National pride, I think. By the 19th century it was generally acknowledged that Antiqua typefaces were more legible, but they were perceived as insufficiently G

National pride, I think. By the 19th century it was generally acknowledged that Antiqua typefaces were more legible, but they were perceived as insufficiently German or whatever. In any case, Fraktur probably would be a lot easier to read than old-school blackletter hands— look at the sheer number of strange ligatures and abbreviations in the Gutenburg bible! This is entirely based off of memory so I could very well be wrong. The fact that blackletter originally evolved as a way of condensing text, though, is pretty much indisputable.