Shepherd's Double Case

—

[ ]

( )

;

' '

mids

ffl

ffi

ens

ems

thin

thicks

quads

Æ
Œ

This English typecase configuration is shown by F.G.Shepherd in Typography for Students 1958. It is said to be basically standard throughout all English-speaking countries, but of course this is only at the very basic level, i.e. for caps and most l.c. characters. Scottish lays are necessarily different, as the box construction is slightly different, see for example Glasgow School of Art and U.S. cases reverse w and , and divide the 'mids' box and thus start the figures there, and also only have five rows in the upper case section, for example California Job. Australia and New Zealand tend to follow the U.S. style in that respect. Whilst there are other versions of double case, with seven or five rows in the Upper, even with the six row style, there are differences many of which are listed at Double Lays.

The empty case is the Improved Double Case of Miller & Richard 1894 and still Stephenson Blake 1989, and others. The case has 53 boxes in the lower case section and 42 boxes in the upper case (right hand) section and the improvement is in the reduction of upper case rows, to allow more room for capitals. Thus the upper case bay has 2 short and 4 tall rows of boxes, whereas the Ordinary Double has 7 rows of same sized boxes.

Other empty cases ie with the boxes left blank		Other type layouts ie with characters assigned to boxes
Full Index of layouts	Glossary of terms used	Sources of the layouts	Introduction
Quantities in a fount of type		Quantities in a case of type
Notes about Job and Double Cases	Notes about Upper cases	Notes about Lower cases	Alembic home page

This page was written in 2015 by David Bolton and last updated 28 May 2015.