Gothic

Besides its original meaning, "of or relating to the Goths (Gothos, Getas), a Germanic tribe" and thus the Gothic language and the Gothic alphabet, the word Gothic has been used to refer to distinctly different things:

From a Renaissance perspective (originally Italian, gotico, with connotations of "rough, barbarous"), it conveyed the opposite of 'classical' or 'Roman', hence:
- High Medieval northern European art, especially architecture, see Gothic art, Gothic architecture, International Gothic
  - The 18th century Gothic revival sought to revive High Medieval Gothic architecture.
  - The Gothic (Naenia typica) is a species of noctuid moth, named after its patterns reminiscent of Gothic architecture.
- Another name for Blackletter, a script developed in the Middle Ages.
from the 18th century, the word came to mean Germanic in general (synonymously with Teutonic), with grim overtones e.g. from the contrast of Germanic mythology with classical Greek mythology.
- A British literary genre from the late 18th and early 19th century, with a Victorian revival a hundred years later: see Gothic Novel.
From its use in Romanticism, the word in the 20th century came to refer to anything dark or gloomy.
- a certain lifestyle (see Goth), music (see Gothic rock), and fashion (see Gothic fashion).
- A roleplaying computer game: Gothic (computer game)
- Gothic (movie), a 1986 film by Ken Russell.
- Gothic (album), an album released by the heavy metal/goth metal band Paradise Lost in 1992.
more recent uses:
- Another name for sans-serif typefaces.
- Japanese Gothic typeface is a common printing style in Japanese printing.
- A chess variant: Gothic Chess.

See also