The Usage of “Long S” in Old Manuscripts

English is an ages old language. It has been in use for over thousands of years. The language has also undergone a lot of changes and alterations. Varying from the different types of pronunciations to the style of writing an alphabet, all has seen a lot of change.  If we look at the centuries-old manuscript, such as an original handwritten copy of the U.S. Bill of Rights or may be the first-edition printing of John Milton's epic poem "Paradise Lost, we will observe that the letter “s” is written in an unfamiliar manner. The “s” in those days was written differently.

It used to resemble the present day’s “f”. To the readers of today, it might look like the the long s (written as 'ſ'). They may think that there is a spelling mistake or typos such as "Congrefs" instead of "Congress" or "Loft" instead of "Lost." On a closer look only, one is able to assess that unlike an f, the character either doesn’t have any crossbar or only a nub on the left side of the staff.  Although the letter resembles f more, but in reality it is just any other variation of the lower case. One question that comes to our mind in this scenario is that “Where did the long s originate from and why has this character disappeared over time? John Overholt, who is a curator at the Harvard University's Houghton Library, stated that the long s originated in handwriting and was later adopted in typography when printing became common in parts of Europe during the Renaissance. The long s has its origin in the Roman times, when the lowercase s typical took an elongated form in cursive writing in Latin. As per the librarians at the New York Academy of Medicine, people were making use of the long s at the beginning and middle of words by the 12th century. Overholt stated that the long s and the more familiar short s possess the same sound and the rules for usage. There were also few rules, as per which long s could not be used at the end of a word. Also, it could not be used before an f or an apostrophe. Overholt further stated that although there are consistent standards for using the long s, still there were rules that are a slightly arbitrary. The end of the usage of long s was slightly abrupt in English printing. It happened around 1800, but the character was used for a little longer time in the U.S. If seen outside of manuscripts and antique books, one might only find the long s in German.

By: Anuja Arora

Content: https://www.livescience.com/65560-long-s-old-texts.html