By George Sadek and Maxi Zhukov

First published in 1997 by the Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI) and Cooper Union, Typographia Polyglotta is a concise, practical study in multilingual typesetting.

The book presents a single sample text translated into twenty-two languages, each set to demonstrate how differences in linguistic structure and orthography affect length, space, and page composition. Preceding each typeset sample is a brief discussion of the language’s typographic and linguistic properties, offering insight into how these factors shape design decisions.

Produced in black and white with 22 pages of sample settings (in English, Arabic, Chinese, Czech, Dutch, Esperanto, Farsi, Finnish, French, German, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swahili, and Swedish), the volume reflects the late 1990s moment when desktop publishing was bringing multilingual typesetting into broader practice, yet reference material for designers remained scarce. Today, it stands as both a historical document and a practical resource for anyone working across scripts—a reference for type designers, typographers, and students interested in the mechanics of setting text in multiple languages.

Designed by Maxim Zhukov

Softcover, 72 pages, b&w offset, 9.1 × 6.1 in