Croatian Glagolitic Script
http://www.hr/darko/etf/et03.html - the whole story
© by Darko Zubrinic, Zagreb (1995)
In the history of Croatian people three scripts were in use:
- Croatian Glagolitic Script,
- Croatian Cyrillic Script (bosancica),
- Latin Script.
Today the Croats are using exclusively the Latin Script.
The Arabica was also in use among the Muslims in Bosnia-Herzegovina. It was in fact the Arabic script used for the Croatian language and it constitutes the so-called Adjami or Aljamiado literature, similarly as in Spain. Its first sources in Croatia go back to the 15th century. One of the oldest texts is a love song calledChirvat-türkisi (Croatian song) from 1588, written by a certain Mehmed. This manuscript is held in the National Library in Vienna. Except for literature Arabica was also used in religious schools and administration. Of course, it was in much lesser use than other scripts. The last book in Arabica was printed in 1941.
It is important to emphasise that the earliest known texts of Croatian literature written in the Latin script (14th century) have traces of Church-slavonic influences. Hence, Croatian glagolitic, Cyrillic and Latin traditions cannot be viewed as separated entities. We know that Middle Age Croatian scriptoriums were polygraphic (for example in Zadar and Krk), see [Malic, Na izvorima..., pp 35-56].
