engleski

Scriptura Beneventana – Example of European Calligraphic Script in the Middle Ages. A Contribution to the Research of Manuscripts Written in Beneventan Script from Croatia

Scriptura Beneventana was a Medieval Latin script that developed from the ancient Roman cursive minuscule of the pre-Carolingian type in the second half of 8th century. It was mostly used in south Italy, where it originated in the Benedictine monastery of Monte Cassino, and in Dalmatia (especially in the scriptorium of the Benedictine Abbey of St Chrisogonus in Zadar). The Beneventan script along with the Italian pre-Carolingian minuscule, Curial script, Insular scripts (scripturae insulares), Visigothic (Mozarabic) and Merovingian script make up the so-called group of national scripts of the European Middle Ages. The Beneventan script (Latin scriptura Beneventana or littera Beneventana) is so called because it originated in the area of Benevento (Duchy of Benevento) in southern Italy. It was also called littera Langobardisca, scriptura Langobardica signifying its origins within the realm of the Lombards (what is wrong!). The script as such was used from approximately the second half of the 8th century until the 14th and 15th century, although there are examples of it as late as the 16th century. In that long period we can observe 4 phases of development (establishment, evolution, perfected form and declining thereafter). The script was common also as bookhand (scriptura libraria), especially as scriptura liturgica, and in charters (scriptura documentaria). In Croatia in the Middle Ages the script was used parallel with the Carolingian minuscule. The calligraphic moments and identification marks of scriptura Beneventana (in its ‘mature’ style) are: letters a, e, r, t ; many quasi obligatory ligatures e. g.: ci, fi, gi, li, ri, ti ; some unique ways to signify abbreviations and contractions, initial letters, ductus etc. That ‘mature’ style makes its appearance in the early 11th century and in the beginning of the 12th century. Numerous Beneventan manuscripts are illuminated. Today we have also numerous historical sources written in Beneventan hand, for example: Epistolae Ioannis VIII, Reg. Vat. 1 (and more else, see: E. A. Lowe, The Beneventan Script, I-II, 1980, and V. Brown, A Second New List of Beneventan Manuscripts, 1978-). The most important Beneventan manuscripts from Croatia (Dalmatia) are: Passionale – Liber psalmorum (MR 164a), Missale Beneventanum (MR 166) ; Evangeliarium Absarense ; Liber horarum Cichae, abbatissae monasterii sanctae Mariae monialium de Iadra ; Evangeliarium Vekenegae ; Missale Beneventanum notatum ecclesiae cathedralis Ragusii saec. XII ; Evangeliarium Traguriense ; Thomae Archidiaconi Historia Salonitanorum atque Spalatinorum pontificum (Codex Spalatensis) ; Chartulare monasterii sanctae Mariae monialium de Iadra ; Chartulare monasterii sancti Chrisogoni de Iadra etc.

Latin paleography, Beneventan script (scriptura Beneventana), Italy, Dalmatia

The collection of conference papers Classical Heritage from the Epigraphic to the Digital: Academia Ragusina 2009&2011 includes papers from the 2009 and 2011 conferences taking place in Dubrovnik as part of the project supported by European federation of the national societies of classical philologists— Euroclassica.