cursive

The tradition & historical record

Cursive (also known as joined-up writing or real writing) is any style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster, in contrast to block letters. It varies in function and modern-day usage across languages and regions, used both publicly in artistic and formal documents and in private communication. Formal cursive is generally joined, while casual cursive combines joins with pen lifts. The writing style can be further divided into "looped", "italic", or "connected". Many alphabets use cursive because infrequent pen lifting increases writing speed. However, more elaborate or ornamental calligraphic styles of writing can be slower to reproduce. In some alphabets, many or all letters in a word are connected, sometimes making a word one single complex stroke. ¹

Cursive is a style of penmanship in which the symbols of the language are written in a conjoined, or flowing, manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster. This writing style is distinct from "print-script" using block letters, in which the letters of a word are unconnected. Not all cursive copybooks join all letters; formal cursive is generally joined, but casual cursive combines joins and pen lifts. In the Arabic, Syriac, Latin, and Cyrillic scripts, many or all letters in a word are connected (while others must not), sometimes making a word one single complex stroke. In Hebrew cursive and Roman cursive, the letters are not connected. In Maharashtra, a cursive alphabet known as the "Modi" script was used to write the Marathi language. ¹

A ligature is writing letters of words with lines connecting them so you don't have to lift the pen or pencil between letters. Commonly, some of the letters are written in a looped manner to facilitate the connections. In common printed Greek texts, the modern small letter fonts are called "cursive" (as opposed to uncial) though the letters do not connect. ¹

In looped cursive penmanship, some ascenders and descenders have loops which allow the letters to link. This is generally what people refer to when they say "cursive" in the context of English. The letters in this style have their own unique characteristics. For example, the lowercase t is taller, while the lowercase v and w are rounder. Also, the lowercase x extends to the baseline. ¹

Cursive italic penmanship—derived from chancery cursive—uses non-looped joins, and not all letters are joined. In italic cursive, there are no joins from g, j, q, or y, and a few other joins are discouraged. Italic penmanship became popular in the 15th-century Italian Renaissance. The term "italic" as it relates to handwriting is not to be confused with italic typed letters. Many, but not all, letters in Renaissance handwriting were joined, as most are today in cursive italic. ¹

The origins of the cursive method are associated with the practical advantages of writing speed and infrequent pen-lifting to accommodate the limitations of the quill. Quills are fragile, easily broken, and will spatter unless used properly. They also run out of ink faster than most contemporary writing utensils. Steel dip pens followed quills; they were sturdier, but still had some limitations. The individuality of a document's provenance (see Signature) also mattered, unlike machine font. Cursive was also favoured because the writing tool was rarely taken off the paper. The term cursive derives from Middle French cursif from Medieval Latin cursivus, which literally means 'running'. This term in turn derives from Latin currere ('to run, hasten'). Although by the 2010s, the use of cursive appeared to be on the decline, as of 2019 it seemed to be coming back into use. ¹

The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Cursive”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. ¹

cursive is style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. ²

The source record links this tradition to 22 external registers, which can be verified through the citation. ²