two Thetas

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Bert
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two Thetas

Post by Bert »

I have run across two ways of writing a Theta in the same piece.
One looks "normal", like so; [size=150]θ[/size]
The other one is leaning back and the bottom left side is open.
Why?

chad
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Post by chad »

hi bert, i remember episcopus asked this last year:

viewtopic.php?p=876&highlight=#876

what text is it, and who's the editor and what year was it printed &c. i haven't seen this before. thanks, chad. :)

Emma_85
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Post by Emma_85 »

For me the second theta you describe is the 'normal' one, it's just two different ways to write one, funny that they would use two different fonts in the same piece though :? .
I suppose you are talking about this sort of theta:
Image

It's easier and quicker to write than the other one.

PeterD
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Post by PeterD »

Hi Bert,

The theta you describe is the handwritten cursive style of type. It is easier and faster to write and, thus, prefered by most Greeks.

~PeterD
Fanatical ranting is not just fine because it's eloquent. What if I ranted for the extermination of a people in an eloquent manner, would that make it fine? Rather, ranting, be it fanatical or otherwise, is fine if what is said is true and just. ---PeterD, in reply to IreneY and Annis

Geoff
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Post by Geoff »

Something Strange happened the other day. I do exercises from time to time on my home PC and always use the same document. One time I opened it up and began typing in Greek using a unicode font with Keyman and got a different theta than the one of previous weeks (Same font). I'm not sure what happened, but it was strange.

Bert
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Post by Bert »

chad wrote:
what text is it, and who's the editor and what year was it printed &c. i haven't seen this before. thanks, chad. :)
First Six Books of Homer's Iliad by James R. Boise. Published by S.C. Griggs & company in 1872
Emma wrote:
For me the second theta you describe is the 'normal' one, it's just two different ways to write one, funny that they would use two different fonts in the same piece though .
The Theta you drew (Beats me how you did it) is like the one I meant except that 'mine is leaning left (The other letters are leaning right)
I write mine a lot like that but instead I start mine half way up, move down and then across and up etc. That way I end up with a Theta that is closed. (I hope that made sense.)
PeterD wrote: Hi Bert,

The theta you describe is the handwritten cursive style of type. It is easier and faster to write and, thus, prefered by most Greeks.
Strange that they switch back and forth randomly, or so it seems, isn't it?

annis
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Post by annis »

Some Greek fonts imitate older Byzantine practice and, like the sigmas, may use different forms for letters within a word, at the end, and I know some systems have a different beta at the beginning (the variation is the usual SPIonic beta, and a thing that looks like a pince-nez).
William S. Annis — http://www.aoidoi.org/http://www.scholiastae.org/
τίς πατέρ' αἰνήσει εἰ μὴ κακοδαίμονες υἱοί;

Emma_85
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Post by Emma_85 »

The Theta you drew (Beats me how you did it) is like the one I meant except that 'mine is leaning left (The other letters are leaning right)
I write mine a lot like that but instead I start mine half way up, move down and then across and up etc. That way I end up with a Theta that is closed. (I hope that made sense.)
Ah, I see... I just quickly did one in paintshop pro, all my letters lean to the right, I think ones leaning towards the left always look really odd.

ThomasGR
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Re: two Thetas

Post by ThomasGR »

Bert wrote:I have run across two ways of writing a Theta in the same piece.
One looks "normal", like so; [size=150]θ[/size]
The other one is leaning back and the bottom left side is open.
Why?
The first one you mentioned [size=150]θ[/size] is the capital form, the other one for lower case.

Bert
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Re: two Thetas

Post by Bert »

ThomasGR wrote:
Bert wrote:I have run across two ways of writing a Theta in the same piece.
One looks "normal", like so; [size=150]θ[/size]
The other one is leaning back and the bottom left side is open.
Why?
The first one you mentioned [size=150]θ[/size] is the capital form, the other one for lower case.
They are both somewhere in the middle of a word where all the other letters are lower case. :?:

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