hairline

A thin typographic line. Also describes a very thin serif, as in hairline serif, or the thinnest line that can be printed, as in hairline rule. In a typeface that has a high degree of contrast between the thicknesses of strokes, such as Bodoni, hairline also refers to the thinnest stroke of a letter.

hair space

A very small space used to adjust the spaces between letters and words. Typographic style rules define many specific uses for this space, such as to separate characters slightly when setting mathematics and references to footnotes. Thickness of the hair space varies in the fonts and software of different manufacturers; in digital typesetting positive kerning is sometimes used to obtain the same spacing effect.

hamburgevons, hamburgefontstiv

See key words.

hand-set metal type

See metal type.

heavy

See typeface weight.

H height

The distance from the baseline to the top of the capital H, which type designers sometimes use to represent the height of all capital letters that do not have a curved overlap. Also called capital height or cap height.

hint, hinting

In computer-aided type design, software instructions added to a typeface to improve its appearance in low-resolution output and in small sizes. Hints govern features such as spacing, character shape, and alignment of character parts.

horizontal fraction

A common fraction comprising a numerator, denominator, and a horizontal fraction bar. May be supplied by the type designer or manufacturer as a single unit or built up by the compositor or software from separate characters. Ready-made horizontal fractions usually exist in the form of commonly used fractions such as ¼, ½, ¾. Also called horizontal bar fraction, vertical fraction, or (when it occupies the width of the en space) an en fraction, en set fraction, or nut fraction.

Hp height

The distance from the top of the capital H to the bottom of the lowest descender. Relevant when capitals are taller than ascenders, as in some script typefaces. In many typefaces identical to the kp height. Also known as Ep height.

humanist

Describes typefaces derived from letterforms of the fifteenth century, especially those of the Italian Renaissance. Includes roman typefaces based on lettering that originated as copies of the earlier Carolingian script as well as italic typefaces based on more quickly written, cursive forms. See also italic.

hyphenation

The inclusion of a hyphen between words to create a compound from two separate words (as in self-restraint); also, the practice of breaking words between syllables at the end of lines of type (also known as word division).