PURPOSE: To enable to reduce the size to a pocketable size, by eliminating a platen mechanism through utilizing the weight of a head and inertia, in a typewriter wherein a printing leg is lowered from a head scanned on a substantially horizontal paper to print characters or the like.

CONSTITUTION: A printing head 15 is moved along guide rails 12 placed on the surface of a paper, and characters or the like are printed by ink pens or sign pens 11. The pens 11 are arranged in the condition of being spread over a distance for several characters in the moving direction of the head 15, and are controlled with time lags by a CPU 17 in conformity with the moving timing. For example, in the case of printing 32 segments, each partial head is constituted of four legs 11 arranged at an interval of 1/4 of a character in a direction perpendicular to the moving direction, 8 sets of such partial heads are distributed over a two-character width, and the legs 11 are made to take charge of the 32 segments. By using a code system, signals are inputted by a foldable-type keyboard 16 through a 64-KB ROM. For setting a line, the guide rails 12 are engaged into holes 14 of a line-fixing specified-length rail 13.