A Remembrance of Things Past

85 years ago today the breaching of Tutankhem's Tomb was announced, by the vulgar but titled self publicist Lord Carnarvon. 49 years ago Fidel Castro overthrow Fulgencio Batista to seize political power in Cuba.

The Times (London) World Copyright, by Arrangement with the Earl of Carnarvon. Copyright, 1923, by The New York Times Company.
Special Cable to The New York Times

Luxor, Egypt, Feb. 16 -- This has been, perhaps, the most extraordinary day in the whole history of Egyptian excavation. Whatever any one may have guessed or imagined of the secret of Tut-ankh-Amen's tomb, they surely cannot have dreamed the truth as now revealed.

The entrance today was made into the sealed chamber of the tomb of Tut-ankh-Amen, and yet another door opened beyond that. No eyes have seen the King, but to practical certainty we know that he lies there close at hand in all his original state, undisturbed

Full text of the original article in the New York Times Here

Giambattista Bodoni was born on February 16, 1740 in Saluzzo, Italy and eventually designed the Bodoni typeface in 1790 which he evolved from the French style of Fournier, and with elements from the English printer Baskerville.

In 1788 he created the "Manuale Tipografico"(The Inventory of types). This was a collection of 291 roman and italic typefaces along with samples of Greek, Russian and other types. Bodoni's passion was type design. This was published after his death by his widow Margherita Dall'Aglio in 1818.

Bodoni said,

"Philosophy and the best literature impel a cultured taste more and more toward simplicity and restriction to essentials and toward a preference over all others for the beauty which has no borrowed plumes... the type is the one thing which is inevitably necessary, and to it all else is subserviant".

He died on November 29, 1813 in Parma, Italy.

A complete collection of his editions are preserved in the Museo Bodoniano, next to the Bibilioteca Palatina of Parma (the museum was recognized through an official decree in 1962).

You can download a Freeware (Hewlett Packard 1998) Bodoni Type Font here