Archivo de las Indias in Seville

 The Archivo de las Indias in Seville is a bit like the British Library: it is free to enter and you can see some of the most interesting documents there. Of course all the documents are post-Columbus, as “las Indias” really means America here. The documents are hand-written, one can see the delelopement of document hand. The earliest, like the treaty of Tordesillas of 1494, are written basically in style of mediaeval documents, later documents (some of which are dated) show the developments of later styles.

There are no Neudorfer-style fraktur initials, but in some documents we see clearly Baroque flourishes.

The treaty of Tordesillas

The treaty of Tordesillas

Charge against Hernan Cortes, 1533 

Charge against Hernan Cortes, 1533

Charge against Hernan Cortes, 1533

Charge against Hernan Cortes, 1533

Charge against Hernan Cortes, 1533

Document of 1663

Document of 1663

Document of 1665

Document of 1665

Document of 1665

Warning about English pirates, 1683

Document of 1744

Dominican Museum in Cracow

 There is an interesting museum in the cloisters of the Dominican church in Cracow. I mean it is interesting if you are either into history of the Dominicans or into calligraphy. There are some documents pertaining Dominican history here, they are of course mediaeval and written in the best hand. They are examples of official documents hand of the time. The first is so called "passport of st. Jacek", a letter explaining his credentials to whoever may be concerned (he was sent by the pope to organise the Dominican order in Poland). The second, of almost the same date, is the document permitting the Dominicans to build their church in Cracow. The third, a century later, is a document establishing the papal inquisition in Cracow. There also is a missal written for a pope, of course also in the best hand possible. It is an example of texture capitalis quadrata in the best version, although apparently created late for this style.

There are also examples of later styles. Apparently in the 17thcentury in Poland there was a custom of writing on the pictures, an information of who is on the picture would be written on it, not always in the best hand but in the style of the times. The styles are capitalis minumentalis with antiqua and also some corsiva, of course written by hand with a brush. They seem to have been written with a relatively wide brush held so that vertical lines would be thicker than the horizontal ones.

I also found a picture from the 19th century with descriptions of what is on the picture in quite a good hand of the time. In fact I wander how it was written there. It appears to be a style of hand writing taught at schools at the time, with a steel nib, which pressed when writing vertical strokes would produce a thicker line. But how it was done on an oil painting?

"Passport" of St. Jacek (also called St. Hiacynth),1227

Charter of the Dominican monastery in Cracow, 1227

Charter of the papal inquisition in Poland, 1327

Life of St. Jacek, 1360

Papal missal, 1570

Fraktur in Gdansk

 In 1538 Ludwig Neudorfer, a calligrapher of Imperial Chancery, published a book about writing letters which were at the time called "Gothic", as opposed to the Renaissance writing based on classical monuments, at the time in fashion in Italy. His book became popular in German-speaking areas and his style spread especially during the Baroque era. He introduced very elaborate capital letters, never used in Middle Ages but afterwards associated with Gothic script, which was then called "fraktur". They can be seen in many places where there was German-speaking population. 

Here is an example from Gdansk, which during the Baroque era was in the Kingdom of Poland but its inhabitants were mostly German-speaking Lutherans. Here it seems that the Neudorfer-style elaborate decorative letters are not only initials, but just capitals, which in German would mean the first letter of any noun. Not to speak of the first letter of each line of a poem, which appears to be one case. 

There is a book available, based on this blog.  

On the blog there is, so to speak, more room, one can show more illustrations there. Blogs, however, come and go, there is no certainty that it will be there ten years from now. The book, on the other hand, once you acquire it, will last, one can be sure of that.

Temple church in London

The Temple is of course one of the things to see in London, one of the oldest churches in the city, used to belong to Knights Templars (hence the name, though the knights are long gone). It is a characteristic church that crusader orders built in Europe, a rectangular church with a rotunda in the west (like the church of the Sepulchre in Jerusalem). The calligraphy is in the rectangular part, which is Gothic, obviously built later than the Romanesque rotunda. During the Cromwell era calligraphy instead of pictures were produced. Here is one of the best examples I know: a prayer written in antiqua calligraphy, with even shadows added to each letter, and framed like a picture. Apparently in England for a time it was a custom to frame prayers like pictures and hang them in churches.

There is a book available, based on this blog.  

On the blog there is, so to speak, more room, one can show more illustrations there. Blogs, however, come and go, there is no certainty that it will be there ten years from now. The book, on the other hand, once you acquire it, will last, one can be sure of that.

Handwriting of the 19th century

 As I was in Barcelona in February 2024, completely by chance I saw an exhibition of handwritten musical scores in Palau de la Musica Catalana. I can't even read a music score, but I took a few pictures anyway because there were some titles etc. in normal writing. Some of them are dated.

All this is written in a normal writing style of the time. Very likely a pen with a metal nib was used, a very pointed nib, which would produce a very thin line , but it could also produce a slightly thicker line when pressed. Only the lines going down or from left to right cold be made thicker, if the nib was going up, the line had to be very thin. 

This was actually the way I still remember being taught. Only the earliest lessons, soon the ball pointed pens took over. But still it makes me see how a script like this was written. 

I guess it was just a fleeting exhibition, but anyway, it was there. 

Rabat

 The country called Morocco today was in the Roman times a province of the empire called Mauretania. Roman remains are therefore no surprise there. Some can be seen in the capital Rabat, in the part of the town called Chellah. There are Roman ruins there, including some stelae with Roman inscriptions on them. Some inscriptions are in the elegant capitalis quadrata, some in what I called capitalis rectangularis and some even in rustica. Anyway they are clearly Roman inscriptions, written in Latin.

Some of those inscriptions are written in what we call "rustica", which was used as a bookhand at the time. It required less turning of the hand to write serifs, consequently it was easier to write books, but as a result horizontal serifs tended to be thicker that vertical lines. It gave a kind of rhythm to a page.