Viktor vor Mainz.” - Uwe Israel (2006), p. Papal records also corroborate this provenance: “…den päpstlichen Registern hervorgeht Pannartz als Inhaber einer Altarstelle am Dom von Köln, die er vertreten lassen konnte, Sweynheym als Inhaber einer Präbende an St. Sweynheym & Pannartz’s first colophon (Rome, 1467) states they are “comrades from the German nation.” Their petition of 1472 addressed to Pope Sixtus IV states unequivocally that they are from the dioceses of Mainz and Cologne: “…Conradus Sweynheym et Arnoldus Pannartz clerici Maguntine et Coloniensis diocesis…”, Scholderer (1996), p. By the time two dusty and tired German clerics arrived at the monastery of Subiaco in the quiet seclusion of the Sabine hills east of Rome, the humanist script was fully evolved, and already a natural choice for manuscripts books of classical literature. Seeing that a great number of their venerated classical authors were penned in a script so contrasted to gothic, they mistakenly attributed the medieval Caroline minuscule to antiquity, hence the term ‘littera antica,’ or antique letters. And so they scoured the earth for manuscripts, transcribed, translated, and copied them in earnest. A great deal of their enthusiasm was aimed at restoring classical civilization, embodied in its literature. Burckhardt describes the early Italian humanists as “mediators between their own age and a venerated antiquity.” (Burckhardt, p. Humanism, a cultural and intellectual movement born in Florence, saw in antiquity a culture vastly superior to their own. The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript Books: From the Twelfth to the Early Sixteenth Century, Albert Derolez, 2003 Krave, The Cambridge Companion to Renaissance Humanism, p. Humanism in Script and Print in the Fifteenth Century. What is the Origin of the Scrittura Humanistica? Bibliofilia, 53, pp. 1-10.ĭavies, M. The Origin and Development of Humanistic Script, B. ‘On Humanistic script’ – The Origin and Development of the Script of the Renaissance, Giulio Menna. From Florentine Script, Paduan Script, & Roman Type. Florentine ‘humanist’ script of Antonio di Mario, 1448. The southern European variant, rotunda or Southern Textualis, is characterized by rounder bows and broader letterforms. However, the extreme angularity and compression of Northern Textura (or Textualis) was resisted in Italy, Spain, and Portugal. In late medieval and early Renaissance Italy, the gothic script, as elsewhere in Europe, was the preeminent formal book-hand. From left to right: Imperial capitals, Rustic capitals, Uncial script, Carolingian minuscule Humanists like Coluccio Salutati (1331–1406) and Poggio Bracciolini (1380–1459), among others, championed a new semi-gothic script that would thereafter evolve into the humanist book-hand. However, by the fourteenth century, changes were afoot. By the twelfth century, this gothic script, with numerous national and local variations, was fully developed and adopted throughout Europe. Not only were letterforms affected by this compression, but the letter-spacing too, so much so that letters begin to kiss, bite, and fuse. However, from the beginning of the eleventh century, through to about 1225, the Caroline minuscule (accompanied by a form of uncial majuscule) evolved into a more angular and laterally compressed script. This Carolingian script flourished in the eighth and ninth centuries. 66) Photo courtesy of University of Fribourg, Switzerland Brown’s A Guide to Western Historical Scripts from Antiquity to 1600, 1990, p. Alcuin of York was responsible for introducing the notion of a hierarchy of scripts from old to new: roman capitals, uncials, and Caroline minuscule, with capital forms reserved for display purposes. From those uncial and half-uncial forms evolved a new formal book-hand practiced in France, that spread rapidly throughout medieval Europe.Ĭaroline minuscule, rustic capitals, uncial, and Caroline / square capitals. In ancient Rome, the Republican and Imperial capitals were joined by rustic capitals, square capitals (Imperial Roman capitals written with a brush), uncials, and half-uncials, in addition to a more rapidly penned cursive for everyday use. But their heritage reaches far beyond the Italian Renaissance to antiquity. The Renaissance affected change in every sphere of life, but perhaps one of its most enduring legacies are the letterforms it bequeathed to us.
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