Dante is a mid-20th-century old-style serif typeface designed by Giovanni Mardersteig, originally for use by the Officina Bodoni for books.
[2] One of the primary objectives in designing Dante was in keeping a visual balance between the roman and italics[3] (in Griffo's time typefaces were cut in roman style and italic style, but not both).
The name of the typeface comes from the first book in which it was first used, Boccaccio's Trattatello in Laude di Dante, published in 1955 by the Officina Bodoni.
This was about the same time that Malin died, and Monotype was also interested in adding a semibold weight to the Dante family.
Matthew Carter, in his twenties at the time, was recruited to cut some of the initial punches of the semibold.