Rotunda

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The Rotunda in comparison with other broken scripts

Rotunda ( Latin rotunda "the round [writing]"), also round Gothic or (outdated) semi-Gothic , is the modern name for a medieval non-cursive book script that originated in Italy. It is calligraphic and belongs to the group of broken scripts . In the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance , it was also used in letterpress.

Scriptural context

In the High Middle Ages , a process of “Gothicization” of writing took place as early as the 11th century, which changed the entire writing system with the introduction of new stylistic features and a new aesthetic. The "Gothic scripts" emerged as an expression of a changed sense of style, which is culturally and historically classified in the overall context of the emergence of Gothic . In the course of the 12th and early 13th centuries, the new style took shape and more or less clearly established itself everywhere, albeit with regional differences. A main feature is the breaking of the shafts , which is why one speaks of broken script. The early Gothic minuscule was created . It is characterized by the elongation and straightening of all shafts as well as the similar treatment of all shafts that are perpendicular to the line. The letters f and long s are on the line. Book fonts that have these characteristics are called " Textura " or "Textualis". A feature that was added later, at the beginning of the 13th century, is the arc connections (English "biting"): the arcs of two letters facing each other (for example o and c) are moved so close together that the arc lines partially overlap. If the arcs are broken into straight strokes, the two connected letters share the vertical parts of the converted arcs. The result was a typeface that was as closed as possible, which corresponded to the taste of the time and which shaped non-cursive manuscripts in the late Middle Ages. It was not until the Renaissance that the textura was replaced by the antiqua , the non-cursive book and printed font favored by the humanists .

The rotunda in manuscripts

The Italian book script from which the Rotunda emerged, in a Passionary manuscript from 1180. Bologna, University Library, 1473, fol. 35v

The development of the Gothic minuscule began in what is now Belgium and northern France. The new style spread to Germany and England and in the course of time spread to a greater or lesser degree throughout the entire Latin West. However, a special development occurred in Italy and southern France: there the elements of the Gothicization were only partially incorporated. In the late 12th century, the development of a book script, the rotunda, which was later also used in southern France, began in Italy. At the beginning of the 13th century it achieved its stable typeface from then on. In Italy it achieved the importance that the variants of the Textura had in Central and Western Europe; It played a central role in the late medieval Italian production of non-italic manuscripts. The Rotunda is one of the Gothic typefaces, but it is an expression of an aesthetic design will that differs significantly from that prevailing in Northern and Eastern Europe. Some palaeographers - among them Bernhard Bischoff - regard the rotunda as a special form of the Textura and refer to it as the Italian Textura. Others use the term "Textura" only for the group of non-cursive book scripts of Western and Central European origin and see the Rotunda "almost in opposition to Textura" because of the difference in typeface.

Rotunda in a manuscript from 1340 ( Vinzenz von Beauvais , Speculum historiale ). Rome, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana , Vat.Lat. 1966, fol. 339v

In contrast to the narrow textured fonts of the northern regions, the Rotunda has a relatively low, round, broad character. It shows a typeface that was already prevalent in the Italian book industry in the 12th century. It hardly differs from the early Gothic Italian book minuscule of the 12th century; only the arch connections are added as a new element. They are particularly common in the rotunda and reinforce the impression of roundness. The Gothic break is carried out only moderately; for example, the hexagonal o of the northern Textura corresponds to a pointed oval of the Rotunda. Hence the name "Rotunda" ("the rounded one") is appropriate. Most of the shafts sit wide on the line, only the shaft of the i, the shafts of the u and the last shafts of m and n are bent to the right. After o, the r is regularly written in round shape . The descenders also end broadly. Hair strokes used for jewelry are rare. The shape of the letters was fixed; the prevailing conservative attitude left the scribes little leeway for individual deviations, as occur in the northern texture.

The “Rotunda formata” is, so to speak , the southern counterpart to the Textualis formata , the formalized Textualis. It has an extremely high line contrast and a nib angle of about 45 °. The arches, which are on the bottom left and top right, are more or less round, while the arches on the top left and bottom right are sharply broken.

In contrast to the northern Textura, the rotunda did not branch out into a number of variants with marked differences. In Bologna , where many professional scribes were busy creating legal manuscripts for the needs of the university members there, an early type of Rotunda manuscript was created, the script of which is known in Latin as littera Bononiensis ("Bolognese script"). The texts written in this style stand out due to their very narrow line spacing and a particularly large number of abbreviations, ascenders and descenders are very short, but - as with the Rotunda - it is a clear script. It spread to universities in northern Italy.

Southern French scribes largely followed the example of the Italian ones. Codices were also created in Spain whose script is similar to the Italian Rotunda, and the name littera rotunda was also used there .

Use in letterpress printing

Printing rotunda in an incunabulum , which was printed by Heinrich Gran in Hagenau in 1490 : Concordantiae minores Bibliae , fol. 19v and 20r

The rotunda was introduced to book printing in the sixties of the 15th century. A pioneer was the printer Ulrich Han , who worked in Rome . The printer, publisher and bookseller Nicolas Jenson played a key role in the spread of the Druck-Rotunda . In Venice he created perfectly shaped rotunda letters , which were often imitated in the following years and which were given the name litterae Venetae (“Venetian script”). The German printer and publisher Johann Koelhoff the Elder , who had worked temporarily in Venice, brought the Rotunda to Germany from there; the first print with its Rotunda type appeared in Cologne in 1471. In the late 15th century, the printing rotunda spread across Europe; it made its home in Spain, Portugal, France and Germany and also made its way to Denmark, Poland and Bohemia. She stayed relatively seldom in the Netherlands and England. At the turn of the century and in the early 16th century it was superseded by the Renaissance scripts. In Spain it still dominated until the middle of the 16th century. It held its own longest in Italy in the liturgical book system, where traditionally a conservative disposition prevailed; it stayed there until the 17th century.

literature

  • Bernhard Bischoff : Palaeography of Roman antiquity and the western Middle Ages . 4th edition, Erich Schmidt, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-503-09884-2 , pp. 174-178
  • Michelle P. Brown, Patricia Lovett: The Historical Source Book for Scribes. University of Toronto Press, Toronto 1999, ISBN 0-8020-4720-3 , pp. 103-110
  • Severin Corsten : Rotunda . In: Lexicon of the entire book industry. 2nd, revised edition, Vol. 6, Hiersemann, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-7772-0327-0 , p. 388
  • Albert Derolez: The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript Books. From the Twelfth to the Early Sixteenth Century. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2003, ISBN 0-521-80315-2 , pp. 102-122
  • Otto Mazal : paleography and paleotype. On the history of writing in the age of the incunabula. Hiersemann, Stuttgart 1984, ISBN 3-7772-8420-3 , pp. 13-15, 64-138

Web links

Remarks

  1. ^ Otto Mazal: Paläographie und Paläotypie , Stuttgart 1984, p. 9.
  2. ^ Bernhard Bischoff: Palaeography of Roman Antiquity and the Occidental Middle Ages , 4th edition, Berlin 2009, pp. 171–174, 176–178.
  3. ^ Hans Foerster, Thomas Frenz: Abriss der Latinische Paläographie , 3rd, revised edition, Stuttgart 2004, p. 237.
  4. ^ Otto Mazal: Textbook of Handschriftkunde , Wiesbaden 1986, p. 117; Albert Derolez: The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript Books , Cambridge 2003, p. 102 f.
  5. ↑ Bernhard Bischoff: Palaeography of Roman antiquity and the occidental Middle Ages , 4th edition, Berlin 2009, pp. 174–177; Albert Derolez: The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript Books , Cambridge 2003, p. 102.
  6. ^ Elke von Boeselager: Schriftkunde , Hannover 2004, p. 39; Otto Mazal also uses the terms: Textbook of Handwriting , Wiesbaden 1986, p. 115.
  7. ↑ Bernhard Bischoff: Palaeography of Roman antiquity and the occidental Middle Ages , 4th edition, Berlin 2009, pp. 175–177; Severin Corsten: Rotunda . In: Lexicon of the entire book system , 2nd, revised edition, Vol. 6, Stuttgart 2003, p. 388; Otto Mazal: Paläographie und Paläotypie , Stuttgart 1984, pp. 13-15. See Hans Foerster, Thomas Frenz: Abriss der Latinische Paläographie , 3rd, revised edition, Stuttgart 2004, pp. 237, 240; Albert Derolez: The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript Books , Cambridge 2003, pp. 102-109.
  8. ↑ codices.ch. In: codices.ch. Retrieved June 4, 2020 .
  9. ^ Bernhard Bischoff: Palaeography of Roman antiquity and the occidental Middle Ages , 4th edition, Berlin 2009, p. 177; Albert Derolez: The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript Books , Cambridge 2003, p. 111; Otto Mazal: Paläographie und Paläotypie , Stuttgart 1984, p. 15.
  10. ^ Albert Derolez: The Palaeography of Gothic Manuscript Books , Cambridge 2003, pp. 111-117.
  11. ^ Severin Corsten: Koelhoff d. Ä., Johann . In: Lexicon of the entire book system , 2nd, revised edition, Vol. 4, Stuttgart 1995, p. 263.
  12. ^ Severin Corsten: Rotunda . In: Lexicon of the entire book system , 2nd, revised edition, Vol. 6, Stuttgart 2003, p. 388; in detail Otto Mazal: Paläographie und Paläotypie , Stuttgart 1984, pp. 64-138; Ernst Crous : The Gothic Fonts in Letterpress . In: Ernst Crous, Joachim Kirchner: Die Gothic Fonts , 2nd edition, Braunschweig 1970, p. 30.