le 2001/10/30 4:56, lcs@... à lcs@... a écrit :

> resembling in shape the greek beta is usually not not
> viewed as a ligature; it is **one letter** whose name is:
> 
> der stimmlose  s  (unvoiced s)
> 
> or
> 
> der scharfe  s   (sharp s)

sorry larry,

a ligature is by definition one glyph [what you call a letter], however
historically it sees its origin in the combined form of two letters. these
antedate typewriters by many centuries. this is the definition of a
ligature. it is thus inexact to say that the 'ß' character - that i call
'double-s' - is not a ligature.

in the days of lead type, a font could contain hundreds of ligatures.

the noting of the use of ligatures is a recognised method, for example, for
determining which 16th century typographer copied a type design from
another.

in time, printing habits changed [probably under pressure of simplification
for industrialisation] and most ligatures died out. some live on 'oe' 'ae'
and 'ß' which is not a  'beta' but distinctly a double-s [if i could draw
here i'd show you how it evolved]. another well candidate is the '&' whose
name 'éperluette' in french, or 'ampersand' ['éperluette' -> "est pour le
'e' et 't'", 'ampersand' -> "am pour and"] shows how it is derived from the
letters 'e' and 't'.

it is interesting to note that technology is now taking the reverse path
allowing [through trueType and then openType] the creation and use of
ligatures for other common letter pairs, and sometimes triplets.

in french, accents are in fact a combination of diacritics and 'elisions';
the diacritics change the sound of the letter that they accompany, the
'elisions' mark where a silent letter was taken out [by printers], thus
'thé' is a diacritic, 'guêpe' is an 'elision'. the elision could be
considered a ligature also, but as the ligature implies that the form has
resisted over time, they are not 'real' ligatures.

the tex group may discuss this, but that does not change the historical
references pre-typewriter, my own research on the history of the ampersand
[i was a typographer for decades], and the work of scholars on the subject
of ligatures over the centuries.

so no, i am not confusing <german sharp s> with the genuine
ligature tz (used mostly in gothic style German print), because <german
sharp s> [what i call 'double-s'] is, in all accepted historical fact and
the accepted typographical sense of the word, a ligature.

> The above is a current truth accepted in the the German
> TeX user group "Dante".
> 
> The "truth" is subject to frequent revision on such
> matters.  (But neither you nor I have licence to revise:)

the german tex users group may use whatever changes and revisions to
language that please them in their group. they cannot deny the work of
generations of searchers, and the accepted professional vocabulary specific
to that area of study.

the 'truth' - as you say - is, in the immortal words of chris carter, 'out
there'.

thank you,
:-j