Scriptio continua

Extract from the Codex Vergilius Augusteus

Scriptio continua or scriptura continua is the Latin name for a spelling without word separation.

The letters of the words follow one another without spaces , punctuation marks or capital letters at the beginning of the word. The term is mainly applied to Greek and Latin manuscripts and inscriptions . The word division that makes reading easier was not introduced until the Middle Ages . Even the Chinese script has no spaces between the individual words.

literature

• Hubert Cancik and Helmuth Schneider (eds.): The new Pauly. Encyclopedia of Antiquity. Volume 7 (Lemma Bookmark). Metzler, Stuttgart a. Weimar 1999, ISBN 3-476-01477-0 .
• Severin Corsten , Stephan Füssel and Günther Pflug (eds.): Lexicon of the entire book system. Volume 7. Hiersemann, Stuttgart 2004.