German

German was a specific body size for metal type in letterpress printing, falling between two other standardized sizes. It measured 1.5 points, occupying a narrow band in the hierarchy of type sizes that once crowded the printer's type case. This size is now obsolete, surviving mainly in old foundry catalogs and the occasional reference in historical printing texts.

Type sizing in the metal type era followed no single international standard until relatively late. Printers worked with named sizes, many tied to geographic foundries or regional traditions. German sat between American type (typically smaller) and Saxon type (typically larger), reflecting the competitive landscape of nineteenth-century type founding in Europe and America. Each foundry guarded its own measurements, and standardization came only gradually through formal point systems.

Why the name, and why it vanished

The name pointed to its origin or primary market, much like other geographically named sizes of its era. However, as the Anglo-American point system consolidated dominance in the early twentieth century, intermediate sizes like German lost their practical value. Printers could now select from standardized point sizes (10pt, 11pt, 12pt, and so on) rather than relying on proprietary historical names. A 1.5-point size had no clean place in this grid.

The real pressure came from industrialization. Phototypesetting and then digital typography eliminated the need to physically cast type in dozens of overlapping sizes. Modern systems generate any size on demand. A printer today never needs to know that German ever existed, and the term has vanished from working vocabulary in the trade.

For historians and anyone handling old type specimens or restoring letterpress equipment, German remains a useful identifier when matching orphaned sorts to their original foundry and era. Its obsolescence is precisely what makes it worth preserving in reference works: it maps a lost corner of printing's technical vocabulary.