在苏门答腊北部，多巴湖清澈见底的海水轻轻地拍打着周围的山脉。Samosir岛坐落在湖中，数百年来，它是巴塔克人与世隔绝的家园。

游客们乘坐轮渡到达Tuk Tuk小镇，逃避了苏门答腊丛林的高温和潮湿。在整个村子里，餐厅和招待所都装饰着色彩鲜艳的手绘招牌。也许由于苏门答腊岛在欧洲殖民的悠久历史，这些字母形状让人联想起19世纪末在美国和欧洲用于海报和传单中的字母，但带有明显的东南亚风格。

Charles Nix被维多利亚时代的幻想和巴塔克的蔓藤花纹的结合所吸引，他将这些字母进行拍照、绘制并将其转换一种设计，即现在的ITC Batak。它以Samosir居民引以为豪的祖先的名字命名，这是一个带有六角形衬线的细窄的粗体字母——一种适当装扮的怪诞风格。

Batak有Condensed和Condensed Bold两种字重。

In Northern Sumatra, the crystal clear waters of Lake Toba lap gently against the surrounding mountains. In the middle of the lake sits the island of Samosir, for centuries the secluded home of the Batak people.

Visitors arrive by ferry into the tiny town of Tuk Tuk, escaping the heat and humidity of the Sumatran jungle. Throughout the village, restaurants and guest houses are adorned with hand-painted signs in bright colors. Perhaps due to Sumatra's long history of European colonization, the letterforms are reminiscent of those used for posters and handbills in America and Europe at the end of the 19th century, but with a distinctly Southeast Asian flavor.

Charles Nix, intrigued by the combination of Victorian fancy and Batak arabesque, photographed, sketched and translated the letterforms into a design that is now ITC Batak. Named for the proud ancestors of Samosir's inhabitants, it is a bold condensed letter with hexagonal serifs - a sort of properly dressed grotesque.

Batak is available in either Condensed or Condensed Bold.