Cursive Lowercase "r"

[wyldphyre]

  On 1/6/2013 at 7:42 PM, glinn said:

It's probably just me but I love that Gawain3 used 'wire' as an example of a cursive 'r' when the letter form looks exactly like how I form a cursive 'n' thus the word reads 'wine'.

 

Gary

 

I thought it read 'wine' at first glance as well. Glad I'm not the only one :roflmho:

[restlesscourage]

If I'm writing slowly, sometimes I get it to look like option two. But in reality...when I'm writing in cursive, the only thing that differentiates my i's, e's, and r's is the dot over the i and the possibility that I went back and made the loop of the e a bit more evident.

 

I've been writing with a print/cursive hybrid for years, but when I picked up a fountain pen for the first time, I found I almost HAD to write in cursive. Since that first time was less than a month ago, I'm still relearning how to write legibly in cursive. Apologies to all my pen pals. :embarrassed_smile:

[Horseknitter]

Somewhere in the back of my mind I remember being taught to use #2 in the interior of a word and gawain3's 'r' form when the letter occurred as the final one in the word Of course, that was 7th grade penmanship class in 1960 - and may no longer be relevant!

[gawain3]

  On 1/6/2013 at 7:42 PM, glinn said:

It's probably just me but I love that Gawain3 used 'wire' as an example of a cursive 'r' when the letter form looks exactly like how I form a cursive 'n' thus the word reads 'wine'.

 

Gary

 

Nah, not even close. :hmm1:

[glinn]

  On 1/7/2013 at 12:15 AM, gawain3 said:

  On 1/6/2013 at 7:42 PM, glinn said:

It's probably just me but I love that Gawain3 used 'wire' as an example of a cursive 'r' when the letter form looks exactly like how I form a cursive 'n' thus the word reads 'wine'.

 

Gary

 

Nah, not even close. :hmm1:

Maybe I'm just thirsty

Edited January 7, 2013 by glinn

[bassmannate]

  On 1/6/2013 at 11:45 PM, restlesscourage said:

If I'm writing slowly, sometimes I get it to look like option two. But in reality...when I'm writing in cursive, the only thing that differentiates my i's, e's, and r's is the dot over the i and the possibility that I went back and made the loop of the e a bit more evident.

 

I've been writing with a print/cursive hybrid for years, but when I picked up a fountain pen for the first time, I found I almost HAD to write in cursive. Since that first time was less than a month ago, I'm still relearning how to write legibly in cursive. Apologies to all my pen pals. :embarrassed_smile:

 

Yep, this is me. I've been trying to make it more evident, but when I start writing fast, it tends to look like a lower case i.

[thang1thang2]

I tend to (when writing fast) make mine look like a hump on a camel. It's better than making it look like an 'i' but sometimes I lapse... I'll see if I can post a picture of my 'r's sometime.

[mboschm]

  On 1/7/2013 at 12:11 AM, Horseknitter said:

Somewhere in the back of my mind I remember being taught to use #2 in the interior of a word and gawain3's 'r' form when the letter occurred as the final one in the word Of course, that was 7th grade penmanship class in 1960 - and may no longer be relevant!

 

The Mills Method advocates the option 1 in letters that finish "high" (such as b, w or v) and r on the other ones, so combination isn't as odd.

[caliken]

Here are five letters 'r' which are currently in fairly common use.

 

From left to right they are :-

 

English Roundhand (Copperplate)

Engrosser's Script

Spencerian Script

Italic

Alternative English Roundhand (Copperplate)

 

caliken

 

http://i226.photobucket.com/albums/dd289/caliken_2007/fivelettersr600.jpg

[mirosc]

  On 1/7/2013 at 9:38 AM, caliken said:

Here are five letters 'r' which are currently in fairly common use.

 

That's a lovely and very helpful comparison. Thank you!

[ndw76]

Now that I am trying to learn cursive again after so many years I have found myself doing the number 1 lowercase r. But I have been trying to do the number 2 lowercase r. I think the number 2 version looks better when it is done properly. But the draw back is that it looks awfull when it isn't done perfect.

[Chrissy]

I would love to be able to write my lower case 'r' like caliken's examplar 5, but it hardly ever looks right as ndw76 suggests

[Mike 59]

Hi All, For what it's worth, I notice how my 'r' can become much like a 'v', this photo is more printing than cursive but I do notice it in my own, and other people's writing too.

[gawain3]

With the cursive r the nuns taught me so thoroughly so many years (decades?) ago, r's and v's are often mistaken for each other!

[Mr Ink]

Thanks to all who voted, commented and/or even posted examples of their own writing. I find this topic very interesting.

 

  On 1/6/2013 at 3:46 PM, mirosc said:

The upright stem of the R is left out and so the rest of the R looked a bit like the number 2. Later the angle between the upper round curve and the diagonal line is rounded for faster writing.......

 

This version of the R was only used in ligatures, but in modern times they were looking for a fast cursive and re-introduced this letterform and gave it a completely unhistorical upstroke, so that they could use it in their writings. So this "r" is in reality a "R" from the end of a word and it's missing its vertical stem.

 

Thank you, Michael, that is fascinating. If I understood correctly, the version you describe is similar to that posted by Doug, isn't it?:

 

  On 1/6/2013 at 7:54 PM, HDoug said:

Then theres another variant that looks like a "z" and finally one that looks like a 2. I've seen them in manuscript but can't find a quick image other than in type:

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8186/8355155356_5ee94446e9_m.jpg

 

[mirosc]

  On 1/7/2013 at 2:09 PM, Mr Ink said:

Thank you, Michael, that is fascinating. If I understood correctly, the version you describe is similar to that posted by Doug, isn't it?:

 

indeed, you can also see it in the handwritten example, second line, "torna"

[WestLothian]

Samuel Vaux used a mixture of 2 and 3 in his "r" in Pleasure...

[duboing]

  On 1/6/2013 at 11:24 AM, pmhudepo said:

I voted for option/image 2 because that's what I use most often. However, option 1 occasionally sneaks in, particularly at the end of a word.

 

Ha-ha! Yep, when I try to write in cursive that sneaky r trips me up too. In fact, I think I just prefer the italic-style r. My gut tells me that the hammock-sort is style over substance.

[bbwriter]

I was taught to use style #2, however, when I use style #1 everything goes fine until I get to a word that ends in the letters rs, such as...flowers. If I use style #2 I also use the cursive 's'. If I use style #1 then I use the printed 's'.

Edited January 7, 2013 by bbwriter

[Issendai]

  On 1/6/2013 at 3:46 PM, mirosc said:

This version of the R was only used in ligatures, but in modern times they were looking for a fast cursive and re-introduced this letterform and gave it a completely unhistorical upstroke, so that they could use it in their writings. So this "r" is in reality a "R" from the end of a word and it's missing its vertical stem.

Palaeographically speaking this "r" (your number 2) is utter nonsense, but it's serving a purpose nonetheless.

 

The "2" version of the r was originally written only after curved letters so that the curve of the previous letter could serve as the stem of the r, but somewhere around the middle of the Gothic hands, scribes started writing it after any old letter. (Cue elderly monks grumbling about the decline of standards among kids these days.) It stuck around through the formal Gothic hands, through the Gothic Cursive hands, and into Ronde and its Continental descendants. I don't know when the 2 developed an upstroke and became the cursive r we know today, but the late 18th-century <i>The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert</i> shows the full modern form: http://artflx.uchicago.edu/images/encyclopedie/V19/plate_19_21_9.jpeg

 

Meanwhile, the U.K. decided Ronde-style hands were too elegant and legible, and veered off into Secretary Hand. They developed a double-stemmed r that was unlike anything on earth, and difficult to boot. After struggling with that for a few centuries, they gave in and took up Italic, but initially seem to have preferred the "classic" lowercase r--don't quote me on that, but I do recall Dr. John Dee himself as having a most refined Italic hand, with only the classic r. The U.K. probably reimported the cursive r from France shortly after that, and thus do we arrive at our current state of confusion and bewilderment.

 

Personally, I can't see the outlines of the classic r in either of the cursive r's. That doesn't stop me from using the cursive r, but until I took up paleography, it didn't occur to me that the cursive letter had anything to do with the "real" letter. It was just one of those weird things they made you do in school, like calisthenics.