Il Minuscule Cursive Writing

IL MINUSCULE CURSIVE WRITING Early Minuscule Cursive.—"When writing has to be done frequently and rapidly," says the Nouveau Traite de Diplo matique (ii., 491), "majuscule writing is bound to turn imper ceptibly into a connected or cursive minuscule." It would be easy to illustrate this generalisation by examples taken from ancient cursive writing, in which here and there from the 1st century onwards are found symptoms of transformation in the form of certain letters, the shape and proportions of which corre spond more closely to the definition of minuscule writing than to that of majuscule. Rare and irregular at first, they gradually become more numerous and more constant and by degrees sup plant the majuscule forms, so that in the history of the Roman cursive there is no precise boundary between the majuscule and minuscule periods.

The oldest example of minuscule cursive writing that has been discovered is a letter on papyrus, found in Egypt, dating from the fourth century (Archie fur Urkundenforschung, iii., pl. i.). This marks a highly important date in the history of Latin writing, for with only one known exception, not yet adequately explained—two fragments of imperial rescripts of the 5th century (Mommsen, Fragmente zweier Kaiserrescripte in the Jahrbuch des gemeinen deutschen Rechts, vi., 398 ; Preisigke in Schriften der wissensch. Gesellsch. in Strassburg, xxx. ; Pal. Soc., pl. 30)— the minuscule cursive was thenceforth the only scriptura episto laris of the Roman world.

The ensuing succession of documents (e.g., a certificate of A.D. 400 in Wessely, Studien, xiv., pl. xiii. ; a letter of A.D. 444 in Wessely, Schrifttafeln, pl. xii., No. 19) show a continuous improvement in this form of writing, characterised by the boldness of the strokes and by the elimination of the last lingering majus cule forms. The Ravenna deeds of the 5th and 6th centuries (Marini, I papiri diplomatici; Champollion-Figeac, Chartes et Mss. sur papyrus; E. A. Bond, Facsimiles of Ancient Charters; Archivio paleogr. italiano, i., pl. 1-5) exhibit this hand at its per

fection.

At this period the minuscule cursive made its appearance as a book-hand, first as marginal notes, and later for the complete books themselves. The only difference between the book-hand and that used for documents is that the principal strokes are shorter and the characters thicker. This form of the hand is usually called semi-cursive.

The National Hands.

The fall of the Empire and the estab lishment of the barbarians within its former boundaries did not interrupt the use of the Roman minuscule cursive hand, which was adopted by the newcomers. But for gaps of over a century in the chronological series of documents which have been pre served, it would be possible to follow the evolution of the Roman cursive into the so-called national hands, forms of minuscule writing which flourished after the barbarian invasions in Italy, France, Spain, England and Ireland, and which are still known as Lombardic, Merovingian, Visigothic, Anglo-Saxon and Irish. These names came into use at a time when the various national hands were believed to have been invented by the peoples who used them, but their connotation is merely geographical.

Nevertheless, in spite of a close resemblance which betrays their common origin, these hands are specifically different, per haps because the Roman cursive was developed by each nation in accordance with its artistic tradition. (Cf. Schiaparelli, Note paleografiche in Archivio stor. italiano, lxxiv. 55.) Lombardic Writing.—In Italy, after the close of the Roman and Byzantine periods, the writing is known as Lombardic, a generic term which comprises several local varieties. These may be classified under four principal types : two for the scriptura epistolaris, the old Italian cursive and the papal chancery hand, or littera roman, and two for the libraria, the old Italian book hand and Lombardic in the narrow sense, sometimes known as Beneventana on account of the fact that it flourished in the prin cipality of Benevento.