ABSTRACT
One of the most important fifteenth-century innovations in Europe was a new type of handwriting usually called humanistic script as opposed to gothic script. Some humanist scribes began to strive for orthographical correctness according to classical usages. The main advantage of Niccolò's invention was that his script was not written letter for letter but that several letters and even whole words could be written in one effort. This chapter examines the spread of humanistic document scripts to Rhodes, a subject that has never been studied, although the extant Hospitaller chancery registers, the Libri Bullarum, provide us with an easily accessible source for such a study. The year 1448 can thus be established provisionally as a terminus ante quem for the introduction of humanistic scripts on Rhodes. Of course, there may be earlier examples of original charters from Rhodes with humanistic scripts elsewhere in European archives.
