- description
- # Capital letters within the line.
## Overview
This section, titled "Capital letters within the line.", is a textual analysis of typographical conventions in Elizabethan printing, specifically focusing on the inconsistent use of capital letters within lines of text. It is part of Chapter III of a larger work and was extracted from the file `pdf-01KG6Q7Q25RHMFT3SJXPV18VFF.txt`.
## Context
This section is situated within Chapter III of a work that examines printing practices. It follows a discussion on "Misprints in all extant copies." and precedes an analysis of "The text of 1607.". The broader context is the [PDF Workflow Main Test 2026-01-30T00:26:53](arke:01KG6NWQ2H2K4PGG7H4ZHYCZ3Y) collection, which contains various documents related to PDF processing and analysis.
## Contents
The text details the arbitrary use of capital letters in Elizabethan typography, noting that while some ordinary words like "Tent" and "Citty" are consistently capitalized, abstract concepts like "time" and "opportunity" are not. It highlights variations in the capitalization of words such as "Beauty" and "Sun" within the same text. The section also points out the printer's inconsistent application of rules for small capitals, citing examples like "PLVTO" versus "Orpheus" and the varying treatment of place names like "Ardea" and "Rome." Further observations include dropped catchwords and the use of italics only in the "Argument" section. The text also touches upon the use of cursive contractions and ampersands, as well as variations in spelling, providing examples like "doore" vs. "dore" and "dumbe" vs. "dum."
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- Capital letters within the line.
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- Capital letters within the line.
The volume offers examples of the ordinary irregularities which are usually met with in specimens of Elizabethan typography. Capital letters within the line are used little less arbitrarily than in *Venus and Adonis*. Such ordinary words as ‘Tent’ (15), ‘Bee’ (836, 840, 1769), ‘Citty’ (1554) and ‘Foe’ (1608), are always dignified with an initial capital. But the personified ‘time’ and ‘opportunity’ go without the distinction. No law is observable in such a distribution of capitals. In the first part of the poem, ‘Beauty’ is invariably spelt with a capital, but in the concluding stanzas it appears with a small letter; the word is used eighteen times in all, and the capital appears twelve times. ‘Sun’ occurs eight times in all, five times
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LUCRECE 33
Small capitals.
with a capital. ‘Heaven’ is rarely allowed a capital, although ‘Ocean’ always is. It was obviously the intention of the printer to print all proper names in small capitals; but this rule, although often followed, was imperfectly carried out. Cf. line 553—
‘And moodie PLVTO winks while Orpheus playes.’
‘Pluto’ is with, but ‘Orpheus’ is without, due mark of distinction. The place-name ‘Ardea’ is in lower-case type in line 1, but in small capitals in line 1332. ‘Rome’ appears six times and is never in small capitals. Other signs of careless revision are the substitution of a small letter for a capital at the opening of line 86, and the dropping in two places of the catchword—on pp. 28 and 90. Italics are not used at all, save in the ‘Argument’, which is italicized throughout, proper names only being in roman type.
The cursive contraction for ‘m’ or ‘n’—a long line over the preceding vowel—is used thirty-eight times, commonly in order to save space. The ampersand ‘&’ (for ‘and’) occurs fifteen times for the same reason. Both symbols are employed somewhat capriciously. Their employment reflects on the skill of the printer, even if they figured in the author’s ‘copy’.
Variations in the spelling of the same word are comparatively few, but they are numerous enough to give ground for criticism. Thus we find ‘doore’ (306) and ‘dore’ (325, 337); ‘dumbe’ (268) and ‘dum’ (474); ‘nurse’ (1162) and ‘nourse’ (813); ‘opportunity’ (874, 876, 895, 932) and ‘oportunitie’ (903, 1023); ‘rankes’ (1439) and ‘ranckes’ (1441); ‘Rome’ and ‘Roome’ (1644, 1851); ‘sometime’ (1106) and ‘somtime’ (1105); ‘spirite’ (1346), ‘sprite’ (451), and ‘spright’ (121); ‘tongue’ (1465) and ‘tong’ (1463, 1718). In the case of ‘tongue’ and ‘sometime’ the variations occur within a couple of lines of one another. The curious spelling ‘pollusion’ for
E
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34
LUCRECE
- title
- Capital letters within the line.