A March 1593 letter from England’s Queen Elizabeth I to King James VI of Scotland, where she acknowledges his “cumber [i.e., trouble] to read such scribbed lines.”
(Folger Shakespeare Library)
While the rise of smartphones and typing impacts handwriting, bad penmanship is far from a new phenomenon. People have struggled to read each other’s handwriting for centuries.
Love letters have a rich history as Valentine’s Day gifts.
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A photo beamed via a satellite from a smartphone is never the same as the description of a place the lover must try hard to imagine.
Writing letters allowed the puritan community spread across England, Holland and the US feel a lot smaller continue practices that were important to their worship.
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