Decameron font by Zetafonts

Proemio · the premiseFlorence, 1348

A hundred

In the year 1348 the plague reached Florence. The streets emptied, the bells stopped counting, and the city learned how quickly good manners die.

On a Tuesday morning, in the church of Santa Maria Novella, seven young women meet by chance and decide they will not wait to be next. Three young men walk in. Nobody is surprised. Within the hour there is a plan: a villa in the hills above Fiesole, servants, wine, fountains, and a rule.

stories

in isolation

Every day one of them is crowned king or queen, and everyone tells a story on the day’s theme. Ten people, ten days, a hundred stories, and a book that still reads like gossip, 700 years later.

“Umana cosa è aver compassione degli afflitti.” · Proemio, 1353Set in Decameron Light Italic and Regular

Specimen sheet · nothing but textAfter the 16th-century sheets of the Plantin press

SPECIMEN

CHARACTERVM

Decameron · typorum probatissimorum, incondite quidem, sed secundum suas tamen differentias propositum · Florentiae, apud Zetafonts, 2026

✦

Umana cosa è aver compassione degli afflitti: e come che a ciascuna persona stea bene, a coloro è massimamente richesto li quali già hanno di conforto avuto mestiere.

Gr.

Decameron Romaine, Regular · 21 pt

Alfonsus rex Arrag. Idem dicere solet, ita demum matrimonium tranquille citraque querimonias exigi posse, si maritus surdus fiat, uxor caeca: innuens, opinor, foemineum genus obnoxium esse zelotypiae, atque hinc oriri rixas et querimonias.

ja

Parangonne sur la Romaine, Book · 17 pt

Dico adunque che già erano gli anni della fruttifera incarnazione del Figliuolo di Dio al numero pervenuti di milletrecentoquarantotto, quando nella egregia città di Fiorenza, oltre a ogn’altra italica bellissima, pervenne la mortifera pestilenza.

VDK

Decameron Cursiue, Italic · 21 pt

Anaxagoras Claz. Post diutinam peregrinationem domum reversus reperit patriam possessionesque suas desertas: Nisi, inquit, ista periissent, ego salvus non essem.

Reale Romaine, Semibold · 26 pt

Anachar. Scytha. Aiebat se mirari qui fieret, ut Athenienses qui prohiberent mentiri, tamen in cauponum tabernis palam mentirentur.

Petit Canon, Light Italic · 44 pt

Meglio è fare e pentere.

Cursiue sur la Reale, Light Italic · 20 pt

Valeria Messalarum soror, rogata, cur amisso Servio viro, nulli vellet nubere: Quoniam, inquit, mihi semper vivit maritus Servius.

Petites Capitales, smcp · 17 pt

Comincia la prima giornata del Decameron, nella quale sotto il reggimento di Pampinea si ragiona di quello che più aggrada a ciascheduno.

Florentiae · MMXXVISet entirely in Decameron · roman and cursive

Paintings · Renaissance, rated RFive plates, one book

Ten days, seven weightsLight to Black, each with its italic · tap a line to swap

Signature letters · notable glyphsDecameron Regular, drawn on 2048 units

01/ 09

The italic · Granjon, revisitedMuseum Plantin-Moretus, Antwerp

An italic with a past.

Ascendonica Cursiue, a 16th-century italic by Robert Granjon, on a specimen sheet — Ascendonica Cursiue, Robert Granjon · specimen sheet, Museum Plantin-Moretus

Decameron Italic began as a study of the Ascendonica cursive cut by Robert Granjon in the 16th century, preserved in the specimen sheets of the Museum Plantin-Moretus in Antwerp.

Research digitisationAscendonica study

Anaxagoras Claz. Poſt diutinam peregrinationem domum reuerſus reperit patriam poſſeſſioneſque ſuas deſertas: Niſi, inquit, iſta periſſent, ego ſaluus non eſſem.

Decameron Italicwght 400

Anaxagoras Claz. Poſt diutinam peregrinationem domum reverſus reperit patriam poſſeſſioneſque ſuas deſertas: Niſi, inquit, iſta periſſent, ego ſalvus non eſſem.

Weight400

The source

Granjon’s cursives were the italics of the late Renaissance: narrow, quick, full of long s and ligatures, made to sit beside the romans of the period.

The study

We redrew the Ascendonica from the printed specimen to understand its rhythm: the steep entry strokes, the narrow bowls, words that run like a single gesture.

The result

Decameron Italic keeps the rhythm and leaves the archaisms behind: a larger x-height, seven weights from Light to Black, and swash forms in stylistic set 4.

The alphabetCapitals and lowercase, alternates in red

Red · stylistic sets 1–5 and 9

In useBooks, magazines, labels, packaging

Book cover: The Art of Scandals, set in Decameron — **Books**The Art of Scandals

Posters and leaflets in French set in Decameron — **Print**Vanité, Excès, Virtue

Magazine pages set in Decameron — **Magazines**Socialzine

A novel with an ornamental title page set in Decameron — **Novels**Survive

Wine bottles with a red label, Red Affair — **Labels**Red Affair

Red candle boxes labelled Sinful — **Packaging**Sinful

01 / 06

Legibilityx-height 936 of 2048 units · open counters

Reading speed

300

words per minute

Madonna Filippa was caught with her lover and brought before the judge, where the law said she should burn. She did not deny anything. She asked only whether her husband had ever gone without what he wanted from her, and when he admitted he had not, she asked what she was supposed to do with the rest: throw it to the dogs? The court laughed, the law was changed, and she went home. Decameron, sixth day, seventh story. Still the best closing argument in Italian literature.

186 languagesLatin script · diacritics in red

OpenTypeSwitch the features on

(Old Style Serif) Readable!

Narrator Signature Cuts

Traditional; Novella #Editorial

Book Design · Italian Flair

Vernacular – Renaissance & Rhyme

Storytelling 1349 · Juicy Byzantium

Boccaccio said it14th-century Florentine, with translations

“Meglio è fare e pentere, che starsi e pentersi.”

Decameron III, 5 · Better to do and repent than to sit still and repentRegular & Italic

“Bocca basciata non perde ventura, anzi rinnuova come fa la luna.”

Decameron II, 7 · A kissed mouth loses no luck; it renews itself like the moon

Comincia il libro chiamato Decameron, cognominato prencipe Galeotto.

Incipit · Here begins the book called Decameron, surnamed Prince Galehaut, the go-between

“Rimettere il diavolo in inferno.”

Decameron III, 10 · Dioneo’s story. Look it up. Not at work.

Boccaccio wrote it first. Bukowski drank to it. The White Lotus sent the invoice.

Zetafonts · on the eternal return of rich people behaving badly

TesterType your own confession

Size120px

Weight400

Forgive me, Francesca: I quickly kerned 1348 lazy tales (and 10 sins).

&

U+0026Decameron

Languages

186, Latin script

OpenType

Ligatures and discretionary ligatures, small caps, stylistic sets, case forms, ordinals, tabular figures, fractions, sub- and superscripts

Variable

Weight 200–900, Roman and Italic

Formats

OTF, TTF, WOFF, WOFF2

Confess. Then license.

Single weightfrom €29

Full family, 14 styles + 2 variablefrom €65

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