Ancient G Written Font

Ancient G Written Gen Aris TrueTypeFreeware
  • Euro
Ancient_G_Written.ttf

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Author's note

Ancient G WRITTEN is my adaptation and extension of SGA/SG1 ANCIENT canon glyphset to create a fuller font which distinguishes case, has punctuation and extended chars, and is designed to be more hand-writing-friendly than the machine-print styles of Ancient, like Anquietas or Alteran. The purpose: so that fans can use ANCIENT lettersets more practically, by applying this font to existing docs, typing in it, or even using it as Windows display font for menus etc. With this handwritten version, the additional intent is to model a practical adaptation of Ancient that can be written by hand more practically. This font serves as a reference for that adaptation but also looks nice for machine use and printing too.

Questions or comments can be directed to me at genaris at gmail dot com.

Character map

Please use the pulldown menu to view different character maps contained in this font.
Basic Latin - charmap

Basic font information

Copyright notice
by Gen Aris -Inspired by fan fonts Anquietas, Anc Hand, & my personal prefs . . .
Font family
Ancient G Written
Font subfamily
Regular
Unique subfamily identification
Ancient G Written:Version 1.00
Full font name
Ancient G Written
Name table version
Version 1.00 October 2, 2008, initial release
Postscript font name
AncientGWritten
Trademark notice
FANS are welcome to USE or MODIFY at will but please RENAME any modified versions you may create as to avoid confusion. :)
Manufacturer name
Gen Aris
Designer
Gen Aris
Description
A variant of the ANCIENT glyphsets used by the Ancients in Stargate: Atlantis.

This version is designed to provide a HANDWRITTEN variant of ANCIENT G MODERN, which is my extended character version of the machine-print styled revision of ANCIENT.

The purpose with this revision, as in Anc. G Modern, is to CREATE PUNCTUATION and ADDITIONAL CHARS/SYMBS to facilitate better clarity when applying this font to English documents which contain punctuation and other characters. Of course, this WRITTEN variant stylizes the glyphs to facilitate hand writing them more readily. Some glyphs here are more identical to the source than is possible with others but hopefully, once used a bit, will become intuitive for those familiar with Ancient and or Ancient G Modern.

Per show canon, the Ancients did not appear to use punctuation marks, nor did they distinguish between Upper/Lower case. Again, to facilitate use of this font in regular documents or even as the Windows font (for menus etc) I have created CAPITALIZED VARIANTS which are identical to the lower case except I added a SQUARE DOT FLOATING ABOVE TOP LEFT of CAPPED KEYS. Passwords and user names sometimes use L/case and U/case letters, so it is necessary to distinguish the 2 cses in daily life here on Earth!

My logic for the design of new characters is as follows:

Letters are made up of white/black blocked spaces dividing on a 3 wide by 4 high grid. A few letters make use of subdivsions within the grid.

In canon, all numerals share a centered descender "tail" unlike the letters.

I took this further, by giving all punctuation mark glyphs a centered ascender on top, like an upside down version of the numeral tail -- an "antenna" if you will. This should make it easier to become facile at visually distinguishing punctuation marks from letters or numbers.

Some punctuation marks or symbols are used in numeric/math contexts partly or wholly. So, math or number oriented and shared alphanumeric/math punctuations are given the "tail" of numerals and the "antenna" of punctuation/symbols to so indicate the context.

The numbers, in canon, have a slightly more subdivided or even an altered grid used in their design than do the letters. Here, as well, both numbers and punctuation/symbols share this more prominent use of subdivision or underlying grid different from the letter glyphs.

Overall, I tried to adhere to the digital, techno-sensibility of the glyphs as seen in SG-1 and SGA while striking a balance with variations of weight and tone so as to be reasonably attractive, while remaining aware of the need to make this practical and functional. How well I fared toward my goals, I leave to you to decide. :)

Gen Aris
genaris@gmail.com
License
Use and/or modify as desired with no restrictions other than I'd appreciate that revision versions NOT USE the same name to avoid confusion.
Preferred family
Ancient G Written
Preferred subfamily
Regular
Compatible full
Ancient G Modern

Extended font information

Platforms supported

PlatformEncoding
UnicodeUnicode 2.0 and onwards semantics, Unicode BMP only.
MacintoshRoman
MicrosoftUnicode BMP only

Font details

Created2008-09-27
Revision1
Glyph count116
Units per Em1000
Embedding rightsEmbedding for permanent installation
Family classSymbolic
WeightMedium (normal)
WidthMedium (normal)
Mac styleBold
DirectionOnly strongly left to right glyphs + contains neutrals
Pattern natureRegular
PitchNot monospaced