Pierre Simon Fournier

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Pierre Simon Fournier

1712-1768

French engraver and type founder who studied watercolor paintings before getting involved in type design and beginning a foundry (1736). Fournier, said to have cut 60,000 punches for 147 alphabets of his own design, also developed new type ornaments and improved methods for printing music, for which he invented a point system for standardizing music type. His two volumes entitled Manuale Typographique, published in 1764 and 1766, were the first books on punch-cutting and typefounding.