What is cursive handwriting?

Cursive is a style of handwriting where the characters or letters in a word are connected and rounded. This allows the pen to flow in continuous strokes, increasing handwriting speed with practice. Cursive existed long before English. Examples include hieratic script in ancient Egypt, caoshu in China, and Greek minuscule. Carolingian minuscule was a step toward modern cursive, and Anglicana was popular with English scribes. Round hand was dominant in 18th-century English cursive and was later followed by the Spencerian and Palmer methods. In the U.S., cursive instruction declined in the 21st century, when the Common Core State Standards omitted it from its English language arts standards.

How is cursive different from print handwriting?

Cursive and print handwriting differ primarily in the style of letter formation and how the letters connect within a word. Cursive is characterized by rounded letterforms and the joining of letters, which allows for a continuous flow of strokes, increasing writing speed. Print handwriting, also known as manuscript, uses separated letters and is often the first style taught to children. The standardization of handwriting, such as through the Palmer method , aimed to promote efficiency and clarity in business writing, moving away from the ornate styles of earlier cursive. While cursive was once a standard part of the curriculum, its instruction has declined in some areas due to changing educational standards and the rise of digital communication.

Why do some people learn to write in cursive?

People learn to write in cursive for a few reasons. Cursive is a style of handwriting with rounded shapes and connected letters, which allows the pen to flow in continuous strokes, increasing handwriting speed with practice. Historically, cursive was essential for creating legible signatures, studying historical documents, and general communication. Although its importance has diminished with the rise of digital communication, some schools still teach it, and many adults maintain the skill. Some worry that the decline in cursive instruction may hinder students' ability to read handwritten letters from older relatives or write a legible signature.

What are the basic features of cursive letters?

Cursive is a style of handwriting where letters in a word are typically connected through rounded strokes, allowing the pen to flow continuously, which can increase handwriting speed. Cursive writing existed long before English, with examples such as hieratic script in ancient Egypt and caoshu in China. Later, Carolingian minuscule became the basis for modern roman type. The 18th-century English cursive, round hand, was taught through copy books and made its way to British colonies. The Spencerian method and the Palmer method later standardized handwriting in the United States.

How has the use of cursive handwriting changed over time?

Cursive handwriting has undergone significant changes throughout history. Ancient forms of cursive, such as Egyptian hieratic and Chinese caoshu, existed long before the Latin alphabet. The Carolingian minuscule was a step toward modern cursive, and Anglicana became popular among English scribes by the 13th century. Round hand, a calligraphic style with thick lines, was dominant in 18th-century England and was taught through copy books. In the mid-19th century, Platt Rogers Spencer developed the Spencerian method, which focused on both handwriting and body positioning. Later, Austin Norman Palmer introduced the Palmer method in 1894, a standardized system of business writing that gained popularity in schools. With the rise of typewriters and computers, the need for standardized cursive writing declined, leading to a reduced emphasis on penmanship in schools.

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A chart displays the word for cat in English, French, and Spanish-cat, chat, and gato-written in both print and cursive styles, each in its own colored column.

Flip through Platt Rogers Spencers' workbook: Spencerian System of Penmanship

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What is cursive handwriting?
Cursive is a style of handwriting where the characters or letters in a word are connected and rounded. This allows the pen to flow in continuous strokes, increasing handwriting speed with practice.

Cursive existed long before English. Examples include hieratic script in ancient Egypt, caoshu in China, and Greek minuscule. Carolingian minuscule was a step toward modern cursive, and Anglicana was popular with English scribes. Round hand was dominant in 18th-century English cursive and was later followed by the Spencerian and Palmer methods.

In the U.S., cursive instruction declined in the 21st century, when the Common Core State Standards omitted it from its English language arts standards.
3 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
How is cursive different from print handwriting?
Cursive and print handwriting differ primarily in the style of letter formation and how the letters connect within a word. Cursive is characterized by rounded letterforms and the joining of letters, which allows for a continuous flow of strokes, increasing writing speed. Print handwriting, also known as manuscript, uses separated letters and is often the first style taught to children.

The standardization of handwriting, such as through the Palmer method, aimed to promote efficiency and clarity in business writing, moving away from the ornate styles of earlier cursive. While cursive was once a standard part of the curriculum, its instruction has declined in some areas due to changing educational standards and the rise of digital communication.
4 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
Why do some people learn to write in cursive?
People learn to write in cursive for a few reasons. Cursive is a style of handwriting with rounded shapes and connected letters, which allows the pen to flow in continuous strokes, increasing handwriting speed with practice.

Historically, cursive was essential for creating legible signatures, studying historical documents, and general communication. Although its importance has diminished with the rise of digital communication, some schools still teach it, and many adults maintain the skill. Some worry that the decline in cursive instruction may hinder students' ability to read handwritten letters from older relatives or write a legible signature.
2 Britannica Sources
1. handwriting: Teaching handwriting
2. cursive
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
What are the basic features of cursive letters?
Cursive is a style of handwriting where letters in a word are typically connected through rounded strokes, allowing the pen to flow continuously, which can increase handwriting speed. Cursive writing existed long before English, with examples such as hieratic script in ancient Egypt and caoshu in China. Later, Carolingian minuscule became the basis for modern roman type. The 18th-century English cursive, round hand, was taught through copy books and made its way to British colonies. The Spencerian method and the Palmer method later standardized handwriting in the United States.
2 Britannica Sources
1. cursive
2. Definition of cursive
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
How has the use of cursive handwriting changed over time?
Cursive handwriting has undergone significant changes throughout history. Ancient forms of cursive, such as Egyptian hieratic and Chinese caoshu, existed long before the Latin alphabet.

The Carolingian minuscule was a step toward modern cursive, and Anglicana became popular among English scribes by the 13th century. Round hand, a calligraphic style with thick lines, was dominant in 18th-century England and was taught through copy books.

In the mid-19th century, Platt Rogers Spencer developed the Spencerian method, which focused on both handwriting and body positioning. Later, Austin Norman Palmer introduced the Palmer method in 1894, a standardized system of business writing that gained popularity in schools.

With the rise of typewriters and computers, the need for standardized cursive writing declined, leading to a reduced emphasis on penmanship in schools.
3 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.

cursive, style of handwriting distinguished by rounded shapes in a word and, frequently, connection of characters. Cursive style allows the pen to flow in continuous strokes, accelerating the handwriting speed of a practiced hand.

Though modern cursive is often associated with languages that use the Latin alphabet, including English, Spanish, and French, cursive writing existed long before the development of written English. For instance, hieratic script was a form of ancient Egyptian cursive used from about 2925 bce to about 200 bce. Caoshu, a cursive variant of Chinese script, developed during the Han dynasty (206 bce–220 ce). By the 8th century ce, Byzantine schoolchildren learned to write in Greek miniscule, a variant of Greek script that consisted of rounded characters that were frequently joined. Cursive became the popular styling for the Cyrillic alphabet in the 15th century, as Muscovy was laying the foundations of a centralized Russian state.

Within the history of the Latin alphabet, a first step toward modern cursive writing was Carolingian minuscule. Popularized during the rule of Charlemagne in the late 8th to early 9th century, it became the basis of modern roman type: from Carolingian minuscule, almost all future styles of Latin writing would evolve.

Another major evolution came in the 12th century with Anglicana, a style of writing widely used by English scribes in Britain and northern France. Its purely cursive form, aptly called cursiva Anglicana, was popular with scribes by the 13th century. Sometimes called court hands for their prevalence in government documents, these styles would vary slightly over the next few centuries and between countries. Changes included added or removed flourishes, characters that slanted one way or the other, and varying levels of clarity.

The dominant style of 18th-century English cursive was round hand, a style of calligraphy with thick lines produced on the downstrokes of capitals and minuscules through pressure applied on a flexible nib of a quill pen. Round hand was used by scribes and writing masters and taught to literate members of the public via copy books, which were “how-to” guides with detailed instructions on standards and technique. Round hand made its way to the British colonies, including those that later became the United States. The Declaration of Independence was written in round hand.

Following round hand, development in English cursive is fairly simple to track. One of the most successful techniques of standardizing handwriting in the United States was the Spencerian method, developed by Platt Rogers Spencer in the mid-19th century. Spencerian penmanship instruction focused not only on a writer’s handwriting but also on their body positioning in order to facilitate long hours of continual writing without fatigue. According to a workbook written by Spencer and others, “Form, in writing, is the picture of a movement, and movement the result of a proper action of the writing muscles.…Before we can expect a satisfactory handwriting, [these muscles] are to be rendered strong and supple.” Aided by the advocacy of Victor M. Rice, superintendent of public schools for Buffalo and later for New York state, Spencer saw his method become a popular alternative for round hand in the United States about the 1850s.

Following Spencer was Austin Norman Palmer, an entrepreneur and educator who in 1894 introduced the Palmer method: a standardized system of business writing. The Palmer method intended to teach businessmen to write clearly and efficiently, without the ornamentation common in cursive writing. Though originally intended for business use, the Palmer method also gained popularity in schools.

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These methods of cursive writing were entwined with the technology available at the moment of their development. Rather than being carved or inscribed, as hieroglyphic writing was, hieratic was written in ink using a reed pen on papyrus. Round hand was particularly suited for the quill pen. Spencer’s method arrived when schools traded the quill and ink pot for slates and chalk, which allowed students to erase and start over during practice. By the time Palmer had developed his method, paper was becoming less expensive and thus more accessible to the common businessperson. And as typewriters, then word processors, then personal computers came into common use, the need for a standardized system of cursive writing dwindled.

Along with that dwindling need for cursive writing, emphasis on penmanship in schools declined. In 2010 a set of educational guidelines for U.S. schools, known as the Common Core State Standards, was introduced and omitted cursive from its standards for English language arts. Many states continued to mandate some level of cursive education, but the exclusion of cursive from the Common Core sparked a defensive reaction among many Americans. Some worried that less time spent in the classroom learning cursive could hinder students’ ability to decipher handwritten letters from older relatives, write a legible signature, or study historical documents.

In the 21st century, tools that use artificial intelligence to interpret cursive writing have increased the accessibility of such handwritten records. Optical character recognition (OCR) software is able to transform scanned pages of uniform handwriting into editable text documents, although such software is better suited for print materials than handwritten ones. Advancements in cognitive computing have also led to the emergence of handwritten text recognition (HTR), which can transcribe less structured handwriting by using deep-learning algorithms.

Meg Matthias

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