Georgian alphabet options

Question

How can I find out which fonts have the Georgian alphabet? Basically, I'd like to swap my preamble specification DejaVuSerif for something else that will:

let me continue to write English and Georgian (and maybe Russian)
give me small caps
look less adolescent than DejaVuSerif

(Other information. (a) I know you can fake small caps but shrinking full caps, but I have reasons for wanting to avoid doing so. (b) I'm a font dunce. I downloaded and followed the read me instructions for http://www.fonts2u.com/tinano.font but couldn't get TeXShop to find the installed font. DejaVuSerif must have come for free in my set up.)

I’m compiling the code below in TeXShop via XeLaTeX.

% !TEX encoding = UTF-8 Unicode
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[georgian]{babel}
\usepackage{fontspec}

\setmainfont
  [Extension=.ttf,
  UprightFont={*},
  BoldFont={*-Bold},
  ItalicFont={*-Italic},
  BoldItalicFont={*-BoldItalic},]
{DejaVuSerif}

\begin{document}

თქვენ თაგვებს ჩვენ ბუები მოგიტყუებივართ

DejaVuSerif doesn't have \sc small caps 

\end{document}

As you have a Mac, you can use UnicodeChecker; copy a Georgian word and paste in the application's window: the drop down menu above it will show all system fonts that have the glyphs. Very few on my machine (where I have as system fonts also all those provided by TeX Live): DejaVu (Serif, Sans and SansMono), FreeSerif, FreeSans, FreeMono, Arial Unicode MS, Code2000, Helvetica, Helvetica Neue and Menlo. — egreg, Sep 18 '16 at 22:03
Thanks. I've just tried that. My machine has even fewer, but I'd be happy with Helvetica. But I get a "font-not-found" error message, when I change to \setmainfont{Helvetica}. Could TeXShop not know where to look and, if so, how can I make it do so? (Sorry if that's too off topic for this site.) — CORRECTION, GOT IT TO WORK, removed the stuff in square brackets — Daniel Harbour, Sep 18 '16 at 22:20
Still no small caps though, either with Helvetica (Neue) or Menlo — Daniel Harbour, Sep 18 '16 at 22:26

score 5 · Answer 1 · answered Sep 18 '16 at 22:32

You should segregate each language in its environment. This way you can also choose a different font for Georgian (and maybe also for Russian).

I provide \textgeorgian (actually babel provides it, I just patch it for using the proper font) and georgian; the former is for short phrases, the latter for blocks. Similarly for Russian.

\documentclass{book}
\usepackage[georgian,russian,english]{babel}
\usepackage{fontspec}
\usepackage{xpatch}

\setmainfont{Libertinus Serif} % or whatever you prefer

\newfontfamily{\georgianfont}[
  Scale=MatchLowercase,
  NFSSFamily=georgian,
  Extension=.ttf,
  UprightFont={*},
  BoldFont={*-Bold},
  ItalicFont={*-Italic},
  BoldItalicFont={*-BoldItalic},
]{DejaVuSerif}

\xpatchcmd{\georgiantext}
  {\selectfont}
  {\fontfamily{georgian}\selectfont}
  {}{}
\newenvironment{georgian}
  {\begin{otherlanguage*}{georgian}}
  {\end{otherlanguage*}}

\newcommand{\textrussian}[1]{\foreignlanguage{russian}{#1}}

\begin{document}

We can also have \textsc{Small Caps}
\textgeorgian{თქვენ თაგვებს ჩვენ ბუები მოგიტყუებივართ} and English.

We can also have \textsc{Small Caps}.
\textrussian{Этот текст написан на русском языке}

\begin{georgian}
თქვენ თაგვებს ჩვენ ბუები მოგიტყუებივართ
\end{georgian}

\end{document}

That's great, thanks: it gives me the flexibility I wanted for font choice. It's still not giving me small caps. Any idea why that might be? I've tried compiling in LuaLaTeX and XeLaTeX (via TeXShop) just in case that makes a difference (it doesn't). — Daniel Harbour, Sep 19 '16 at 07:57
@DanielHarbour You can see that I do get small caps, because the main font I use has them. — egreg, Sep 19 '16 at 08:25

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Sep 18 '16 at 23:14

Take a look at

https://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/kelvinch

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/paratype/newton/

http://www.fonts-online.ru/font/Sylfaen

http://www.paratype.ru/asearch/default.asp?search=&ftype=All&ffoundry=All&enclang=lang&flang=27&x=15&y=6

The choice of Georgian fonts is not very wide...

Georgian alphabet options

2 Answers2

Linked