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The story of the Armenian alphabet. Part 2: Recent developments

This research traces the development of lettering and type in Armenia from late C20th (c.1960s) to 2010. The article gives an insight into the importance of the unique alphabet to the Armenian people (both within the country and the diaspora), particularly since 1991 when Armenia became an independent country following 70 years as a Soviet state with enforced use of the Cyrillic alphabet.

Reichert, editor of the Baseline magazine, was keen to expand on the theme of the Armenian alphabet which had been generating interest since Puzzovio’s conference presentation ‘Mesrob & Yacob – The Story of the Armenian alphabet’ at the prestigious ATypI conference, Helsinki, 2005. By 2009, Puzzovio’s research work connected to Armenian type was becoming known in the type design/academic community and she lectured at ATypI Dublin (2010). The Baseline article gives an insight into the importance of the unique alphabet characters to the Armenian people (both within the country and the diaspora). It covers hand-lettering i.e. painted and drawn; incribed lettering i.e. on stone signs, memorials etc; written/calligraphic lettering; as well as keyboarded type and its recent design development.

Significantly, there had been no illustrated summary of modern Armenian type design and production published before. The choice of the acclaimed international design magazine Baseline enabled the information to be distributed widely and therefore promote the alphabet of the Armenian people. The articles drew upon empirical research in Armenia and elsewhere from personal observation/photography/email dialogue/face-to-face interviews with identified Armenians working in the field:

Edik Ghabuzyan (2005-2012 interviews),

Manvel Shmavonyan (Yerevan 2008/ 2012, Dublin 2010)

Maxim Zukov (New York, 2006)

Hrant Papazian (2006–2012, Dublin/Yerevan)

(Various Armenian books consulted are cited in the article).

Puzzovio acted as a consultant for John A. Lane (2012) The Diaspora of Armenian Printing 1512-2012. This article is cited: Selected List of Sources (pp. 216).