Page:EB1911 - Volume 20.djvu/619

ROMAN CURSIVE] less compact. The letters, so to say, open their ranks; and, from this circumstance alone, MSS. of the second half of the century may generally be distinguished from those fifty years earlier. But alterations also take place in the shapes of the letters. Side by side with the purely minuscule forms those of the uncial begin to reappear, the cause of which innovation has already been explained. These uncial forms first show themselves at the end of the line, the point at which most changes first gained a footing, but by degrees they work back into the text, and at length become recognized members of the minuscule characters. In the 11th and 12th centuries they are well established, and become more and more prominent by the large or stilted forms which they assume. The change, however, in the general character of the writing of this class of codices vetusti is very gradual, uniformity and evenness being well maintained, especially in church books. On the other hand, a lighter and more cursive kind of minuscule is found contemporaneously in MSS. generally of a secular nature. In this hand many of the classical MSS. of the 10th or 11th centuries are written, as the MS. of Aeschylus and Sophocles, the Odyssey and the Apollonius Rhodius of the Laurentian Library at Florence, the Anthologia Palatina of Heidelberg and Paris, the Hippocrates of Venice (Exempla, tabb. 32-36, 38, 40), the Aristophanes of Ravenna (Wattenb., Script. gr. specim., tab. 26), the Strabo of Paris (Omont, Facs. des plus anc. MSS. grecs, pl. 40), a Demosthenes (fig. 18) at Florence (Pal. Soc. ii. pl. 88, 89), &c. In a facsimile from a Plutarch at Venice (Exempla, tab. 44), the scribe is seen to change from the formal to the more cursive hand. This style of writing is distinguishable by its light and graceful character from the current writing into which the minuscule degenerated at a later time.

The gradual rounding of the rectangular breathings takes place in this period. In the 11th century the smooth breathing, which would most readily lend itself to this modification, first appears in the new form. In the course of the 12th century both breathings have lost the old square shape; and about the same time contractions become more numerous, having been at first confined to the end of the line.

When the period of codices recentiores commences, the Greek minuscule hand undergoes extensive changes. The contrast between MSS. of the 13th century and those of a hundred years earlier is very marked. In the later examples the hand is generally more straggling, there is a greater number of exaggerated forms of letters, and marks of contraction and accents are dashed on more freely. There is altogether a sense of greater activity and haste. The increasing demand for books created a larger supply. Greater freedom and more variety appear in the examples of this class, together with an increasing use of ligatures and contractions. The general introduction of paper likewise assisted to break up the formal minuscule hand. To this rougher material a rougher style of writing was suited. Through the 14th and 15th centuries the decline of the set minuscule rapidly advances. The writing becomes even more involved and intricate, marks of contraction and accents are combined with the letters in a single action of the pen, and the general result is the production of a thoroughly cursive hand. In some respects, however, the change was not so rapid. Church books were still ordinarily written on vellum, which, as it became scarcer in the market (owing to the injury done to the trade by the competition of paper), was supplied from ancient codices which lay ready to hand on the shelves of libraries; and in these liturgical MSS. the more formal style of the minuscule was still maintained. In the 14th century there even appears a partial renaissance in the writing of Church MSS., modelled to some extent on the lines of the writing of the 12th century. The resemblance, however, is only superficial; for no writer can entirely disguise the character of the writing of his own time. And lastly there was yet another check upon the absolute disintegration of the minuscule book-hand in the 15th century exercised by the professional scribes who worked in Italy, and who in their calligraphical productions reverted again to the older style. The influence of the Renaissance is evident in many of the MSS. of the Italian Greeks, which served as models for the first Greek printing types.

The Greek minuscule book-hand had, then, by the end of the 15th century, become a cursive hand, from which the modern current hand is directly derived. We last saw the ancient cursive in use in the documents prior to the formation of the set minuscule book-hand, and no doubt it continued in use concurrently with the book-hand. But, as the latter passed through the transformations which have been traced, and gradually assumed a more current style, it may not unreasonably be supposed that it absorbed the cursive hand of the period, and with it whatever elements may have survived of the old cursive hand.

The course of Latin palaeography runs on the same lines as that of Greek palaeography. In regard to the former, as in regard to the latter, the documents fall into two main divisions: those which are written in the ordinary cursive hand of everyday life, and those which are written in the formal book-hand of literature. But Latin palaeography covers a wider ground than Greek. Greek writing being limited to the expression of the one