Abbreviations in typography catalogue: “Antiqua Lg.-Nr. 1342”, “A.-G. für Schriftgieß. u. M., Offenbach a. M.”?

Question

I’ve been seeking information on the typeface used in some turn-of-the-century German scientific articles, and the closest match I can find is the typeface appearing in Seeman’s 1926 Handbuch der Schriftarten on p.75, listed as “Antiqua Lg.-Nr. 1342”, attributed to the company/foundry “A.-G. für Schriftgieß. u. M., Offenbach a. M.”

However, I’m not sure what some of these abbreviations stand for — especially necessary since Antiqua is just the generic term for roman-style serif faces. I can recognise Offenbach am Main, Schriftgießerei (= type foundry), and Aktiengesellschaft, but for Lg.-Nr. and u. M. I am unsure (I guess Nr is Nummer and u is und?), and these don’t appear in standard lists of abbreviations — I guess they are more specific to the topic. I hope these may be more transparent to native speakers than they are for me?

Answer 1

The Klingspor Museum has an artists portrait about the "Aktiengesellschaft für Schriftgießerei und Maschinenbau" on its website.

According to that, the full name of the company is "Aktiengesellschaft für Schriftgießerei und Maschinenbau". "Maschinenbau" can be translated as "machine construction", "engine building" or, when referring to a department at an university for example, as "mechanical engineering". In addition to typefaces, the "A.-G. für Schriftgieß. u. M." also offered printing presses.

The meaning of "Lg.-Nr." is less clear. If I were to speculate, two possible meanings come to mind. As far as I know, there were a lot of Antiqua variants at the time, and not every one had an individual name. So, "Lg.-Nr." could simply stand for "Lagernummer", the position number in the company's storage. Also, not every variant contained the same ligatures. So, "Lg.-Nr." might refer to which ligature (or set of ligatures) could be printed with the respective typeface. But this part is mostly guesswork, as mentioned.