Carolingian minuscule: Encyclopedia II - Carolingian minuscule - Spread

Carolingian minuscule - Spread

The new script spread through Western Europe most widely where Carolingian influence was strongest. It reached far afield: the 10^th century Freising manuscripts, the first Roman-script record of any Slavic language, which contain the oldest Slovene language are written in Carolingian minuscule. In Switzerland, Carolingian was used in the Rhaetian and Alemannic minuscule types. Manuscripts written in Rhaetian minuscule tend to have slender letters, resembling Insular script, with the letters a and t, and ligatures such as ri, showing similar to Visigothic and Beneventan. Alemannic minuscule, used for a short time in the early 9^th century, is usually larger and broader, very vertical compared to the slanting Rhaetian type. In Austria, Salzburg was the major centre of Carolingian script, while Fulda, Mainz, and Wurzburg were the major centres in Germany. German minuscule tends to be oval-shaped, very slender, and slants to the right. It has uncial features as well, such as the ascender of the letter d slanting to the left, and vertical initial strokes of m and n.

In northern Italy, the monastery at Bobbio used Carolingian minuscule beginning in the 9th century. Outside the sphere of influence of Charlemagne and his successors, however, the new legible hand was resisted by the Roman Curia; nevertheless the Romanesca type was developed in Rome after the 10^th century. The script was not taken up in England and Ireland until ecclesiastic reforms in the middle of the tenth century; in Spain a traditionalist Visigothic hand survived; and in southern Italy a 'Beneventan minuscule' survived in the lands of the Lombard Duchy of Benevento through the thirteenth century, although Romanesca eventually also appeared in southern Italy.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Spread", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki