a mark used in Codex Alexandrinus to distinguish different
uses of an isolated eta (p. 73; cf. Allen's _Vox Graeca_, p. 124ff.;
and Metzger's _Manuscripts of the Greek Bible_, p. 12).

So although it's accurate to say that using diacritics with an uncial
font as consistently as they're used in modern editions (e.g.) is
anachronistic, they weren't *entirely* absent from the MSS.

The uncial
>fonts of which I'm aware, Unicode, bitmapped, and post-script, are
>all without accents.

Since the original request had been for a free font I hadn't
responded to the thread earlier, but there does exist a commercial
package that includes a polytonic uncial Unicode font, Antioch:

http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~hancock/antioch.htm

You'll find more information and a .gif sample of the uncial font at:

http://www.ucl.ac.uk/GrandLat/greekfonts/frameUtilities.html#Antioch

The fontographer, Ralph Hancock, is a frequent and valuable
contributor to the Classics list and a prince of a fellow.

I *think* the URL for this page with detailed information about
various polytonic Greek Unicode fonts has been posted to the B-Greek
list before, but in case not:

http://gainsford.tripod.com/fonts_unicode.htm

John

***

On Aug 5, 2006, at 8:19 PM, Jim Darlack had written:

>  Does anyone out there know of a free polytonic unicode Greek font
>  that uses Uncial letters?
--


*** John McChesney-Young  **  panis~at~pacbell.net  **   Berkeley,
California, U.S.A.  ***
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