1775–1817 · Writers

Jane Austen signature

English novelist, 1775–1817

Inspired by Jane Austen’s signature

A rendering in a modern handwriting font, made for this page. It is not the real signature; see where to view the original below. Where to see the original ↓Style: La Belle Aurore, slant 4°

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Pinyon Script · 6°

Who Jane Austen was

Jane Austen was born in Steventon, Hampshire, in December 1775 and died in Winchester in July 1817. Her six novels, from Sense and Sensibility (1811) to the posthumous Northanger Abbey and Persuasion (1817), made her one of the best-loved writers in English.

None of those books carried her name in her lifetime. Sense and Sensibility was published as “By a Lady”, and later novels as “By the Author of” the earlier ones. So her signature was never a public mark: it lives in private letters and family papers.

The story of the signature

About 160 of her letters survive, many of them to her sister Cassandra, who after Jane’s death destroyed or cut a large part of the correspondence. The letters that remain show a small, even, very legible hand, written to fill the page because postage was paid by the sheet.

She signed in several ways depending on the reader: full name, initials, or a short closing such as “Yours affec:ly”. In 1809 she even wrote to the publisher Crosby & Co. under the invented name “Mrs Ashton Dennis”, signing with the initials M.A.D., to ask about a novel they had bought and not published.

Her most formal signature is on her will, a short document written in April 1817 that left almost everything to Cassandra. It is held by The National Archives. Her handwriting can also be seen in the cancelled chapters of Persuasion at the British Library, the only surviving manuscript pages of any novel she published, and in the notebooks of her early writings divided between the British Library and the Bodleian Library in Oxford.

What makes it distinctive

Small and even

Letters are compact and regular in height, written by someone used to filling every inch of a sheet.

Upright and clear

Her hand leans only slightly and stays readable even in fast family letters.

Signed for the reader

Full name on legal papers, initials or a short closing to family, and once an invented name to a publisher.

No flourish

Her will signature is a plain name, without the underline or paraph many men of her time added.

How to give your signature a similar feel

In the Type tab of the signature generator, try La Belle Aurore for an everyday neat hand, or Pinyon Script for a more formal English roundhand. Keep the Slant slider between 4° and 8°.
Lower the Size a little. A Regency letter hand was small, and a compact signature reads as more refined than a large one.
Leave out underlines. Austen’s signature works because it is tidy, not because it is decorated.
For a private, informal mark, sign with initials the way she often closed letters to family. Browse the signature fonts to find a script whose capitals you like.

Where to see the original

These links lead to archives, libraries, museums and Wikimedia Commons.

Questions about Jane Austen’s signature

Did Jane Austen sign her novels?

No. They were published anonymously, the first as “By a Lady”. Her name appeared publicly only after her death, in her brother Henry’s biographical notice of 1817.

Where can I see her handwriting?

Her will is at The National Archives, the cancelled chapters of Persuasion are at the British Library, and her letters are spread across several libraries, including the Morgan Library & Museum in New York.

Why are so few of her letters left?

Her sister Cassandra destroyed or cut many of them after Jane’s death, apparently to keep family matters private.