CURIALE, SCRITTURA. — This name designates a group of Latin scripts, derived from Roman cursive, because they were used by the scribes of certain curiae between the 5th and 13th centuries. The general characteristics of these scripts are: rapidity of strokes, abundant letter connections and ligatures, and the length of the ascenders; in addition, the form of the a simile to ω (v. CANCELLERESCÀ, SCRITTURA).
In the papal curia this script had two periods: from the 8th to the 11th century and from the 11th to the 12th: in the first it appeared broad, rounded, and majestic, as was moreover required by the still frequent use of papyrus; in the second, instead, small and graceful, as parchment by then permitted. Alongside the curial script there developed, closely resembling it, the c. of the Roman notaries, which was less elegant and equally difficult to read.
The scripts of the scribes of Naples and Amalfi are also called c., or more properly curialesche; they spread, or exerted their influence, in Sorrento, Gaeta, Salerno, and Capua. These too, derived from Roman cursive, were definitively abolished by Frederick II because of the enormous difficulties of reading them. Ligatures, connections, and even fusions of letters are their characteristics. For the Amalfitan script, the following forms may be listed: a in the form of α; e in the form of a small δ; g in the form of 3 or 1 or ξ; i small when isolated, large and resembling an l at the beginning of a word, long and comma-shaped when preceded by f, g, l, r, s; t, generally eye-shaped, when followed by a vowel takes the form of o or δ, when preceded by s takes the form of an upright or recumbent δ, and when followed by i takes the same form as e.