The Storied History of the Ampersand, Bitches!
By Indestructible on January 17th, 2010Posted In: morgan
You know, like most people, I often ask myself, “Morgan, you sure are a handsome wrangler of the English language. But do you ever wonder where the characters that you wrestle come from?” Usually, like most red-blooded Americans and the Dutch, I answer “no, of course not. That’s a waste of my amazing brain powers.” But today, let me put aside my mind controlling thought experiments and take a look at our friend, the ampersand.
The ampersand is one of the most unique typographical characters out there. Typography designers can exercise a lot more artistic freedom in the design of the ampersand, ranging from very traditional representations to those that bear little resemblance to the original form.
But many designers have little knowledge about the origin and meaning of the ampersand. The ampersand has a long and rather interesting history, though.
