A wide, partitioned drawer used by compositors to store and organize physical letterpress type. The compartments vary in size based on the frequency of the letter's use in English, with the lowercase e getting the largest box. Traditionally, these cases were arranged in pairs on a frame, with capital letters in the upper case and small letters in the lower case.
Heard on the job
Grab a fresh typecase of 12-point Garamond from the rack, this one is entirely out of sorts.
Also heard as
- case