Ever wondered where Lorem ipsum... came from?

December 11, 2000 5:53 AM

Ever wondered where Lorem ipsum... came from?

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat. Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ulliam corper suscipit lobortis nisl ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis autem veleum iriure dolor in hendrerit in vulputate velit esse molestie consequat, vel willum lunombro dolore eu feugiat nulla facilisis at vero eros et accumsan et iusto odio dignissim qui blandit praesent luptatum zzril delenit augue duis dolore te feugait nulla facilisi.
posted by Foaf (12 comments total)

Here's a 1914 translation of the original Cicero. Can't get enough Cicero? Here's a longer (translated to English) excerpt of de Finibus, and the big 'ol latin original.
It's interesting to see where changes have and have not occurred in the lorem ipsum text since the 1500s.
posted by iceberg273 at 6:46 AM on December 11, 2000

Can't get enough Cicero?

Isn't Betty Loren Maltese in jail or something by now?

(sorry)
posted by ethmar at 6:49 AM on December 11, 2000

Not yet.
Ironically, de Finibus is a work on ethics.
posted by iceberg273 at 8:01 AM on December 11, 2000

Mathowie, the mockup looks great. Let's get this Metafilter thing live.
posted by dhartung at 1:05 PM on December 11, 2000

Despite my desperate attempts to mop-up the late afternoon cup of coffee with the nearby roll of paper towels, I'm pretty sure my 't' key is going to be sticky for quite some time.

Huzzah, Dan, well done.
posted by cCranium at 1:49 PM on December 11, 2000

I know we're not supposed to plug our own stuff, but I did a Dreamweaver extension of Lorem Ipsum. You can download the files from my site or search for Latin Text (??) on macromedia's Dreamweaver Exchange (which is impossible to pass a URL around from, stupid Broadvision).

Travis Spencer also made a little program based on my extension that copies Lorem Ipsum to the clipboard. So get greeking!!!!
posted by captaincursor at 2:38 PM on December 11, 2000

I use that little Lorem Ipsum extension, Taylor. Pretty useful, thanks. Someone else did a similar one with biz-speak, which cracks me up but is too distracting for actual use.
posted by rodii at 3:39 PM on December 11, 2000

It's usually referred to as Greeking.

(for no apparent reason).

But y'all have missed the best part.

... never mind. Someone let the cat out; now all the Google hits point to something useful. Damn.
posted by baylink at 7:22 PM on December 11, 2000

About.com quotes from Before and After Magazine: It's ironic that when the then-understood Latin was scrambled, it became as incomprehensible as Greek--hence, the term "Greek" for dummy text.
posted by Aaaugh! at 8:41 PM on December 11, 2000

Y'know, "Greeking" used to refer to the use of illegible but plausible-looking *characters* to mock up a page, not incomprehensible text. When did this change? Nobody uses "widows" and "orphans" right anymore either.
posted by rodii at 7:10 AM on December 12, 2000

rodii, I think you're noticing that there's a difference between the way that font designers use greeking, and the way that layout designers do. I learned graphic arts back in the 70s, and that was the term then.

Even if it wasn't, it's a useful extension of meaning.
posted by dhartung at 11:15 AM on December 12, 2000

It's actually also used to describe the replacing of characters with sized grey bars on a page layout program, to increase speed when the rendered text gets too small to be readable anyway.
posted by baylink at 1:20 PM on December 12, 2000