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An Engraving font (also called a Hershey or single line font) is a type of vector (stroke) font made up of simple line segments (and sometimes arcs) rather than filled-in shapes like modern TrueType/OpenType fonts.

They were created in the 1960s by Dr. Allen V. Hershey for early computer graphics and plotters (machines that physically draw with pens).

Modern fonts often don’t work well for engraving or plotting because they’re designed as filled outlines, which means the machine might trace the outline twice (inside + outside)

The image below shows the difference between an engraving font and a true-type font

 

 

 

 

 

 

The difference is more apparent when filled with a colour

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are some bold and medium options in the font list. In these cases some extra single lines are included.