Test of the quill

Saturday, October 29, our young calligraphy students had a chance to time-travel: guided by the teacher Artyom Lebedev they tried to write with a real quill.

Artyom suggested the kids imagine themselves apprentices in a scriptorium: a place where scribes worked in the Middle Ages. It turned out rather difficult to write with a quill: either you push it too hard, and the line splits in two, or you shift it awkwardly, and it splatters ink all around. This way the kids could experience the hardships of being a scribe in the olden days.

The students could also pretend just for that hour that they were Alexander Pushkin – for the great Russian poet used the goose quill to write all his poems.

The quill as a writing instrument witnessed the history for several ages, and the kids had a chance to time-travel through all those epochs, trying their hand at the uncial, semi-uncial and cursive uncial scripts.

Despite all the difficulties, by the end of the class many students managed to produce quite acceptable letters, which they proudly demonstrated to their parents.

Test of the quill