The Anglaise types of Firmin Didot, 1806

The innovative Anglaise typeface was introduced in 1806, when Firmin Didot published his translation of Les Bucoliques de Virgile, dedicating it to his brother Pierre and later preserved by the Imprimerie nationale.

In 1806, Firmin Didot published his first work, Les Bucoliques de Virgile, translated into French verse by himself. He dedicated it to his elder brother, Pierre. “Always united since childhood by a friendship as tender as it was unalterable,” he emphasized, “our tastes have always been the same for both Typography and Poetry. I therefore dedicate to you the first work I publish; I offer the poet the translation of the pastorals sung by the swan of Mantua, and to the typographer the typefaces of this volume, and especially this one called Anglaise, a typeface which, tried without success in its native country, appears for the first time, with some distinction, under the auspices of French Typography.”

Firmin recalls that, for a round script, he had already “cut typefaces in such a way that it was difficult to see where the ends of each letter met. But there were still great difficulties to overcome in order to execute the typeface called Anglaise [...] I have taken pleasure in letting you guess the means I took to succeed...”. This typeface, for which he filed a patent, was awarded the gold medal at the 1806 Exposition des Produits de l'Industrie Française. A proof of the types used at the Imprimerie Impériale, dated 1810, bears witness to the official use of a typeface (28 points). In 1811, Firmin Didot, appointed Head of the Imprimerie Impériale, began the production of thirteen Didot Millimétrique roman and italic sizes, of which only two were cast and used in a single work: Les Cérémonies du Sacre de Napoléon. At the same time, he cut other sizes of Anglaise. In 1831, the government acquired all of Firmin Didot’s English and round script coinage. These masterpieces of engraving are preserved in the treasury of the Imprimerie nationale.