Turkey: a new symbol for the lira

[hrant]

the sign also resembles a lowercase t

That's a good point (that I for one had missed). But I really would be wary of getting closer to the Dram... Especially if I were the one making it. :-)

Craig, do you think it's good to evoke the £?

Chris, I'm repeating myself, but I think the Arabic-script undercurrent in Turkish culture is too easily ignored (especially by Westerners) and it's something that should instead take pride of place. And the fact that this symbol is to be used with a set of symbols that have their [recent] origins in Arabic only amplifies this.

This is such a wonderful challenge.

hhp

[evertype]

What undercurrent?

Arabic script was formerly used, a good long while now. Is it still visible in signage? Do Latin fonts made by Turks have an Arabic feel to them?

I'm just not sure where this undercurrent is.

[hrant]

You mean like on mosques? :-> Compare how long Turkish used Arabic versus how long it's been using Latin... And you can't read the Qur'aan without it (since it's Arabic by definition - translations are not kosher, pardon the pun).

Do Latin fonts made by Turks have an Arabic feel to them?

To me, the ones that are worth talking about, yes. But in very subtle ways, like the wonderful diamond-shaped tittles in the work of Emin Barın (that Onur Yazıcıgil showed at last year's TypeCon).

* http://www.barincilt.com.tr/eng/eminbarin.html

I'll find out first-hand in less than a month* but I'd be shocked to see Arabic having become irrelevant. BTW, a good chunk of my talk will be about how Turkish type could help preserve their culture if/when they join Europe.

* https://typography.guru/forums/topic/101821-forwarding

hhp

[Si_Daniels]

>translations are not kosher, pardon the pun

http://www.jewlicious.com/2007/08/first-authorized-hebrew-translation-of...

[hrant]

Very cool. But it depends who you ask. And I think this might be a difference between Sunni and Shee'a, noting that in Iran (a Shee'a nation) people learn Arabic for the sole reason of reading the Qur'aan. Turkey is Sunni, so I'm guessing Turkish has [long had] an "official" translation as well, I mean in Latin script. But what's the largest text on the typical cover? :-)
http://www.hilalplaza.com/ProductImages/DS/reg/LT01-NobleQuranTurkish.jpg

hhp

[Andreas Stötzner]

John,
> I think the whole 'anchor' notion is a red herring
And I think the whole business is one, too.

> the anchor notion is something to be completely ignored
It would be best if we could ignore the matter *at all*. Well, now we’re in.

We can try to ignore the one or the other aspect, it won’t help much. The official drawing presented by the Prime Minister has nothing – nothing – of neither L nor t nor ‘anchor’. It simply hasn’t. As you say: post facto interpretation. I reject to take it for serious that the proposed design has something of an capital L. It has as much resemblance of a capital L than it bears resemblance of a Turk praying (viewed sideways) with a upturned c***.

I fear it will remain looking like a bastard between the € and the £.

[eliason]

Keeping the curve tail-like (rather than arm-like) can also be had without resorting to the loop on the left with a join like this:

[Birdseeding]

That's starting to look like a b or a ♭ now. :) It does seem to be the way it wants to be written, mind.

[evertype]

To me that wiggly bit at the join looks unstable and like a leaf that will break off.

[Andreas Stötzner]

I can’t help: of all the so-far proposed L-derivates I can see L-ishness from the top to the bottom only. Everything which comes then (on the bottom right) looks more or less crampy and ill. (this is not our fault. It’s the mess of the initial briefing. There is no true L-ishness in it and hence it cannot be achieved while sticking to it.)

[Andreas Stötzner]

On the Unicode discussion list I just have proposed a postponing of the encoding process. I think the matter needs time to mature.

[evertype]

That isn't going to happen, Andreas.

[evertype]

Everson Mono

[John Hudson]

Can we see the Everson Mono forms in context with some numerals, Michael?

[dezcom]

Also, it would be nice to see various example of the new Turkish lira in the context of the other monetary symbols that are in current use--particularly the Sterling, since it is the one most likely confused with the new entry.

[russellm]

much of this thread strikes me as judging a house by the tatty, tasteless furniture left over from the seventies by the old granny who died there - It will all be gone long before you move in.

Write the glyph out by hand a dozen times with a blunt marker on a piece of cardboard to set you minds at rest.

It is all just geometry. There are a million ways to convey the topology of the glyph without direct reference to that fish hook in the first post.

R

[kentlew]

FWIW — My explorations in Whitman have wound up somewhere between John’s Cambria and Craig’s latest:

[evertype]

Here's Everson Mono in context. I never realized how lousy my ¥ was before.

[hrant]

So I did some thinking, and some rough sketching, and came up with:
- Three ways to do the top.
- Four "essential" terminal styles.
- Seven ways to handle the critical bottom-left.
- Two ways to modulate the bottom.
- And two ways to connect the bottom to the terminal.

To narrow down the permutations, here are ideas I'm getting comfortable with:
- The glyph should be a cross between caps and numerals.
- The best place to make it look like a capital is the top.
- The best place to make it belong with the numerals is the terminal.
- The bottom-left must have a singularity, probably a serif (but not a [closed] loop).
- The bottom "stroke" should be thin (assuming contrast), not least because I'm a fan of "rationalist" stroke contrast in the numerals anyway.
- Attaching an up-curving form immediately at the bottom of the stem is no good.
- The structure should be able to accommodate narrowness.

I'm starting to see two overall strategies to combine everything:
- Very conservative, where I'm ending up with something like what John first showed, and Kent just showed. Although it's solid, it also feels like a lost opportunity.
- Something akin to Craig's "rocker bottom" version, but less flamboyant (and with capital serifs up top). I think curving the bottom might be the key ingredient to making this click.

If this all sounds too detached from the making of glyphs, sorry, this is how I roll. But now I am ready to make glyphs.

hhp

[eliason]

Here are some "rocker-bottom" alternatives in which the stem, instead of dumbly running into the curve, swings over like a J.

I think these show nice balance but are rather busy (ameliorated by the versions with a unilateral [though still "capital"] serif at the top).

[oldnick]

Hrant,

How you roll is how you roll; however, you may be overthinking the subject. To me, it appears that the character is based on an uppercase D, so whatever works for the D will work for the currency symbol.

On the other hand, Occam’s razor isn’t the best tool to use all the time…

[Riccardo Sartori]

Craig, your last version really looks like a scythe.
I wonder if someone would try to make it with a crescent. You can’t go more Turkish than that. ;-)

[hrant]

Craig, I love the bottom ones! Probably because I have a weakness for sharp implements... The extra Arabic flavor and the crescent allusion really kick it up a notch; I think the official structure should have been like this actually. I do have to worry about people at large (especially secularists) accepting it, but it has so much going for it (not least a strong deviation from the Euro).

Nick: guilty as charged.

hhp

[John Hudson]

Love it, Craig. Here's the command economy version:

[Andreas Stötzner]

Folks, please grant yourself a break from this Frankensteinism for a short while. This is decadence at its worst.
Reality will slam all those pieces back in our faces.

> Write the glyph out by hand a dozen times …

Yeah. Hic Rhodos. Hic salta.