Court hand: alphabet (upper-cases and lower-cases) and some syllable abbreviations
Court hand (also common law hand, Anglicana, cursiva antiquior, and charter hand[1]) was a style of handwriting used in medieval English law courts, and later by professionals such as lawyers and clerks. "It is noticeably upright and packed together with exaggeratedly long ascenders and descenders, the latter often and the former occasionally brought round in sweeping crescent shaped curves".[2]
The hand took its name from the fact that it was particularly associated with formal records of the courts of Common Pleas and King's (or Queen's) Bench, although its use was not confined to them.[3] In the 17th and 18th centuries the writing became increasingly stylised, to the point that it was virtually illegible to any reader unfamiliar with its conventions. The hand was banned from English law courts in 1731 by the Proceedings in Courts of Justice Act 1730, which required that, with effect from 25 March 1733, court proceedings "shall be written in such a common legible Hand and Character, as the Acts of Parliament are usually ingrossed in ... and not in any Hand commonly called Court Hand, and in Words at Length and not abbreviated".[4][lower-alpha 1] Even in the 19th century, however, an ability to read court hand was considered useful for anyone who had to deal with old court records.[6]
Cultural references
In Shakespeare's Henry VI, Part 2 (written c.1591), Act 4, scene 2, Dick the Butcher says of Emmanuel, Clerk of Chatham, "He can make Obligations, and write court-hand."
In Charles Dickens's novel Bleak House (1852–3), Lady Dedlock begins a significant subplot by noticing a particular "law hand" on a legal document.
Calligraphy is a visual art related to writing. It is the design and execution of lettering with a pen, ink brush, or other writing instrument. Contemporary calligraphic practice can be defined as "the art of giving form to signs in an expressive, harmonious, and skillful manner".
In common law, a writ is a formal written order issued by a body with administrative or judicial jurisdiction; in modern usage, this body is generally a court. Warrants, prerogative writs, subpoenas, and certiorari are common types of writs, but many forms exist and have existed.
In the English-American common law, quo warranto is a prerogative writ issued by a court which orders someone to show what authority they have for exercising some right, power, or franchise they claim to hold. The writ of quo warranto still exists in the United States, although it is uncommon, but it has been abolished in England and Wales. Quo warranto is also used, with slightly different effect, in the Philippines.
The Court of Chancery was a court of equity in England and Wales that followed a set of loose rules to avoid a slow pace of change and possible harshness of the common law. The Chancery had jurisdiction over all matters of equity, including trusts, land law, the estates of lunatics and the guardianship of infants.
Handwriting is the writing done with a writing instrument, such as a pen or pencil, in the hand. Handwriting includes both block and cursive styles and is separate from formal calligraphy or typeface. Because each person's handwriting is unique and different, it can be used to verify a document's writer. The deterioration of a person's handwriting is also a symptom or result of several different diseases. The inability to produce clear and coherent handwriting is also known as dysgraphia.
Cursive 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 functionality and modern-day usage across languages and regions; being used both publicly in artistic and formal documents as well as in private communication. Formal cursive is generally joined, but casual cursive is a combination of joins and pen lifts. The writing style can be further divided as "looped", "italic", or "connected".
Blackletter, also known as Gothic script, Gothic minuscule or Gothic type, was a script used throughout Western Europe from approximately 1150 until the 17th century. It continued to be commonly used for Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish until the 1870s, Finnish until the turn of the 20th century, Latvian until the 1930s, and for the German language until the 1940s, when Hitler officially discontinued it in 1941. Fraktur is a notable script of this type, and sometimes the entire group of blackletter faces is referred to as Fraktur. Blackletter is sometimes referred to as Old English, but it is not to be confused with the Old English language, which predates blackletter by many centuries and was written in the insular script or in Futhorc. Along with Italic type and Roman type, blackletter served as one of the major typefaces in the history of Western typography.
The legal system of Singapore is based on the English common law system. Major areas of law – particularly administrative law, contract law, equity and trust law, property law and tort law – are largely judge-made, though certain aspects have now been modified to some extent by statutes. However, other areas of law, such as criminal law, company law and family law, are almost completely statutory in nature.
Italic script, also known as chancery cursive and Italic hand, is a semi-cursive, slightly sloped style of handwriting and calligraphy that was developed during the Renaissance in Italy. It is one of the most popular styles used in contemporary Western calligraphy.
The Rotunda is a specific medieval blackletter script. It originates in Carolingian minuscule. Sometimes, it is not considered a blackletter script, but a script on its own. It was used mainly in southern Europe.
Summary jurisdiction, in the widest sense of the phrase, in English law includes the power asserted by courts of record to deal brevi manu with contempts of court without the intervention of a jury. Probably the power was originally exercisable only when the fact was notorious, i.e. done in presence of the court. But it has long been exercised as to extra curial contempts.
Secretary hand or script is a style of European handwriting developed in the early sixteenth century that remained common in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries for writing English, German, Welsh and Gaelic.
Bastarda or bastard was a blackletter script used in France, the Burgundian Netherlands and Germany during the 14th and 15th centuries. The Burgundian variant of script can be seen as the court script of the Dukes of Burgundy. The particularly English forms of the script are sometimes distinguished as Bastarda Anglicana or Anglicana.
Spencerian script is a script style based on Copperplate script that was used in the United States from approximately 1850 to 1925, and was considered the American de facto standard writing style for business correspondence prior to the widespread adoption of the typewriter. Spencerian script, an American form of cursive handwriting, was also widely integrated into the school system as an instructional method until the "simpler" Palmer Method replaced it. President James A. Garfield called the Spencerian script, "the pride of our country and the model of our schools."
The term "chancery hand" can refer to either of two distinct styles of historical handwriting.
In common law, a right of audience is generally a right of a lawyer to appear and conduct proceedings in court on behalf of their client. In English law, there is a fundamental distinction between barristers, who have rights of audience in the superior court, and solicitors, who have rights of audience in the lower courts, unless a certificate of advocacy is obtained, which allows a solicitor advocate to represent clients in the superior courts also. There is no such distinction in American law.
Round hand is a type of handwriting and calligraphy originating in England in the 1660s primarily by the writing masters John Ayres and William Banson. Characterised by an open flowing hand (style) and subtle contrast of thick and thin strokes deriving from metal pointed nibs in which the flexibility of the metal allows the left and right halves of the point to spread apart under light pressure and then spring back together, the popularity of round hand grew rapidly, becoming codified as a standard, through the publication of printed writing manuals.
A book hand was any of several stylized handwriting scripts used during ancient and medieval times. It was intended for legibility and often used in transcribing official documents.
Ronde is a kind of script in which the heavy strokes are nearly upright, giving the characters when taken together a round look. It appeared in France at the end of the 16th century, growing out from a late local variant of Gothic cursive influenced by North Italian Renaissance types in Rotunda, a bookish round Gothic style, as well as Civilité, also a late French variant of Gothic cursive. It was popularized by writing masters such as Louis Barbedor in the 17th century.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
