Latin script is currently used by approximately 30-35% of the world's population. These are residents of almost all of Europe (with the exception of Greece, Bulgaria and partially the republics of the former Yugoslavia), Africa, America and Asia (Turkey, Indonesia, Philippines).

History of Latin writing originates in ancient rome. Initially, it was only among the inhabitants of Rome and a small area around Rome (Latium). It was not invented by the Romans themselves, but was the result of the Western Greek alphabet brought here by the Greek colonists and the local Etruscan writing.

The Roman state grew, thereby expanding the boundaries of the use of the Latin alphabet. After the division of the Roman Empire into Eastern and Western Latin language and writing remained a means of communication in the Western Roman Empire.

In 476 the empire fell, but the language remained on its territory - it was calmly accepted by the young "barbarian" peoples who founded new states on the territory of the former Western Roman Empire.

Throughout its history, Latin writing has repeatedly changed under the influence of territorial factors, local writing, changes in the writing material (stone, metal, wax tablets, papyrus, parchment or paper), changes in writing tools (chisel, style, kalam, pen).

The first monuments of Latin writing that have survived to this day are to the VIII - VI centuries BC . They are inscriptions made on stone and metal, only by the 1st century include inscriptions on papyrus, to IV-V centuries- on parchment and only by the thirteenth century- on the paper.

The oldest form of Latin inscriptions was "capital" letter on the stone. This technique has given rise to big sizes and the shape of the letters - like our printed ones. In relation to Latin writing, this type of writing is called "majuskul"(from Latin majus - "more" ). The letters in such a letter are not connected to each other and occupy the space between two horizontal rulers: A S D F G H

Minuscule- the type of writing opposite to the majusculum (from the Latin minus - "less" ) and represents writing in lowercase (small) letters. In it, part of the letters is no longer located between two, but between four rulers, while the loops and lines extending up and down from lowercase letters are called remote, and that part of the letter that remains within the two middle rulers is called body (body) of the letter . In the Latin minuscule, letters with extensions - b d f g h l p q t y .

Minuscule can be compared with our printed lowercase letters, in Latin writing it appeared later than majuscule. In antiquity, there was only majuscule writing, it was created specifically for hard material (stone, chisel). Then, with the passage of time, it migrated to parchment and paper.

But a business letter requires the speed and convenience of writing, that's how it appeared italics(from Latin cursus - running). It involves the binding of letters in one continuous movement of the pen, a strong tilt to the right and an abundance of merged letters ( ligatures). Italics can be compared to our written letters - text written by hand, not printed.

AT early times cursive was a careless and difficult to read draft letter, which was found on wax tablets, lead plates, on potsherds and even on the walls of houses, for example, in Pompeii - there they were ordinary "fence" inscriptions (like our modern ones - Vasya was here or something like that). Only in the imperial era is the improvement of cursive - it becomes the language of business correspondence, documents and letters.

Over time, there is an improvement in both bookish Latin writing and business, i.e. majuscula and minuscule. Throughout evolution, there has been a general trend towards convergence of these types of writing.

The most ancient monuments of Latin book writing that have come down to us were papyri written in capital letters. They were works of ancient authors: Virgil, Cicero, Plautus.

In chronological order, the capital letter is followed by unial- book writing on parchment IV-VIII centuries. They were mostly Christian texts, which is why the unital is often referred to as the "Christian" type of writing. The origin of the word "uncial" is quite controversial. The main version is that this word comes from the Latin initiales(i.e. initial), since in subsequent eras, up to the present day, the unival, along with a capital letter, is used only for capital letters of the text, for the beginning of books and headings.

Compared to the capital letter, the unital is characterized by great roundness and softness. This is explained with the transition to parchment - a softer and more pliable material than papyrus. This type of writing serves as the first step towards italics, in it portables appear for the first time, although according to the classification it is generally a majuscule type of writing.

In the XI-XII centuries appeared gothic writing . Its appearance is associated with a change in the aesthetic tastes of the era. characteristic feature Gothic writing is a break in letters, the difference between bold and thin (hairy) lines gradually increases - bold lines thicken, and thin ones become thinner. At the points of their connection, the letter breaks a little, verticals and extensions receive angular endings. In letters with rounded body outlines, such as b, d, o, p, q, ovals turn into diamonds. Such gradualness in the development of a fracture is explained by the gradual change in the sharpening of the pen. In addition, elongated proportions and their close placement within the word made it possible to use writing material more economically. From the 12th century The first universities began to appear in European countries. This increased the demand for books, but the writing material was still expensive parchment. The lack of writing material necessitated the search for more economical forms of writing.

But as the paper spreads from the end of the XIII, and especially XIV-XV centuries, in Gothic writing, precisely those features that made it economical began to be lost. It becomes free, with long extensions, although it retains the fracture accepted according to the aesthetic standards of that time. It is no coincidence that one of the original titles of this letter - "fracture"(those. fracture), but "Gothic" or "monastic" it was called by the Italian humanists, contrasting it as medieval with their new Renaissance writing.

In this way, in the XIII - XV century Gothic writing became universal throughout Western Europe, although each country had its own national version.

In the 15th century attempts were made to revive ancient culture and ancient writing - antique antique ( ancient writing) . With the introduction of printing, this letter became the basis for the creation of the first printed Italian font and its name - antiqua. By the way, first bible was printed I.Gutenberg in 1450-1456 in gothic font.

In the 16th century the typographic type was exactly what the books had written before - Gothic in Germany and the revived serif in Italy.

Gothic block type and Gothic regular script existed for a long time and fell out of use only in the middle of the 20th century , but the antiqua font is still used today.

In contact with

The Etruscans, a people with a rich culture, not related to other Italic peoples, adopted the Greek alphabet (approximately in the 8th - 7th centuries BC) and later changed it, adapting it to their language. A line of Etruscan writing runs from right to left. Latin writing was formed on the basis of the Etruscan writing. Compared to what was achieved by the Greeks, the Romans did not create anything new in writing. Of interest is the graphic history of Latin writing. The letters B, D, O, X, absent in the Etruscan alphabet, were additionally borrowed from the Greek alphabet. The adoption of writing by the Romans took place around 700 BC. In Latin, there were no voiceless stop aspirated φ, h, χ, and the corresponding signs were omitted by the Romans. The ancient ú was used for f. The letter Z became superfluous and was abolished after about 350 BC. the ancient z (voiced s) turned into r in Latin (according to the law of rotacism). During the reign of Sulla, this sign was again borrowed from the Greeks. Initially, the sound k was transmitted by three letters: C, K, Q, later it began to be transmitted only by the letter C. The Romans did not adopt the Semitic-Greek names of the letters, with the exception of the later "iodine", "zet" and "upsilon". Probably the names be, de, ef, el, ha, etc. were adopted from the Etruscans according to the type of the original Etruscan syllabary. The direction of the most ancient Latin inscriptions VI - IV centuries. BC. was from right to left or boustrophedon, later, under the influence of Greek writing, the direction changes to the direction from left to right. Signs are mostly written in the form capital, or monumental, letters, sometimes decorated. One type of such a letter is rustic(IV - VII centuries). In the IV - IX centuries. prevails uncial letter, both in manuscripts and in inscriptions, especially church ones. According to papyri and Christian literature of the 7th - 8th centuries. known half ounce. With the spread of Christianity, this letter comes to Ireland, and on its basis is formed Irish writing style, known from Irish manuscripts, which, thanks to the Irish monasteries, began to be used on the mainland. From Irish in Britain formed Anglo-Saxon style. From the 8th century the peoples who adopted the Latin script develop their own characteristic badass: Spanish (called Visigothic IX - XI centuries), Italian poshib of the papal curia ( Beneventian and Lombard), Frankish insignia ( Merovingian and Carolingian). In the XI century. under the influence of the Gothic style, a refracted letter appears, or Gothic. Distinguish gothic minuscule, pointed poshib and gothic double refraction texture. New species appear in Italy: rotunda with blurred refraction, bastard with italic elements and gothic-antiqua, which then passes into antiqua Renaissance, or modern Latin . A sharp turning point in the development of Latin writing comes with the invention of printing. Around 1500 introduced textured set and start to differ. uppercase and lower case. In Italy, with the revival of classical education, the ancient Latin style, called humanistic antique. In Germany texture for a long time (until the 18th century) competed with antique, but was gradually superseded by it. In the 19th century a new stage in the improvement of Latin writing took place - a phonetic transcription appears, created to more accurately designate sounds. Ancient Greek writing did not know any word division or punctuation. There were no spaces between words in the inscriptions. Only in handwritten book writing did the words gradually begin to delimit one from the other, the letters in the word gradually approached, forming a unity, and gaps appeared between the words. Periods and commas were rare until the Byzantine era. In Latin writing, the separation of words by dots or spaces was partly carried out already in antiquity, but was unstable. And in the Middle Ages, a certain inconsistency was preserved here. Punctuation in the modern sense, including the colon, question mark, quotation marks, etc., was established everywhere only with the invention of printing.