---
title: Where did Lorem Ipsum come from?  - The Hustle
description: Designers have been using Latin for a long time.
image: https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/hubfs/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/988082936-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-31T010555.474Z.webp
---

# Where did Lorem Ipsum come from?

![Mark Dent](https://thehustle.co/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/0-3-1.jpeg?width=48&height=48&name=0-3-1.jpeg) [Mark Dent](https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/author/mark-dent)

Published:  April 11, 2023

Updated:  October 11, 2023

Latin is a dead language. Depending on the source, the number of fluent speakers globally ranges from [~2k ](https://www.speaking-latin.net/#:~:text=There%20are%20no%20official%20estimates,are%20learning%20to%20do%20so.)to [~2m](https://carmentablog.com/why-latin-is-considered-a-dead-language-and-how-many-people-still-speak-it/) people.

![Where did Lorem Ipsum come from?](https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/hs-fs/hubfs/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/988082936-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-31T010555.474Z.webp?width=595&height=400&name=988082936-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-31T010555.474Z.webp)

But everybody who’s spent time on the internet is familiar with at least one Latin phrase: “lorem ipsum,” the first two words of the [dummy text](https://www.lipsum.com/) designers use to gauge the layout of a page. It tends to appear in the wild when somebody forgets to replace the Latin with their intended message (often [in hilarious fashion](https://twitter.com/dbvisel/status/522780673816674304?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E522780673816674304%7Ctwgr%5Ec23aa1a4b7a996236b0a1e8923333fea520b64f1%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fslate.com%2Fnews-and-politics%2F2023%2F01%2Florem-ipsum-history-origins.html)).

The backstory of how “lorem ipsum” appeared in our lives is complicated, [according to *Slate*’s Jack Shepherd](https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/01/lorem-ipsum-history-origins.html).

#### **The full passage is attributed to Cicero**

The famous Roman philosopher penned it as a long-winded way of saying, “No pain, no gain.”

From there, the story goes that a 16th-century typesetter used “Lorem Ipsum dolor…” in a book of typefaces, and the tradition continued for hundreds of years.

But Shepherd found those origins unlikely because the popular translation of Cicero’s text didn’t appear until 1914.

#### **So who introduced lorem ipsum?**

The British design company Letraset, which used the phrase to advertise its services in the 1960s.

Why? Nobody really knows. Probably because an employee was a fan of Cicero.

Their decision led to years of lorem ipsum-ing, as well as lots of fun recent spinoffs: Online text generators let designers use everything from [Hipster Ipsum](https://hipsum.co/) to [DeLorean Ipsum](https://satoristudio.net/delorean-ipsum/) for planning layouts.

**BTW: **Until 2014, Latin was the official language of [Vatican City](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-pope-latin/pope-ditches-latin-as-official-language-of-vatican-synod-idUSKCN0HV1O220141006).

## Follow us on social media

<https://www.tiktok.com/@thehustle.co?lang=en> <https://twitter.com/TheHustle> <https://www.facebook.com/hustlecon/> <https://www.instagram.com/thehustledaily/?hl=en>

Pop up for Subscribe to The Hustle Daily Newsletter Subscribe to The Hustle Daily Newsletter

Get the 5-minute news brief keeping 2.5M+ innovators in the loop. Always free. 100% fresh. No bullsh*t.

 JOIN FREE

### 100% Free CRM

 Nurture and grow your business with customer relationship management software.

Signup for a free account

Close modal

```json
{
  "@context" : "https://schema.org",
  "@type" : "BlogPosting",
  "author" : {
    "@type" : "Person",
    "name" : "Mark Dent",
    "url" : "https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/news/author/mark-dent"
  },
  "datePublished" : "2023-04-11T05:29:36.000Z",
  "headline" : "Where did Lorem Ipsum come from?",
  "image" : [ "https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/hubfs/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/988082936-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-31T010555.474Z.webp" ],
  "mainEntityOfPage" : {
    "@id" : "https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/news/01302023-lorem-ipsum",
    "@type" : "WebPage"
  },
  "publisher" : {
    "@type" : "Organization",
    "logo" : {
      "@type" : "ImageObject"
    }
  }
}
```

```json
{
  "@context" : "https://schema.org",
  "@id" : "#article",
  "@type" : "NewsArticle",
  "author" : {
    "@type" : "Person",
    "name" : "Mark Dent",
    "url" : "https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/author/mark-dent"
  },
  "dateModified" : "2023-10-11T19:35:17+0000",
  "datePublished" : "2023-04-11T05:29:36+0000",
  "headline" : "Where did Lorem Ipsum come from?",
  "image" : [ "https://7355427.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/7355427/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/988082936-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-31T010555.474Z.webp" ],
  "publisher" : {
    "@type" : "Organization",
    "logo" : {
      "@type" : "ImageObject",
      "height" : 112,
      "url" : "https://fs.hubspotusercontent00.net/hubfs/53/assets/hubspot.com/web-team/WBZ/Blog%202021/Images/Logos/HubSpot%20Logo%20112X112.svg",
      "width" : 112
    },
    "name" : "HubSpot",
    "sameAs" : [ "https://www.facebook.com/hubspot", "https://twitter.com/hubspot" ],
    "url" : "https://www.hubspot.com"
  },
  "speakable" : {
    "@type" : "SpeakableSpecification",
    "xPath" : [ "//title", "/html/head/meta[@name='description']/@content" ]
  }
}
```