What is Lorem Ipsum?

Lorem Ipsum is merely placeholder text used within the printing and typesetting industry. It has served as the standard dummy text since the 1500s when an anonymous printer rearranged letters to create a specimen book. It has endured five centuries and has even transitioned into the realm of electronic typesetting, maintaining its original form. Its popularity surged in the 1960s with the introduction of Letraset sheets featuring Lorem Ipsum passages, and more recently, it has been included in desktop publishing software such as Aldus PageMaker.

Why do we use it?

It’s a well-known fact that readers can become distracted by the layout of a page when viewing its content. The primary reason for employing Lorem Ipsum is its relatively normal distribution of characters, which contrasts with phrases like ‘Content here, content here’ that do not resemble readable English. Nowadays, many desktop publishing programs and web editors default to using Lorem Ipsum as their text model. A search for ‘lorem ipsum’ will reveal numerous websites still in early development stages. Different versions have emerged over the years, some unintentionally, while others intentionally include humorous elements and variations.

Where does it come from?

Unlike common misconception, Lorem Ipsum is not just random text. It stems from a piece of classical Latin literature dating back to 45 BC, making it over 2000 years old. Richard McClintock, a Latin scholar at Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia, researched the less common Latin term consectetur found in a Lorem Ipsum passage and traced it back to its legitimate source. Lorem Ipsum originates from sections 1.10.32 and 1.10.33 of de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum (The Extremes of Good and Evil) by Cicero, composed in 45 BC. This work is a dissertation on ethical theory, widely read during the Renaissance. The first line of Lorem Ipsum, “Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet…”, is derived from section 1.10.32.

For those interested, the standard passage of Lorem Ipsum used since the 1500s is provided below. Sections 1.10.32 and 1.10.33 from Cicero’s de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum are included in their original form, along with English translations from H. Rackham’s 1914 version.

Where can I get some?

Numerous variations of Lorem Ipsum passages are available; however, most have undergone some modifications, such as humorous additions or random word placements that appear implausible. If you plan to utilize a Lorem Ipsum passage, it’s crucial to ensure nothing inappropriate is interspersed within the text. Many Lorem Ipsum generators online tend to repeat predefined segments, but there’s a true generator that employs a vocabulary of over 200 Latin words combined with various model sentence structures to produce Lorem Ipsum that appears coherent. Thus, the Lorem Ipsum generated is always devoid of repetition, extraneous humor, or unusual words.

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