Ascender
This article is about ascenders in typography. For the font company, see Ascender Corporation. For the rope-climbing device, see Ascender (climbing). For the sports utility vehicle, see Isuzu Ascender.
In typography, an ascender is the portion of a letter in a Latin-derived alphabet that extends above the mean line of a font. That is, the part of the letter that is taller than the font's x-height.
Ascenders, together with descenders, increase the recognizability of words. For this reason, British highway road signs that must be read quickly no longer use all capital letters.[1]
References
- ^ Sampson, Geoffrey. Writing Systems: A linguistic introduction, pp. 94–95. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1985. ISBN 0-8047-1254-9.
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Page | Pagination · Recto and verso · Margin · Column · Canons of page construction · Pull quote | |
Paragraph | Widows and orphans · Leading · River · Baseline · Median · Alignment · Justification | |
Character | Ligature · Letter-spacing · Kerning · Majuscule · Minuscule · Initial · x-height · Ascender · Descender · Diacritics · Counter · Subscript and superscript · Dingbat | |
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