Field Guide No. 03 · The Pelikan Brief

Fine Nib, or
Medium?

The stroke width you choose once, and then write with for the next twenty years.

A fountain pen is sold by model and finish. The decision that actually shapes how it feels in your hand is neither. It is the width stamped on the nib itself: Fine or Medium.

Most retailers reduce the choice to a size chart. That is unfortunate. Nib width is the one permanent decision you live with on every page, for as long as you own the pen.

What Actually Changes

	Fine Nib	Medium Nib
Typical line width	≈ 0.4 mm	≈ 0.5–0.6 mm
Ink flow	Sparing and controlled	Generous and free-flowing
Feel on the page	More textured and precise	Smoother and more forgiving
Best paper	Smooth stock only — can catch on rough or textured sheets	Forgiving of nearly any smooth paper
Best suited for	Redlines, marginalia, dense notes, small handwriting	Signatures, correspondence, the pen people notice
Without saying it, it says	"I take a lot of notes."	"I write to be read."

This guide examines the practical differences between the two, then maps each width to the moments that matter in legal practice — redlining a draft, taking deposition notes, signing closing documents, and writing personal inscriptions.

Exhibit A — The Fine Nib

Built for margins, redlines, and small handwriting.

A fine nib lays down a narrower, more controlled line — roughly 0.4mm at the page. Less ink reaches the paper per stroke, which means less feathering on ordinary copier stock, legible text at a small size, and a slightly firmer, more textured feel as the tip meets the page. It's the nib that disappears into the margin of a draft rather than announcing itself.

It also asks a little more of the hand and the page than a medium nib does. Use a light touch rather than a ballpoint's habitual press — the tip needs less force to lay ink, not more — and keep to smooth, high-quality stock. Rough, laid, or heavily-textured paper can catch a fine tip and interrupt the line entirely, which a broader nib shrugs off.

AShoulder — where the nib meets the section and begins to taper. Same anchor point on every width; what happens after this is what changes.
BBreather hole — vents air back into the reservoir as ink is drawn out, and stops hairline cracks from creeping up the slit.
CSlit — channels ink to the tip by capillary action. Narrower and stiffer on a fine nib, so less ink moves through per stroke.
DTipping — the actual writing surface, a hard alloy ball fused to the tip. Ground smaller and rounder than a medium nib's.

Typical line width	≈ 0.4mm
Ink use	Sparing — a cartridge lasts longer
Best paper	Smooth, high-quality stock — avoid rough or heavily-textured sheets
Technique	Light hand, gentle pressure
Best for	Redlines, marginalia, dense forms, small handwriting

Exhibit B — The Medium Nib

Built for signatures, letters, and the pen people notice.

A medium nib is the width most fountain pen owners settle on for their primary pen — wider than fine, generous with ink, and smoother on the page because more of the tipping's rounded surface is in contact with the paper at once. It's the width that makes handwriting look like handwriting, with the kind of visible ink shading a ballpoint can't produce.

It's also the more forgiving width in practical terms. A medium nib writes reliably under normal pressure and in any direction — no special grip or light touch required — and it handles nearly any smooth, uncoated paper without complaint, which is one reason it's the width most people never think twice about once they've chosen it.

AShoulder — the same anchor point as any Pelikan nib; the section grips here regardless of width.
BBreather hole — same function as the fine nib's, slightly larger to keep pace with faster ink flow.
CSlit — wider-set and more flexible than a fine nib's, moving more ink to the tip with less resistance.
DTipping — ground larger and rounder than a fine nib's, which is what puts more of it in contact with the page.

Typical line width	≈ 0.5–0.6mm
Ink use	Generous — refills more often
Best paper	Forgiving — handles most smooth, uncoated stock without much thought
Technique	None needed — writes reliably in any direction, any grip
Best for	Signatures, correspondence, the pen you actually reach for

The Docket

Which one, which moment

Four moments, and the case for each width.

Redlining a draft

Fine Nib

Interlineations and margin notes need a line that doesn't bleed into the text it's correcting.

Case notes / depositions

Fine Nib

Fast, dense, and small — a fine nib keeps up without turning a legal pad into a blot test.

Signing the closing documents

Medium Nib

The one signature on the page people actually look at. Let it show a little ink.

Personal notes & gifting inscriptions

Medium Nib

Warmer on cream cardstock than a fine nib manages — this tier is built for occasions, not to-do lists.

Building the Kit

Four ways in

Every tier is a genuine Pelikan, made in Germany since 1838. The difference is nib material, fill mechanism, and how much presence the pen carries on the table.

Three of the four pens below fill by piston rather than cartridge — a mechanism Hungarian engineer Theodor Kovács patented in 1929¹ and licensed to Pelikan, who brought it to market the same year with a transparent ink window built in from the start². That patent lapsed decades ago and other makers now build their own piston pens, but the mechanism is unchanged in principle since 1929: it shows you how much ink remains, holds more of it than a cartridge, and refills from any bottle. The exception is the P205, which uses a cartridge instead — part of why it costs and weighs less than the three above it.

U.S. Patent No. 1,706,616 (filed Sept. 15, 1927; issued Mar. 26, 1929); see also German Patent No. DE457462 (filed Sept. 29, 1926; issued Mar. 16, 1928) (Theodor Kovács, inventor). ↩
The Piston Filling Mechanism, 1929–1950, Pelikan Heritage & Tradition Archive, archive.pelikan.com (licensing agreement with Günther Wagner dated Aug. 19, 1927; product launched as the Transparent Pelikan Fountain Pen, 1929); see also The Patent That Launched a Fountain Pen Empire, The Pelikan's Perch (Oct. 2, 2020). ↩

Exhibit C — Anatomy of a Nib

The detail that decides how a pen feels in ten years.

Steel — standard on the P205 and most M200s, steel nibs are firm and consistent from day one: what you feel at first is close to what you'll feel in year ten, and they're cheaper to produce, which is part of why the entry tiers cost less than the Souveräns above them.

18K gold — standard on the M800 and M1000, gold nibs flex slightly under normal writing pressure and don't corrode, so most owners find one quietly adapts to their hand over time. The nib itself is solid 18K gold — it's the pen's trim (cap bands, clip, rings) that's gold-plated brass.³ Either way, the tipping that actually touches the paper is the same hard iridium alloy; gold changes the flex, not the wear.

Pelikan-Collectibles, M800 Basis (Souverän Series) spec table, pelikan-collectibles.com/en/Pelikan/Models/Souveraen-Series/M800-Basis (listing the nib as 18K/750 solid gold and the trim separately as gold plated); see also The Pelikan's Perch, Understanding Pelikan Gold Nibs (Nov. 23, 2021), thepelikansperch.com/2021/11/23/pelikan-gold-nibs (two-tone rhodium plating is applied over a solid gold nib, not a base-metal substitute). ↩

The Argument

The Pelikan Brief

Why Pelikan earned a place in this catalog — the case for the file.

A curated catalog means every item had to earn its place, not just be available. Three grounds are why Pelikan did.

Ground I — Continuity

One name since 1838

Pelikan has made pens under one name for coming up on two centuries, including piston-fill engineering unchanged in principle since 1929 (see notes 1–2, supra). A house that's serviced its own mechanism for a hundred years is a safer long-term bet than one that's changed hands recently.

Ground II — The Nib

Solid gold, verifiably

At its senior tier, Pelikan's nib is solid 18K gold, not a spec-sheet phrase that quietly means something thinner (see note 3, supra) — a claim a skeptical reader can check against the maker's own documentation.

Ground III — The Look

Traditional, on purpose

Pelikan's striped resin barrels and gold nibs were never designed to look modern. They sit in the same traditional register as the leather and brass this catalog is built around — part of the collection, not an accessory bolted onto it.

Closing Argument

A signature is the one piece of handwriting in a legal career that gets read as carefully as it's written — on a closing, a judgment, a partnership agreement. Nib width is a small, permanent decision that shapes every one of them. Choose based on what you're actually writing, not the size chart, and you'll rarely choose wrong.

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