Phoreus™ Cherokee
Type Culture · 2011
A multi-weight family designed for the Cherokee syllabary, including the first cursive italic and the first full family with Cherokee lowercase glyphs.
About
Developed at the request of the Cherokee Nation's Language Technology Office, the family covers 86 Cherokee syllabary glyphs across Regular, Italic, Bold and Bold Italic, with the italic drawn from nearly 180 years of Cherokee manuscript sources rather than simply slanting the upright. Version 2, completed in 2015, added the newly specified Cherokee lowercase, making Phoreus the first full typeface family to include it. The uncomplicated forms are aimed primarily at young readers in language preservation contexts, though the Latin complement has found independent use.
Classification
Phoreus Cherokee is a humanist serif designed to support the Cherokee syllabary alongside a Latin complement; its forms are described as distinct and uncomplicated, suited to young readers, with a genuine cursive italic drawn from Cherokee handwriting manuscripts.