History of Calligraphy

The history of calligraphy finds its origin in Greek words. Actually the word calligraphy has been derived from two Greek words, 'kallos' and 'graphe'. The meaning of these two words express the importance of the writing technique. The word 'kallos' signifies beauty and the word graphe' denotes writing. Since 3000 BC, this western form of writing has been gaining popularity and another important thing is that this calligraphy writing style has given good competition to Greek and Cyrillic alphabets during that time. In the original form of this writing you can find only capital letters but as time passes it is modified with different styles and embellishments.

Calligraphy writing has been found mostly among Christian monks and other religious people. These scholar persons used to make illuminated texts with the help of this specific type writing which is very much popular today as calligraphy tattoos. They emphasized on the technique and decorative part of the writing and thus increased its craze so much among people. Even among the Celtic region, especially among the Irish people the calligraphy writing was so famous, hence they grew some unique style in their writing and the style was known as Uncial. This style has brought some of the best works, for example, “The Book of Kells.”

Designs in Calligraphy tattoos

• When you have decided to make your body a part of the calligraphy tattoo style, you may find the specific form of writing which begins with illuminated letters. In such design your tattooist may write some ornamental letters which are large in size and it is found in old handwritten manuscripts. Inspiring from the Uncial writing style different styles have been introduced which make your tattoo simply awesome. In 12th century the very famous style, Gothic style was discovered which named as blackletter in earlier days. Such style will make your calligraphy tattoos much more gorgeous.
• In another form of design the tattoo artist will design some specific style of calligraphic writing, popular as, “Carolingian minuscule” and here lower and upper these both types of letters are used. You may try this in your tattoo.
• Your tattooist may draw some Chinese calligraphy designs which is a known as another type of handwriting precess. The technique is called hanzi in China and kanju in Japan. You may find some kinds of calligraphy tattoo writing styles in China. These are-
  • Seal Script
    
    
  • Clerical Script
    
    
  • Regular Script
    
    
  • Running Script
    
    
  • Grass Script