Castine Font Family Free Download

There’s a cemetery in Castine, Maine—a lovely coastal town perhaps best known for Maine Maritime Academy and a surviving crop of stately old American elms—with headstones dating back into the 18th century.

They have the standard old headstone shape, often topped by winged skulls. Thanks to a friend, I got my hands on a couple of rubbings that show a particular style of stone carving that was popular in New England at the time.

I found them captivating to the point of typeface design. Castine has both roman and italic styles, each with numerous historical ligatures, old-style and lining figures, Central/Eastern European alphabets, and a winged skull.