Workshops / Workshop 5
Lettering with a dip pen
A broad-edged pen makes thick and thin strokes by itself. Your job is to hold the angle and to be patient.
In brief
A broad-edged nib has a flat, chisel-shaped end. If you hold it at a steady angle to the writing line, the width of every stroke is decided by its direction, and letters acquire their familiar thick and thin look. Even spacing and steady pen angle matter more than speed.
What it is
Lettering here means writing letters carefully by hand, one stroke at a time, as opposed to quick everyday handwriting. It uses a dip pen, a holder with a metal nib that you dip into ink. The edge of a broad nib is a straight line, so a stroke made along the edge is thin and a stroke made across it is thick.
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Baseline | The line the letters sit on |
| x-height | The height of small letters such as x, a and o; often measured in nib widths |
| Ascender | The part of a letter that rises above x-height, as in b, d, h and l |
| Descender | The part that drops below the baseline, as in g, p and y |
| Counter | The enclosed or partly enclosed space inside a letter |
| Nib | The metal tip of the pen; a broad nib has a flat, chisel-shaped end |
| Pen angle | The angle between the nib edge and the writing line |
Why it is worth learning
- It trains attention. You see the shape of each letter and the space between letters, which improves everyday writing too.
- It is a window onto history. Modern book and type shapes come from letters formed with the same kind of tool.
- It needs little. A pen, ink, paper and a ruler are enough.
How to begin
- Set up. Sit with your feet flat and the paper on a sloping board if you can. Rule lines on practice paper: baseline, x-height and a space above for ascenders.
- Load the pen. A new nib has a protective coating and may refuse ink. Rinse it in water first. Dip, then touch the nib to the side of the jar so it holds only a small amount.
- Find the angle. Many teachers begin at about 30 degrees between nib edge and baseline. Your teacher, or the manual you are following, will name the angle for the hand you are learning. Draw a row of short slanted strokes and check that all of them have the same width.
- Draw the ladder. Stack small squares of the nib width and use them to mark the height of letters. A common way of setting x-height is to count nib widths, which keeps size consistent.
- Learn letters in families. Round letters (o, c, e, d), arched letters (n, m, h) and straight letters (i, l, t) share strokes. Learn each family’s stroke order and keep the same angle through every curve.
- Space by area, not by distance. The white areas between letters should look equal. Round letters sit closer to each other than straight ones. A word space is about the width of a letter o.
- Practise little and often. Fifteen minutes a day beats an hour a week.
| Problem | Likely cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Hairlines are too heavy | The pen angle has drifted | Check the angle at the start of each line |
| Ink floods or blobs | Too much ink on the nib | Touch the nib against the jar and load less |
| Ink will not flow | Grease on the nib or dried ink | Rinse the nib in water and wipe it dry |
| The baseline wobbles | No guide lines or a shifting wrist | Rule lines and rest the forearm on the table |
| Gaps look uneven | Spacing by distance instead of by area | Squint at the line and move letters so that the white shapes match |
A short history of letter forms
| When | What | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| First to second century CE | Roman inscription capitals, such as those at the base of Trajan’s Column in Rome (dedicated 113 CE) | The model for most capital letters used today |
| Around 800 | Carolingian minuscule, a clear small-letter script spread across a large part of Europe | The ancestor of today’s lower-case letters |
| Fifteenth century | Scholars in Italy revived the older clear script; printers followed it for their roman types | It linked handwriting and type |
| 1820s onward | Steel pen nibs were made in large numbers | Pens became cheap and common |
| 1906 | Edward Johnston published a manual of formal writing and lettering | It started a revival of broad-pen lettering that continues |
For centuries a common ink was iron gall ink, made from oak galls and iron salts. It writes dark but is acidic, and in some old manuscripts it has turned brown and even eaten through the paper. Today, use inks made for dip pens or calligraphy.
Effects and legacy
The shapes of today’s printed letters, from book text to road signs, still follow forms developed with the pen. Learning to draw them slowly gives a feeling for why a font looks the way it does.
Try it
Rule a practice sheet and write the word “handmade” ten times, trying to make each copy a little more even than the last. Pin the first and last side by side and compare.
Check yourself
Read the question, think of your answer, then open it with a tap or the Enter key.
Why does a broad-edged pen make thick and thin strokes?
Its flat edge makes a thin line along the edge and a thick line across it, so width depends on stroke direction at a steady pen angle.
What is an ascender?
The part of a letter that rises above the x-height, such as in b, d, h and l.
Why rinse a new nib?
It has a protective coating that can stop ink from flowing.
What does it mean to space by area?
Judging the white spaces between letters by eye so they look equal, rather than measuring equal distances.
Which script from around 800 is an ancestor of today’s lower-case letters?
Carolingian minuscule.
What is a problem with iron gall ink?
It is acidic, and in some old manuscripts it has darkened to brown and damaged the paper.
Basis of the facts
Where these facts come from. The technique (pen angle, nib-width ladder, letter families, spacing by area) follows standard teaching manuals such as Johnston (1906). The history table follows Brown (1990) and general histories of writing: Trajan’s Column was dedicated in 113 CE; Carolingian minuscule developed around 800; Italian scholars of the fifteenth century revived it; mass-produced steel nibs date from the early nineteenth century. The 30-degree angle is given as a common starting point, not a rule for every script. See the sources list.