Thin and thick strokes at the same flourish are achieved by alternating low and high pressure of the pen, but never by tracing the same line more than once. Over time, some penmen began to perform intricate flourishes as the main subject of their artwork.įlourishes consist of combined lines, curves, spirals and loops, usually in form of a single, uninterrupted line executed by a quick but graceful movement of the pen. Initially, flourishes were attached to the letters and served as letter decoration, but soon they became stand-alone ornaments, often positioned around the text and between the paragraphs and chapters of the manuscript. In hand-written official documents from that time, flourished capital letters, as well as flourishes above and below the text and at the end of every written line, were rendered as decoration but also served to prevent additional writing to the text. In Europe, flourishing was widely employed for the embellishment of English and German manuscripts. Decorative flourishes, also known as calligraphic ornaments or ornate pictorial calligraphy, developed during centuries of writing and decorating of manuscripts. Flourishes, that are considered a combination of drawing and calligraphy, presumably evolved during a long period of time from extended curved letter strokes executed for embellishment in calligraphy and penmanship, when beauty was an imperative in handwriting. Decorative flourishes were almost inevitable decoration of books and documents for centuries. The term ‘flourish’ implies embellishment of letters and text, as well as stand-alone decorative elements. These vector flourishes are suitable for use in graphic designs and, one might say, they are ideal for wood carving.
All the flourishes are colored black, so that you can simply adjust their size and use them straight away it is, however, possible to change the color to your liking by editing it in an appropriate software.