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1916

LECTURES ON THE HISTORY
OF THE PAPAL CHANCERY

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
C. F. CLAY, Manager
Honion: FETTER LANE, E.G.
EBtnfiurgt : loo PRINCES STREET

iPtfa Bork: G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS
JSoniliaB, ffalHitIa anU MtiStas: MACMILI.AN AND Co., Ltd.
Boronto; J. M. DENT AND SONS, Ltd.
ffoItHO: THE MARUZEN-KABUSHIKI-KAISHA

All rights reserved

LECTURES ON THE HISTORY
OF THE PAPAL CHANCERY
DOWN TO THE TIME OF INNOCENT III

by
REGINALD L. POOLE, Hon. Litt.D.
Sometime Birkbeck Lecturer in Ecclesiastical History at Trinity College
Keeper of the Archives of the University of Oxford, and Fellow of St Mary
Magdalen College and of the British Academy; LL.D., Edinburgh

Cambridge :
at the University Press
1915

CambtiBae :
PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A.
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS

BsL^3

PREFACE
f 1 1HE study of Papal documents has occupied me for
-*- many years. I began transcribing Bulls during the
time when I held a post in the Department of Manuscripts
in the British Museum so long ago as 1880, but I do not
think that I published anything on the subject imtil 1892.
At that time my interest was mainly historical and
palaeographical, but when in 1897 I was called upon to
give regular instruction in diplomatic in my own Uni
versity of Oxford, I was led to pay closer attention to
the forms of documents and to the modes of their trans
mission ; and since then in most years I have given either
a fuU course of lectures, or, if time did not permit, at least
a shorter series, on the history of the Papal Chancery and
on the characteristics of its hterary productions. I
welcomed therefore the opportunity, offered by my election
by the Master and Fellows of Trinity CoUege to the
Birkbeck Lectureship in Ecclesiastical History in 1912,
for applying myself to the improvement and extension
of my lectures ; and after I had completed my course in
the Michaelmas Term of 1913 1 looked forward to recasting
what I had written so as to form a methodical treatise on
the subject. In this hope I have been disappointed. An
infirmity of eyesight for many months made it very
difficult for me to perform my ordinary tasks and pre
cluded the possibility of rearranging the materials of my

vi Preface
book, filled as it is with smaU details which would certainly
have become confused had they been transferred and
reinserted in different places without a more exact super
vision than I could command. I was therefore obliged to
leave the scheme of the work as it was at first composed,
but I have done my best to revise the matter. I have
rewritten nearly one-half of it, and have enlarged the
book by about two-thirds. Originally it consisted of six
liectures; but I removed some parts of the sixth and
expanded them so as to form a seventh chapter. It was
perhaps rash in the circumstances to venture upon
publication at all; but I may plead in excuse that a
book on the subject of which I treat is really wanted,
for nothing at all dealing with it has ever been pubhshed
in Enghsh. For this reason it wiU not be out of place to
glance briefly at the course of its exposition in modem
times. The study of Papal as of other documents was founded
in France. It is a part of the great learned tradition of
the Benedictines of the congregation of St Maur. The
illustrious Jean Mabillon first laid down the principles of
diplomatic with a sureness of grasp which has made his
treatise the model on which aU subsequent work has
proceeded. He had an instinct of critical divination
which seldom allowed him to go astray, and the little
that he says about Papal documents is pregnant with
suggestions which have been turned to account by later
scholars. His successors, the two authors of the Nouveau
Trait6 de Diplomatique^, dealt with the subject with much
1 Their modesty forbade them from giving their names, but
the survivor (R. T. Tassin) mentioned that of his colleague,
Charles Toustain, in the preface to volume vi.

Preface vii
greater fulness. They may irritate us by their prolixity
and by their constant attitude of defence against forgotten
opponents; but their industry is beyond all praise, and
the mass of material which they collected, especially with
regard to the Papal Chancery, can never be neglected.
But it would be idle to compare their critical initiative
with that of Mabillon.
Nearly a century passed before a notable landmark in
the study of Papal documents was fixed, in a Memoir on the
Acts of Innocent III, by Leopold DeUsle, a true successor
of Mabillon in a large part of his varied activity. This
short article, pubhshed in 1858, stands as the pattern for
the exposition of the system of the Chancery and of the
diplomatic of the later middle ages. Dehsle's method is
perfect; the main lines which he estabhshed have been
established once for all, and even in details few of his
statements have needed revision. His influence is
apparent in the productions of the French School at
Rome^; but these, if we except the important editions
of the Liber PontificaHs and the Liber Censuum, have
been mainly occupied with the documents of a more
recent period than that to which this volume is confined.
During the eighteenth century there was great and
continuous activity in Italy in the pubhcation of materials
for history, and especially for ecclesiastical history, but
less interest was shown in the criticism of documents.
1 This is not less true of the late Comte L. de Mas-Latrie's
]fil6ments de la Diplomatique Pontificale, which appeared in the
Revue des Questions Historiques xxxix. (1886) 416-451; and of
the relative sections in Arthur Giry's Manuel de Diplomatique,
1894. It is incorrect to speak, with Dr Bresslau, Urkundenlehre,
p. 31, of Giry having emancipated himself from the Maurine
influence and worked in close connexion with German researches;
for Giry, like Delisle, was vmf amiUar with the German language.

viii Preface
Pierluigi Galletti in his book on the Primicerius furnished
a storehouse of evidence bearing upon the early organiza
tion of the Chancery, and in 1805 Gaetano Marini pro
duced an invaluable collection of documents preserved,
or once preserved, on papyrus. But little was done in
the way of constructive treatment. The Diplomatica
Pontificia of Marino Marini, nephew of Gaetano, is an
insipid and superficial sketch, based chiefly on the
Nouveau Traite and only of interest for its occasional
references to the Papal Registers. Until the Archives
were thrown open by Pope Leo XIII in 1881 access to
them was rarely permitted to anyone outside the official
staff. The exceptional facihties granted to the Danish
historian P. A. Munch in 1860 resulted in the pro
duction of the first scientific treatise on the Registers,
but this was not pubhshed imtil many years after his
death^. The French influence was slow in penetrating into
Germany, where Papal documents had been for the most
part left to antiquaries, who examined the leaden seals,
and to lawyers, who looked on the subject as a branch of
mainly obsolete jurisprudence. While an immense service
was done to history by Phihpp Jaffe, himself a Polish
Jew, through the compilation of his great calendar of
Papal documents down to 1198, his purpose was historical,
not diplomatic. What he aimed at was to make as com
plete a Mst of the documents as was possible, in order to
provide materials for the historian; and however meri
torious as a pioneer, his work suffered from a neglect of
the great French tradition. This was noted by Wilhelm
Diekamp as the weak point not only of Jaff6 but also of
' A German translation of it by S. Lowenfeld appeared in the
Arcbivalische Zeitsehrift, iii. (1878) 66-149.

Preface ix
his continuator Potthast^; and Hemrich Denifle made
the same criticism on Jaffe's editor, Kaltenbrunner^. But
at Vienna as early as 1854 the Institute for Austrian
Historical Research was estabhshed expressly on the
model of the ficole des Chartes at Parish and Theodor
Sickel (afterwards Ritter von Sickel) came to take part
in its organization when he had spent five years in study
at the French capital and had become closely acquainted
with the work of the ificole*. It was m fact after com
pleting a task of research entrusted to him by the French
Government that he entered upon his duties at the Vienna
Institute in 1856. Working thus on the method which he
brought with him, Sickel rose to be the second founder of
the study of diplomatic. In time he was made head of
the Institute, and when in 1881 it was resolved to erect
an Austrian Historical Institute at Rome he was appointed
its superintendent. By this means, though his own
special investigations had been devoted to Imperial
documents, he became the master spirit directing
an amount of energetic work upon the productions
of the Papal Chancery which was long imsurpassed in
Europe. Meanwhile in the German Empire a movement was on
foot which had a profound influence on the study. The
^ 'Sie iibersahen gleichmassig die friihere Hauptarbeit iiber
ihren Gegenstand,...Potthast die Dehsle's, Jaff6 die der Bene-
dictiner ' : in Historisohes Jahrbuch, iv. (1883), 217.
2 Kaltenbrunner, he said, might have been saved from a
serious blunder, 'hatte er nicht die franzosischen Forscher so
vomehm ignoriert': Archiv fiir Literatur- und Kirchen-
Geschichte des Mittelalters, ii. (1886), 55.
* See B. von Ottenthal, in Mittheilimgen des Instituts fiir
Osterreichische Geschichtsforschung, xxix. (1908) 547.
* For the particulars of Sickel's biography, see Void.
pp. 545-659.

X Preface
greatest historical imdertaking in that coimtry, the
Monumenta Germania Historical, was placed under the
management of the Berlin Academy in 1872, and three
years later its organization was reconstructed and the
sphere of its operations extended. In 1876 it was
determined to include the Letters of Gregory the Great;
in 1880 and 1881 a selection of Papal Letters of the
thirteenth century was arranged ; a year later a proposal
for the pubhcation of aU that remains of the Register
of John VIII was adopted; and then by 1884 Theodor
Mommsen had taken upon him to edit afresh the Liber
PontificaUs^, which was at that very time passing through
the press imder the masterly editorship of the Abbe (now
Monsignor) Louis Duchesne.
This enlargement of the work of the Monumenta, side
by side with the vigorous activity of the Institute at
Vienna, soon estabhshed the German lands in the front
rank in the special study of Papal diplomatic, which had
previously been neglected there. The new enterprises
involved prehminary researches, and just as for many
years the Monumenta had had its missions in Italy for
the discovery of materials for German history, so now
the Academies of Vienna and Berlin and the committee
^ It is interesting to recall that when the famous Baron vom
Stein projected the foundation of the Monumenta Germaniae he
was impressed by the fact 'that what had been done for Italy by
Muratori and for France by the Congregation of St Maur had not
yet been done for Germany.' In 1822 he invited Georg Heinrich
Pertz, 'like another Muratori or Mabillon,' to take charge of the
work. See Sir J. R. Seeley's Life and Times of Stein, iii. 440,
445, 1878. But Seeley comments with truth that a century
earlier Leibnitz had planned a similar collection of historical
materials. ^ See the notices prefixed to the first, second, sixth, eighth,
and ninth volumes of the Neues Archiv.

Preface xi
of the Monumenta vied with one another in the encourage
ment which they gave to the exploration of Papal docu
ments. It was with the assistance of the Berlin Academy
that Paul Ewald went to Italy hi 1876, and this Academy
also promoted Dr Julius von Pflugk-Harttung's researches
in that country in 1882. The Vienna Academy sent
Ferdinand Kaltenbrunner to Rome in 1878, and it was
on behalf of the Monumenta that Samuel Lowenfeld
made investigations in Papal documents at Paris. These
examples illustrate the energy with which the new lines
of study were pursued and the hearty support which the
students received from pubhc bodies.
The great advantages which thus enured to learning
were due not only to the fresh stimulus given to Papal
diplomatic but to the fact that the German and Austrian
scholars brought to its criticism a long experience and an
unsurpassed equipment in the analytical work which they
or their teachers had done in connexion with the Monu
menta and with the exploration of Imperial documents.
On the one hand, there was the laborious collation of
manuscripts and tracing of their affinities; on the other,
the palaeographical examination of originals, the com
parison of handwritings, the penetration of the structure
of documents, the analysis of formulae, the establishment
of Chancery rules. These principles of study were trans
planted into a new field, and their results, if at times
impaired by excess of refinement and an undue striving
after originahty, have in the past thirty years proved of
remarkable value and importance.
Of the brilhant band of scholars who first entered the
field two of the ablest were cut off before they had shown
aU the distinguished powers which they possessed : Ewald

xii Preface
died at 36, Diekamp at 31. Those who have since carried
on the work with eminent success need not be here men
tioned by name; almost every page of my book bears
testimony to my indebtedness to them. But to one
scholar above all, Dr Harry Bresslau, it is right that
I should express my special obhgations. His masterly
Handbuch der Urkundenlehre fiir Deutschland und Itahen
is not only a marvellously complete guide to the immense
hterature which has accumulated, very lasgely in scattered
monographs, on the subject of Papal documents; but it
stands alone in the comprehensiveness and lucidity of its
treatment. The author is not overweighted by his great
learning; and his sound judgement, his penetration into
the legal meaning of forms, and his acute criticism make
his book absolutely indispensable. Except in my fourth
and seventh chapters, I have made use of it at every
step, and though I have not always been able to accept
Dr Bresslau's conclusions I am certain that to him, more
than to any other hving man, my book owes whatever
merit it may possess. Nor should I omit to acknowledge
my debt to Dr Paul Kehr for the assistance which I owe
to his works in attempting to disentangle the complex
and obscure changes in the organization of the Chancery
in the eleventh century. The chapter in which I discuss
them is probably the least satisfactory in my book, but
it would have been far darker without the hght thrown
upon the subject by Dr Kehr.
In bringing to a close a work which, though small in
dimensions, is the outcome of protracted toil, it is a
pleasant duty to express my hearty thanks to the Master
and Fellows of Trinity College not only for the honour

Preface xiii
they did me in electing me to the Birkbeck Lectureship
but also in particular for the constant kindness which
they showed me during the time when I enjoyed the
privilege for a brief space of being accounted a member
of their illustrious Society.
REGINALD L. POOLE.
26 July 1915.

LIST OF SOME ABBREVIATED REFERENCES

Acta. Acta Pontificum Romanorum inedita, ed. by
J. vonPflugk-Harttimg,:3 volumes, 1881-1886.
Bresslau. Handbuch der Urkvmdenlehre fiir Deutschland
und ItaUen, vol. i. 2nd ed. 1912. This com
prises only nine out of the nineteen chapters
of the first edition of 1889: when these latter
are cited, the edition is specified.
Greg. VII Reg. Registrvmi, in Jaffa's Monumenta Gregoriana,
1865.
Gregorovius. History of the City of Rome in the Middle Ages,
transl. by Mrs Hamilton, 1894^1902.
Inn. Ill Reg. Regesta, in Migne, ccxiv.-ccxvi.
Jaft6, Reg. Regesta Pontificum Romanorimi, 2nd ed., 1881-
1888 (cited by the number of the document,
except where the volume is specified).
Mansi. Conciliorum nova et arapUssima Collectio.
Migne. Patrologiae Cursus completus, Series Latina.
Mittheilungen. Mittheilungen des Instituts fiir Osterreichische
Geschichtsforschung.
Neues Archiv. . Neues Archiv der Gesellschaft fiir altere Deutsche
Geschichtskunde.
Spec. Specimina selecta Chartarum Pontificum Roma
norum, ed. by J. von Pflugk-Harttung, 1885-
1887.

CONTENTS

II.

III.

IV.

V.

VI.

of Rome

Preface . 
List of some Abbreviated References
I. Introduction .....
Materials ......
The College of Notaries and the Regions
The six Notaries ....
Papal Documents ....
Collections and Calendars of Papal Documents
Traces of Early Registers
Papal Documents from Hadrian I .
Structure of Bulls
The Date 

The Notaries in the Tenth Century
The Librarian .....
The Chancellor ....
The Notaries of the Lateran Palace
The Chancery from Leo IX to Paschal II
The Ars Dictandi ....
The Cursus Curiae Romanae
Its Origin 
The Ancient Metrical Cursus .
Development of the Accentual Cursus
The forms of Documents from Leo IX
The Rota and the Device
The Monogram and the Comma
Privileges .
Simple Privileges
LettersThe Seal .

The Registers .
The Register of Gregory VII
The Register of Innocent III
Officers of the Chancery from Calixtus II

PAGE V

1
4 6
12
20 25
29 37
4047 61565962 65
767883
8792
98
101
105106111113119123
124132 136

xvi Contents PAGE
VII. Criticism of Documents at the Papal Court . . 143
Prevalence of Forgery . . . . . .151
Innocent Ill's Measures for its Detection . . 152
Litterae Tonsae . . . . . . .160
Henry of Wiirzburg's Description of the Chancery . 162
Appendix I. The Liber Pontificalis  166
II. The Regions of Rome  170
III. Salutem et ApostoUcam Benedictionem . . . 177
IV. The Judices Palatini  180
V. A Formulary of the Thirteenth Century . . 188
VI. The Roman Provinciale  193
VII. Miscellanies . .  197
1. Bulls on Papyrus ...... 197
2. The Datary  198
3. The Pope's Name on the Seal . . . 199
4. The Points on the Seal  199
5. Demi-Bulls  201
6. The Closing of Bulls  202
7. The Disappearance of the Registers before that
of Iimocent III  203
Index  205

When we consider the forces which influ
enced mankind during the middle ages, it is
evident that none can be compared with the
Papacy in the continuous and decisive manner
in which it penetrated every country of Western
Europe, intervened in the affairs of church, and
monastery, and town, even of kingdom and
empire, and acted as mediator, as arbitrator, as
judge. This influence was exerted in part by
means of hving agents, and when the system of
appointing Legates was estabhshed much of the
more important poHcy of the Popes was conflded
to them. But this was only a fraction of the-
work they did. Their daily business was con
ducted by letter ; and it is the Papal Letters — or,
as we commonly call them, Bulls — ^which formed
the instrument by which the Papal authority was
exercised. The letters being of such importance,
it was necessary that they should be drawn up
with care; and thus a staff of officers had to be
employed as the Pope's secretaries. An organi
zation already existing was adapted for this
purpose, and its rules for carrying on its business
became gradually more and more precise. When
in the eleventh century the Pope sought to operate
in a more extended sphere than he had previously
been wont to do, it was the more needful to
p. p. o. 1

2 The Pope's Secretarial Office
safeguard the authenticity of his letters, not merely
by formal regularity but also by a variety of
patent marks of genuineness. Certain types were
elaborated which in the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries acquired a perfection of style and of
calligraphy which has never been surpassed. The
purpose of my present undertaking is to examine
the machinery by which the Pope's business was
done and the work which that machinery produced :
in other words, to trace the history of the Papal
Chancery and to describe the documents written
in it, the manner in which these documents were
drawn up, the persons through whose hands they
passed, and the processes which they underwent
before they were finaUy issued.
To speak of the Roman Chancery in the early
ages of the Papacy is indeed an anachronism, for
there could be no Chancery under that name
until the title of Chancellor was imported from the
Imperial system in the eleventh century. But
the anachronism is convenient, because the word
Chancery denotes exactly what we want to express,
the machinery by means of which the Pope con
ducted his business, his secretarial office. It
enables us to detach this limited field of study,
which is but a small and circumscribed depart
ment of the constitutional history of the Roman
Church, from the larger concerns in which the
history of the Papacy is involved. It is only
incidentally that we must notice the local con
ditions which explain the origin of some elements
in the Pope's staff of officers.
The subject is dry and technical; it has not

Literary Characteristics 3
even the merit of introducing controversial topics.
But it presents several features of interest. It
illustrates in an unexpected way the relations of
the Popes towards the City of Rome and towards
other external forces with which they were brought
into contact. It throws light on palaeography.
It will show us how the old Roman school of
penmen was superseded when the Pope ceased to
look upon Rome as his habitual residence, and
how a new style of writing was imported from
the reformed models of the Carohngian Empire.
There is also a hterary interest, and this is a
discovery of the last thirty years which has only
been fully explained quite recently: namely the
establishment of the rules of balance and cadence
in the period, which form what is known as the
Cursus Curiae Romanae. These rules were settled
in the eleventh century, and they soon became a
distinguishing mark of documents proceeding from
the Papal Chancery. Indeed the beauty and
delicate euphony of the sentences thus produced
led in time to the adoption of the Cursus by the
other Chanceries of Western Europe, and it per
sisted, though with abating purity, until the
revival of classical learning in the fifteenth century.
It is, however, one of the most remarkable points
in the critical work which has gone on in the past
generation, that the invention of the Cursus in
the eleventh century was in fact a revival on
somewhat different lines — an adaptation to a
changed mode of accentuation— of a system of
rhetoric which had prevailed in the ancient world
down to the early part of the sixth century and
1—2

4 Materials for the Study
which can be traced in principle back to the
Athenian orators.
These are incidents in our enquiry, which only
claim mention now in order to show that even a
narrow subject ramifies into regions of a less
confined interest.
The materials for our study are primarily
the letters of the Popes themselves. These faU
iiaturaUy in point of time into two great periods.
In the former of these no documents remain
except in transcripts; in the latter we begin to
have to do with originals, at first very few in
number, but gradually and soon rapidly increasing.
The line of division is marked by the pontificate of
Hadrian I, which began two years before Charles
the Great became king of the Lombards. The
date is therefore a convenient one, because it
coincides with the introduction of a new factor
into Itahan politics, which had a profound influence
upon the institutions of Rome. For the time
preceding Hadrian I the letters are preserved,
in copies of varying trustworthiness, in volumes
chiefly compiled, as we shall see, in the interest
of the definition of law. Some hght is thrown on
the official conditions under which the Pope's
correspondence and other business were carried on
by the early evidence presented in the Liber
Pontificalis or coUection of Lives of the Popes,
and in the Liber Diurnus, or book of forms in
use in the Chancery.
For the purposes of our present study it would
be out of place to explore the intricate questions

The Liber Pontificalis 5
connected with the composition and structure of
the Liber PontificaHs i. It must suffice to say
that it includes elements which in their present
form go back at least as far as the early part of the
fourth century. The Catalogue of Popes known
as the Liberian, because it was revised during
the pontificate of Liberius (352-366), is in fact
an emended edition of a Ust drawn up in 336.
Another record incorporated in the Liber Ponti
ficalis ends with the death of FeUx IV (530);
this is distinguished as the Catalogus FeUcianus:
whether it is an abridgement of an older and larger
book, a first edition of the complete work, or
whether it is the nucleus out of which that work
grew, need not be here considered. That the
book existed in its developed form before the end
of the seventh century is disputed by no one.
Thenceforward it was revised and continued, and
a second recension was made after the death of
Pope Cono (687), about which time an abridge
ment ending with this Pope is also preserved,
and is known as the Cononian Epitome. Con-
tinuators carry on the main work down to the
eighth and then the ninth century; but after 872
their notices are, for the most part, brief and it
is not until the accession of Gregory VII in 1073
that the Lives resume a character of contemporary
or nearly contemporary authority and often of
important value.
^ Something on the subject will be found in Appendix i. My
references to the Liber Pontificalis are taken from the edition of
Monsignor Duchesne (1886-1892), except when that of Theodor
Mommsen (1898) is expressly cited.

6 The Liber Diurnus
The Liber Diurnus is in substance a manual
for use in the Papal court. It contains a collection
of formulae for the production of documents and
of rules for the performance of official acts, and
it assumed more or less its present shape between
685 and 751, though some parts may be a little
earlier 1. But the three manuscripts in which it
is preserved differ in their arrangement and in the
number of the documents which they contain,
and a definitive text of the work has not yet been
published 2. The book was used in the Papal
Chancery down to the eleventh century. Traces
of it can be noticed under Alexander II, but it
passed out of currency in the time of Gregory VII^.
When about the beginning of the third century
^ In the Vatican manuscript, formulae 1-63 represent a
collection of the seventh century, probably made up out of more
than one smaller collection already existing; formulae 64^81 are
a continuation down to about 700; formulae 82-99 were put
together under Hadrian I. A few additional formulae, found only
in the Clermont manuscript, were supplied not long after 800.
' The last edition was made in 1889 by Theodor von Sickel
from a manuscript in the Vatican archives which he behoved to be
older than 795, but which on palaeographical grounds I should
place nearer the second quarter of the ninth century ; and from
the Clermont manuscript, now at Paris, which is assigned also to
the ninth century. He was, however, not aware of the existence
of a Bobbio manuscript, now at Milan, of which the text has long
been expected at the hands of Monsignor Ratti. I should add
that, while Sickel has greatly advanced the critical study of the
text of the book — specially in his Prolegomena, published in the
Sitzungsberichte of the Vienna Academy, cxviii. (1889), 7, 13 — his
edition has not at all superseded that which Roziere brought out
some years earlier ; for this contains a large body of notes which
are of great value for the illustration of the subject-matter.
' Bresslau, Handbuch der Urkundenlehre fiir Deutschland und
Italien, i. (1st ed., 1889), 623.

The Ecclesiastical Regions of Rome 7
the Roman Chm-ch acquired the position of a-
corporate body capable of holding property, it
was organized as a collegium, and for the con
duct of its temporal business it required the
employment of clerks or notarii^. These notaries
were distributed among the regions of Rome.
The Liber Pontificalis carries back this distribution
to the first age of Christianity, and says that the
city was divided by St Clement into seven regions,
each of them provided with a notary for the
purpose of recording the acts of martyrs in his
region 2. It is not necessary here to discuss this
tradition, but it is quite possible that the division
into seven regions may be traced as early as the
pontificate of Fabian, who died in the year 250,
for the primitive catalogue which was m^de use of
in the compilation of the Liber Pontificalis contains
the definite statement that this Pope 'divided
the regions among deacons^.' Too much stress
need not be laid on the precise date, but it is
unquestioned that at an early time the city of
Rome was divided for ecclesiastical purposes into
seven regions.
We have then to enquire what relation these
1 Cf. K. J. Neumann, Der Romische Staat und die allgemeine
Kirche, 1890, i. 102-110.
" 'Hie fecit vii regiones et dividit [v.l. divisit] notariis fidelibus
eeclesiae qui gesta mart3rrum soUicite et curiose umasquisque per
regionem suam dihgenter perquireret ' : Lib. Pontif. i. 52, from
the text known as the Fehcian Catalogue. The words' ' fecit vii
regiones* are not found in the later text called Cononian: ibid.
(p. 231, Mommsen).
' 'Hie regiones divisit diaconibus,' in the Liberian Catalogue,
Lib. Pontif. i. 4 ; Ghroh. min., ed. Mommsen (Monum. Germ, hist.),
i. (1892), 76.

8 The Fourteen Civil Regions
seven regions bore to the fourteen in which the
city was organized by Augustus^. One would
naturally assume that the seven ecclesiastical
regions were formed by grouping the civil regions
in pairs; but when we have definite testimony
to the existence of particular ecclesiastical regions,
they are not found to correspond in boundary
with the civil areas ^. The truth appears to be
that the two systems were formed for different
purposes; and when the object for which the
ecclesiastical regions were estabhshed is imderstood,
it wiU be found that their arrangement throws
valuable hght on the distribution of the Christian
population. The civil regions were arranged on a principle
which presupposed that the inhabitants occupied
the heart of the city. No less than five of the
fourteen actually converged on the same point, the
meta sudans between the Forum and the Colosseum.
From that point the ist, und, nird, ivth, and xth
regions radiated. These comprised the central
and eastern parts of the city. The vith, vnth,
and vmth made up the north; and the outlying
districts, running to the Umits afterwards enclosed
by the waHs of Aurehan (a.d. 272) on the east and
north-west, formed the vth and ixth. The extreme
south was divided among the xith, xnth, and
xnith regions, and the district beyond the Tiber
made up the xivth. Except in the two instances
1 The arrangement of the seven regions has been greatly
modified by recent researches. I follow the maps given in the
second edition of Formae Urbis Romae antiquae by H. Kiepert
and C. Huelsen, 1912, plate iii. Compare below, Appendix n.
* See Duchesne's remarks. Lib. Pontif. i. 148, note 3.

The Seven Ecclesiastical Regions 9
where the numeration was interrupted so as to
bring in outlying districts, it proceeded regularly,
from south to east, north, and west.
Now when the Popes came to make provision
for their dependants, they had to deal with a
population smaU in number and limited in dis
tribution. They did not need more than half the
number of the civil regions, and the central districts
hardly concerned them at aU. The Christians
were scattered in the poor and partly waste parts
adjacent to the walls, and hence it was from the
walls and not from the centre that their regions
were constructed. The system of numbering from
the south and following the walls up the east and
then north and west was adopted on the analogy
of the civil regions. Six ecclesiastical regions
covered the space of thirteen civil ones; and the
seventh, hke the xivth civil region, was con
stituted by the district beyond the Tiber. But
any attempt to co-ordinate the boundaries of the
one system with the other leads to no result.
There was no reason why the two should coincide,
for they were formed with entirely different
objects. The civil regions were arranged for the
purpose of municipal administration; the eccle
siastical regions for the charitable service of a
particular class of the inhabitants, a poor com
munity which gathered most at the extremities
of the city. They could not afford to Hve in the
central districts, where moreover their society
would probably not have been welcome.
The conclusion to which we are led by
topographical considerations receives remarkable

10 Early Churches in Rome
support from the recorded traditions as to the dates
of the foundation of churches. Not indeed that
these traditions, so far at least as they concern the
first three centuries, can be accepted as relating
historical facts: there was always a natural ten
dency to attribute to foundations of all sorts an
antiquity beyond their due. But a tradition was
not likely to place the earliest churches in districts
which were altogether improbable, and from this
point of view its evidence is of value. Now the
church of St Pudentiana on the Viminal is traced
back to the middle of the second century ^ ; in the
third we have mention of a church beyond the
Tiber, no doubt, that of St Mary 2; and another,
that of St Ceciha, in the same region emerges in
the fourth^: on the Aventine, tradition speaks
of at least one church, that of St Prisca*. Of
the seven churches ascribed to the Emperor
Constantine, four, St Peter, St Paul, St Agnes, and
St Lawrence, stood outside the walls; and the
other three, the churches known later as St John
Lateran and St Cross in Jerusalem, and that of
SS. MarceUinus and Peter, were near together in
the extreme south-east of Rome^. There is no
sign of any Christian foundations in the districts
where the ancient population chiefly congregated.
The first exception to this rule appears in
1 In a passage inserted in the life of Pius I, Lib. Pontif. xi.,
vol. i. 132, and note 8.
* Ihid. xvn., vol. i. 141 and note 5.
• See an inscription assigned to this century by 6. B. de Rossi,
Insoript. Christ. Urbis Romae, i. 359 f.
* Gregorovius, i. 87, Duchesne, in Lib. Pontif. i. 517, note 45.
" Lib. Pontif. xxxry., vol. i. 172, 176, 178-182.

Spread of the Christian Population 11
a notice relating to the second quarter of the
fourth century, when the church of St Mark is
said to have been founded on the north-west of
the Capitol; but this church is not historicaUy
attested until 499 1. The Basihca of Liberius on
the Esquiline, afterwards known as the Greater
ehurch of St Mary, is said to have been erected
about 3522; ^j^g neighbouring church of St
Praxedis, and the church on the south-west slope
of the Palatine which acquired the name of
St Anastasia, are attributed to the latter years
of the fifth century; and in 527 a pagan edifice
actually adjacent to the Forum was converted
iiito the church of SS. Cosmas and Damian. But
it was not until after the Byzantine conquest
of the middle of the sixth century that derelict
pagan buildings became generally available for
Christian use^; and when the diaconiae were
established nearly half of them were in districts
where Christians had previously been strangers,
in the ivth, viiith, xth, and xith civil regions:
^ Lib. Pontif. xxxv., vol. i. 202 and note 5.
' Ihid. XXXVII. 8 (vol. i. 208). The dedication to St Mary
was made by Xystus III. Dr J. P. Richter and Miss A.
Cameron Taylor, in their work entitled The Golden Age of
Classic Christian Art (1904), propose to carry back the mosaics
in this church to a much earlier date than that of Liberius ; but
it may be doubted whether any of them are as old as his time.
3 See G. M<=N. Rushforth, The Church of St Maria Antiqua, in
Papers of the British School at Rome, i. (1902), 4ff. This church
which was discovered beneath that of S. Maria Liberatrice in 1900
is believed by the Rev. H. M. Bannister to go back 'to at least
the first half of the fifth century' (English Historical Review,
Sviii.i 1903, 338 ff.) ; but this argument rests upon a questionable
interpretation of the attribute antiqua. Cf . W. de Griineisen, Sainte
Marie Antique, pp. 449ff., 1911.

12 The Seven Deacons
not one was in the district beyond Tiber ^ The
centre of the city was now open to Christians.
We have seen that the Liber Pontificahs con
tains an unhistorical tradition that St Clement
divided the city into regions under seven notaries
who were to record the acts of martyrs. In the
notice of Fabian, who was Pope from 236 to 250,
we have a somewhat different account. Here it
is said that Fabian divided the regions among the
deacons, and appointed seven subdeacons to have
charge over the seven notaries, qui septem notariis
imminerent, in order that they might faithfully
collect the acts of martyrs 2. Monsignor Duchesne
sees here a distinction between rank in the church
and rank at the Papal court : in the one the sub
deacons by virtue of their orders had precedence,
in the other the notaries^. It should be noticed,
however, that while the passage as a whole is
transcribed from the Catalogus Liberianus*, a
work of the middle of the fourth century, the
sentence about the subdeacons is an insertion:
all the Catalogus says is that Pope Fabian divided
the regions among the deacons. Under Fabian's
successor Cornelius there is documentary Evidence
that seven deacons and seven subdeacons were
1 Duchesne, in Melanges d'ArcMologie et d'Histoire, vii.
(1887), 238 f.
' 'Hie regiones dividit [v.l. divisit] diaconibus et fecit vii
subdiaconos qui septem notariis imminerent ut gesta martyrum
fideliter coUigerent,' in the Felician Catalogue, Lib. Pontif. xxi.,
vol. i. 64, 148 and note 4 (pp. 238 and 27, ed. Mommsen).
3 Cf. Greg. Magn. Reg. viii. 16, ed. L. M. Hartmann, 1893;
cited below, p. 13, note 2.
* Lib. Pontif. i. 4.

The Notaries of the Roman Church 13
already in existence i, and there is no reason for
doubting that they were attached to the regions.
After the time of Constantine the notaries of
the holy Roman Church are sufficiently attested.
They formed a Schola or guild, just as the notaries
did at the imperial court. Our best evidence for
this comes from a letter of Gregory the Great, in
which the Schola of the seven Notarii of the regions
is mentioned as corresponding in number to the
subdeacons and the Defensores or guardians 2.
But members of the Schola are found much earlier
than Gregory's time. The chief officer was the
Primicerius notariorum^. According to some manu
scripts, Laurentius, to whom St Augustine dedi
cated his Enchiridion was Primicerius of the Roman
Church. Next to him was the Secundicerius, who
is found attending the Constantinopohtan Council
of 536*. It is not clear whether these two were
then reckoned with the regionary notaries or ranked
above and outside their number.
^ Comelii Epist. ix., in P. Constant's Epistolae Romanorum
Pontificum, i. (1721), 149 [JafE6, Reg. 106]. Seven deacons were
present at the Roman synod of 499 : A. Thiel, Epistolae
Romanorum Pontificum genuinae, i. 642 (1868).
* 'Quia igitur defensorum ofificium in causis eeclesiae et
obsequus hoscitur laborare pontificum, hac eos concessa pro-
speximus recompensationis praerogativa gaudere, constituentes ut,
sicut in schola notariorum et subdiaconorum per indultam longe
retro pontificum largitatem sunt regionarii constituti, ita quoque
in defensoribus septem, qui ostensa suae experientiae utihtate
placuerint, honore regionario decorentur': Reg. vui. 16.
' The same officer appears at Alexandria in 431, at Constanti
nople in 451, at Ravenna, and elsewhere: see the references in
Bresslau, i. 194, note 2.
* 'Mennas venerabUis lector apostolicae sedis antiquae Romae
et secundicerius notariorum ' : Mansi, Conciliorum nova et ampliss.
Collect, viii. (1762), 896.

14 The Work of the Notaries
The Papal notaries had a place in the Pope's
council analogous to that held by the Imperial
notaries in that of the Emperor. Their forms of
procedure resemble those of the officials of the
civil government, especially of the senate. When
necessary several of the notaries attended a synod ;
for instance, at the Lateran council of 649 the
Primicerius notariorum and four regionary notaries
were present^. They wrote the minutes of the
proceedings and had charge of the official pre
paration of the Acts: in a word, they formed a
secretary's office 2. Such an office necessarily
had records to keep, and the Papal archives can
be traced back to a very early date^. Damasus I
(366-384) built a 'new house' for them beside the
church of St Lawrence in Prasina, known later as
St Lawrence in Damaso*; from which fact it may
be gathered that the coUection was of old standing.
How long it continued at St Lawrence's is un
known; but it had evidently been removed to
the Lateran by 649 5. The archives and the
library were, and had long been, kept together,
and they were under the charge of the Primicerius
1 Mansi, x. 891, 903, 926, 930.
As late as the fifteenth century the Papal protonotaries, who
took the place of the regionary notaries, retained the right of
making the minutes at consistories and of preparing their decrees :
see Bresslau, i. 195.
* See ibid. pp. 149 ff.
¦' 'Archibis fateor volui nova condere tecta,
Addere praeterea dextra laevaque columnas.
Quae Damasi teneant proprium per saecula nomen ' :
De Rossi, Inscriptiones Christianae Urbis Romae, ii. 151.
^ There are a number of references to documents in the
Scrinium in the Acts of the Lateran council of this year : Mansi, x.
863 ff. (e.g. 911, 914, 923).

The Papal Archives 15
notariorum 1. Besides the archives of the Lateran
there was a special depository of documents in the
Confessio sancti Petri in the crypt of the great
Basilica across the Tiber ; but whether they were
permanently preserved there, or whether, as space
was wanted, they were transferred to the Lateran
or to the muniments of the chapter of St Peter's,
remains obscure 2.
The Primicerius notariorum was one of the
most influential members of the Papal court.
He together with the archpriest and the archdeacon
'kept the place of the holy apostoUc see' during
a vacancy^: as we should say, they were the
guardians of the spiritualities. The Primicerius
was also important as a counsellor of the Pope.
Just as in the paraUel case of the Imperial notaries,
his business training and experience quahfied
him for employment on diplomatic missions and
in weighty matters of administration. But his
primary duty was to take charge of the Papal
archives; it was he who saw to the drawing up
and despatching of the Pope's correspondence.
The actual writing of the Pope's letters was
performed by the notaries, who as members of the
Chancery (to anticipate the use of this word) are
caUed Scriniarii. It has been maintained that the
two offices of notary and Scriniarius were distinct ;
that the one wrote the documents and the other
kept the records. Now there is no doubt that
scrinium may denote the archives, and there are
1 Bresslau. i. 162.
^ IbH. p. 154.
5 Liber Diurnus, nn. 59, 61-63, ed. Sickel.

16 The College of Notaries
texts which mention Scriniarii as having charge
of the archives^. But at the same time it is
certain that the Primicerius notariorum was the
chief keeper of the archives, and there is no suffi
cient reason for doubting that the notaries under
him were employed in a double capacity. The
combined title, Notarius et Scriniarius appears in
the Liber Diurnus 2, and becomes quite usual from
the time of Hadrian I in the latter part of the
eighth century^. It is perhaps needless to insist
further on this identity of office, because in
Imperial inscriptions and in the Notitia Dignitatum
the Scriniarii are secretaries or clerks of account*.
In a law of Justinian the words Scrinium and
Schola are used, almost if not quite alternatively,
to denote aU sorts of offices under the Praefectus
praetorio Africae^. In this as in other ways the
Papal administration modeUed itself closely on the
system of the Empire.
Thus the Scrinium was the office of the notaries,
the Chancery; and it was this at least as early as
the time of Gregory the Great. The notaries
were Scriniarii, and might be caUed equaUy by
the double title and by either of the two separately.
* Liber Diurnus, n. 33.
2 n. 103, 104.
' A century later the word Scriniarii by itself is used to
designate the persons whose business it was to draw up documents
for the Pope. Thus Nicholas I, a. 865 writes: 'Hanc autem
epistolam ideo more solito scribi non fecimus, quia et legatus
vester sustinere non potuit et ob festa Paschaha scriniarios nostros,
eo quod debitis vacabant occupationibus, habere ut debuimus
non voMmus' : Monum. Germ., Epist. vi. 312 [Jaff6, Reg. 2788].
* Bresslau, i. 197, note 2.
^ I Cod. xxvii. I.

and its Officers 17
It may be added that Scriniarii, so designated,
are not pecuhar to Rome: they are found at
Terracina, Ravenna, Milan, Grado, and even out
side Italy at Mainz ^ At Rome the office was
a Schola or guild which supphed a professional
career. Young men entered it to obtain a
training. They received the tonsure or minor
orders; even the Primicerius and Secundicerius
were sometimes married men. The offices appear
to have gained an hereditary character and to
have been filled mainly by members of the
nobiUty of the city. The number of Scriniarii
appointed in early times is not known : to judge
from later times there may have been about a
dozen K
Below the Primicerius and the Secundicerius
ranked the Arcarius. He was the keeper of the
chest, in early times a person of subordinate rank,
but holding an office which graduaUy rose in
importance: he became the Pope's treasurer*.
He is first found mentioned in an inscription in
St Paul's without the Walls assigned to the sixth
century*. Towards the end of the seventh it is
noted as unusual that Pope Agatho left the office
for a time unfiUed, or, as his biographer puts it,
^ Bresslau, L 197, note 4.
^ At the Roman synod of 963 there appear certainly thirteen;
see Liudprand, Hist. Ottonis, rs. : but some of them may have
been town notaries not immediately attached to the Papal court.
* In the ninth century we find the post held by bishops ; but
in the tenth several Arcarii were married men.
* Pierluigi Galletta, Del Primicero della santa Sede apo-
stoUca e di altri Uffiziah maggiori del sacro Palagio Lateranense
(1776), pp. 108 f.; G. B. de Rossi, Roma sotteranea, iii. (1877),
621.
P. P. 0. 2

18 The College of Notaries
was himself made Arcarius, and did the work of
the Arcaria — the word appears in some manuscripts
as Arcariva — personaUy^. There is no evidence
to show that the Arcarius had anything to do with
the notariate. The SacceUarius was apparently
introduced on the reconquest of Italy by Justinian,
but he is not definitely found until the end of the
seventh century. He was the Pope's paymaster.
He was often a regionary notary; sometimes he
was also hbrarian : his connexion with the treasury
might be not unnaturaUy associated with the
charge of the hbrary. Indeed, the first time we
find a SacceUarius and a Bibliothecarius mentioned
by name in the Liber Pontificalis, the two offices
were held by the same person, the future Pope
Gregory II 2.
The Primus Defensorum or Primicerius Defen
sorum dates apparently from Gregory the Great,
when he established in 598 the seven Priores in the
Schola Defensorum as regionary officers. There
is no evidence that he was a notary; but since
the duties of a Defensor were not hmited to the
guardianship of the poor, of widows and orphans,
but extended over various fields of administration
and jurisdiction*, it is not improbable that he
commonly was one.
1 'Hie ultra consuetudinem arcarius eeclesiae Romajiae
efficitur et per semetipsum causa \v.l. causam] arcariva« [v.l.
arcariae] disposuit, emittens videlicet desuscepta per nomen-
colatorem manu sua obmnbratas': Lib. Pontif. lxxxi. 17, vol. i.
350. ^ 'Subdiaconus atque sacellarius factus, bibliothecae illi est
cura commissa' : ibid, xoi., vol. i. 396 (in the longer recension).
» See P. Hinsohius, Kirchenrecht, i. (1869) 377, and the
references to the Register of Gregory the Great there given.

The College of Notaries 19
The Nomenculator represents a weU-known ser
vant in the domestic estabhshments of ancient
Rome ; but he had risen from a servUe position to
a place of honour^. He is first mentioned at the
Papal court under Pope Agatho (678-681) 2; then
he appears in 710, when he accompanied Pope
Constantine with three other officers of the Chan
cery on his visit to Constantinople *. His functions
are not clearly defined, but we gather that he and
the SacceUarius received and dealt with petitioners
who approached the Pope on processions*. In
745 we find Gregory Notarius regionarius et numen-
culator performing the old office of introducing
envoys at a Roman sjmod^.
These six offices aU belonged to the clergy,
though they were usuaUy in minor orders. The
Protoscriniarius, who has been often considered to
belong to the coUege of notaries, does not appear
untU later: he was not a member of the coUege
and he might be a layman. But I defer giving
any account of him, because it is in several ways
convenient to break off the history of the early
organization of the Papal Chancery at the ponti
ficate of Hadrian I. One reason is that in his
^ The origin of the name was in time forgotten, and it became
Amminiculator or the like: Liudprand, Hist. Ottonis, ix., and
below, p. 51.
2 Above, p. 18, note 1.
3 Lib. Pontif. xc. 3, vol. i. 389.
* Another account says that he took charge of widows and
orphans, the prisoners and the oppressed; but this comes from
the Ottoman Notitia (concerning which see below. Appendix iv).
This special duty belonged to the Defensores.
^ Bonifatu Epist. l., ed. Jaff6 (or lix., ed. Diimmler), in three
places.
2—2 .

20 Changes under Hadrian I
tenth year he introduced more than one important
new feature into the form of his documents. It
was in the course of that year, at Easter, 15 AprU
781, that Charles the Great paid his first visit to
Rome^ and advanced by a further stage the
estabUshment of the Papal States which had been
begun by his father Pippin^. Very soon we find
that Hadrian adopted the Prankish practice of
using a double form of dating his documents:
the Scriptum gave the name of the notary who
wrote the text ; and the Data (afterwards Datum)
bore the name of the officer who completed and
authenticated it*. He also omitted the regnal
year of the Emperor at Constantinople and sub
stituted his own pontifical year*. Thirdly, he
adopted the rule, except in letters addressed to
sovereigns, of placing his name first in the title or
superscription of the document.
Another reason for making a division at this
point is the accident that no original document
is preserved until his time^. For the centuries
before Hadrian I we have to rely entirely upon
transcripts, and these transcripts faU to give us
1 Ann. Regni Franc, s.a. (p. 66, ed. F. Kurze, 1895).
* Cf. G. Richter, Annalen der Deutschen Geschichte, ii. (1885),
687 ; Codex CaroUnus, Epist. lxx.
^ Cf. Specimina, 9.
. * These two iimovations are first found in a document of
1 December 781 printed by Baluze, Miscell., ed. Mansi, ui. 3 6 1762
[Jaff6, Reg. 2435.]. Hadrian's earlier form of dating may be found
in a Bull of 20 February 772 transcribed in the Farfa Chartulary
(II Regesto di Farfa, ed. I. Giorgi and U. Balzani, ii., 1878, 83 ff.
[Jafl6, Reg. 2395]).
^ The supposed fragments of Bulls of John V and Sergius I
are Dijon forgeries of the eleventh century.' See Appendix m.

Forms of Papal Documents 21
an exact representation of the original. Most
commonly they were copied out and preserved on
account of their legal value, as they conferred
privileges or gave decisions on disputed matters.
The number of these is large, more than 2500, but
few of them belong to a date at aU near the original
time of writing. There are not, therefore, only the
elements of uncertainty or of corruption which
usually appear in copies; but the reasons which
caused the copies to be made rendered it natural
that the originals should not be transcribed in
their entirety. The formal beginnings and endings
of the documents — ^what are technicaUy known
as the protocols — are abbreviated or altogether
omitted; and in this process the date of issue is
most commonly left out. It is impossible, there
fore, to treat these transcripts with the same
critical rules which we can apply to originals ; but
the general features of the documents are un-
mistakeable. In the first place it is manifest that they
carried on the forms used by the Roman Emperors
and their officials ; in other words, they are drawn
up in the form of Letters. Of course, I am
speaking of the mass of Papal documents to which
we are accustomed to give the name of BuUs. A
far more limited series, consisting of Acts of
Councils and judicial Sentences to which the Pope
was a party, has a different structure and does not
enter into our present consideration. BuUs from
first to last are drawn up as Letters, in principle
on the same model as the letters of Cicero. In
examining the structure of these letters we have to

22 Text and Protocols
distinguish the material part, or Text, from the
formal Protocols which precede and foUow it.
The Text contains the information or the decision
which the writer desires to communicate, and it
necessarily aUows him freer play for individualities
of style and expression than do the Protocols,
although even in the Text there were rules of
rhjrthm and accustomed formulae which were
faithfuUy observed. The Protocols on the other
hand are strictly bound to a model which permits
little or no variation. The Pope announces his
title and names the person whom he addresses,
with or without a greeting. This is aU put in the
third person 1, whereas in the Text the writer
speaks in the first and speaks to the person whom
he addresses in the second 2. The first person is
used also in the Subscription.
The Pope might place his name before or after
that of the person he addressed. At first the usage
was unsettled, but from Leo the Great onwards
most of the Popes preferred to put their names
second, and this practice continued at least untU the
eighth century *. The Pope commonly designated
himself episcopus, sometimes episcopus catholicae
eeclesiae or episcopus Romanae eeclesiae, some
times papa; but this last name passed out of use
^ Occasionally, in the Address, the second person appears in
the possessive pronoun, e.g. tuis in place of suis; and in the
Greeting, the first person.
^ This might be either in the singular or plural ; by degrees
the singular became the rule. Conversely in a letter addressed
to the Pope he was invariably mentioned in the plural.
' Thus Pope Zachary, Monumenta Moguntina, n. lxvi. p. 184
(n. txxx., in Monum. Germ., Epist. iii. 356) [Jaff6, Reg. 2286].

The Initial and Final Protocols 23
in the Superscription of documents and was only
revived in a type of documents entirely distinct in
form, the Brief, towards the close of the middle ages.
From the end of the sixth century, the pontificate
of Gregory the Great, the word episcopus was often
foUowed by the words servus servorum Dei. This
is occasionaUy found at an earher date, but it did
not become the rule untU the ninth century. The
Greeting is by no means regularly expressed, or at
least not represented in the transcripts, during the
earher centuries. In the fourth century Liberius
and Damasus I used in Domino salutem^ or in
Domino aeternam salutem^. The formula becomes
more frequent from the pontificate of Adeodatus,
who was elected in 672 : he wrote, Salutem a Deo
et benedictionem nostrum. But the Greeting con
tinued far from being a constant feature, and it
seldom crystaUized into Salutem et apostolicam
benedictionem untU the tenth century, and was not
fixed until the eleventh*. In the more solemn form
of document the place of the Greeting was taken
by the emphatic words ' for ever,' in perpetuum.
When the material part — ^the Text — of the
letter is concluded we reach the final Protocol,
consisting of the Subscription and the Date. In
early times the Pope did not sign his name. He
wrote instead his FareweU: Deus te incolumem
custodial, or, in the accustomed form of the corre
spondence of the day, Bene vale, jrater carissime or
Opto te, frater carissime, semper bene valere^.
1 Constant, i. 673 [Jaff6, Reg. 239].
2 Ibid. 448 [Jaff6, Reg. 223]. ' See Appendix m.
* These two forms alternate in the letters of St Cyprian and

24 The Date and the Leaden Seal
From the end of the sixth century the Pope would
not style a bishop /rater carissime, but employed the
more distant phrase venerabilis frater. To princes
such a form as Incolumem excellentiam tuum (or
vestram) gratia superna custodial was appropriate,
and to Emperors this was sometimes expressed in a
more ample style. It should be noticed that the
Farewell often occurs in the plural when the body
of the letter is drawn up in the singular. The
commonest form, which we find as early as the
fourth century, was simply Bene valete. This
became constant in the seventh or eighth century,
and served in fact as the Pope's signature.
In earlier documents the Date has been omitted
in the process of transcription. The great bulk of
the documents of the first six centuries has been
transmitted in coUections of Decretals, and it
was the legal decision, and not ttie precise date,
which was of importance from the point of view
of the compilers. StUl dates are preserved in the
Decretals of Siricius (384-398), and there we find
them given by the names of the Constils and by
the day reckoned after the ancient Roman manner.
Later, the regnal year of the Emperor was added,
but not yet the year of the pontificate. The
practice of authenticating Papal letters with a
leaden seal or bulla can be traced from the middle
of the sixth century. The seal bore only the
Pope's name in the genitive, as leonis papae,
Comehus, Coustant, i. 125-144, 167-194. The latter is a trans
lation of the Greek forms found e.g. in letters of Juhus I to
the clergy of Antioch and of Alexandria, Coustant, i. 388, 404
[Jaff6, Reg. 186, 188].

Transmission of Papal Letters 25
with a smaU Greek cross, and perhaps a star or an
other cross or a 5^ monogram^. The transferred
appUcation of the name BuU to the document
itself was not estabhshed untU late in the middle
ages, and then it was chiefly employed to indicate
a particular type of letter with which we are not
at present concerned. The common use of the
word in Enghsh is free from objection, so long as
it is understood that it is a conventional use with
out early authority.
Before entering upon the subject of the manner
in which Papal documents were officiaUy recorded,
I may say something as to the transmission of
these older letters of which the originals no longer
exist. At an early time selections were made of
Papal letters which were deemed of special im
portance as defining points of law. Of these the
most famous is the smaU series of Decreta or
Decretales which were coUected by Dionysius
Exiguus in the first quarter of the sixth century,
and are printed in the first volume of the Bibho-
theca luris Canonici Veteris edited by Henry
Justel or Justeau in 1661. They begin with Pope
Siricius towards the end of the fourth century.
This coUection in an enlarged form became widely
known in the West during the eighth and ninth
centuries. It must of course be carefuUy dis
tinguished from the Pseudo-Isidorian work which
^ The apostles' heads came in later: that of St Peter was
introduced in the time of Victor II, and those of St Peter and
St Paul under Paschal II. By Innocent III the two heads were
interpreted as indicating the authority of Rome over all churches :
Reg. I. 235.

26 The Forged Decretals
was compUed and largely forged about 847. The
three books of the Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals
contain in book i. sixty letters of Roman bishops
from St Clement to the beginning of the fourth
century, aU of which are spurious. Book ii. con
tains other famous documents, such as the forged
Donation of Constantine together with genuine
Canons of CouncUs; and in book iii. there is a
series of a hundred and twenty Decretals and
other letters from Sylvester I to Gregory II (who
died in 731), and of these more than a quarter are
spurious^- Most of these were fabricated at one
time for a definite political object, but some of
them are traceable to an earUer date. In an
uncritical age the Pseudo-Isidorian coUection was
soon accepted without question, though there are
reasons for thinking that the Roman court was
not so easUy deceived as were the clergy of the
church in Gaul. StiU, before long it acquired an
undisputed position, and was used, together with
the genuine Decretals, as materials for selection
and codification in such a way as to constitute one
of the elements in the formation of the body of
Canon Law.
Many other Papal letters exist in a variety
of sources. Early in the eighteenth century
Dom Coustant spent his hfe in coUecting all he
could find ; but he issued no more than one f oUo
volume of Epistolae Romanorum Pontificum,
1 Decretales Pseudo-Isidoriani, ed. P. Hinschius, 1863;
compare the elaborate article on the subject by E. Seckel in
Herzog and Hauck's Realencyklopadie der protest. Theologie,
xvi. (1905), 265-307.

Modern Collections and Calendars 27
extending down to the death of Leo the Great in
461. A similar fate befeU his continuator, A. Thiel,
nearly a century and a half later, whose single
volume pubhshed in 1868 carries on the series
from 461 to 523. After this date the letters of
many Popes, so far as they are preserved, have been
edited in several forms, some of them in the
CoUections of Councils. But no attempt on a
large scale has been made to continue the series
for the succeeding period. There is indeed a
misceUaneous and Ul-arranged collection of Papal
letters which was pubhshed by Dr Julius von
Pflugk-Harttung under the title of Acta Ponti
ficum Romanorum Inedita in three volumes be
tween 1880 and 1888 ; but the documents are not
all in fact unpubhshed and they are not edited with
sufficient care. In spite of its defects, however, it
is the only single book easily accessible which
provides a large coUection of specimens extend
ing from early times to 1198, and as such I shall
constantly refer to it.
The lack of any complete coUection of Papal
letters after 523 has been to some extent made
good by the calendars produced by Philipp Jaffe
and August Potthast. The former scholar, with
whom at the moment we are alone concerned,
published in 1851 a chronological catalogue of the
whole series of extant documents, so far as he
could find them, down to 1198. In this Regesta
Pontiflcum Romanorum he dealt in a masterly
way with 11,171 Papal documents which he
described in flve years of arduous toU from some
1700 different volumes, and gave full references to

28 Calendars of Papal Letters
the books in which they are to be found. A
second edition prepared by Paul Ewald, Ferdinand
Kaltenbrunner, and Samuel Lowenfeld, under
the general supervision of Wilhelm Wattenbach
appeared between 1881 and 1888. In this the
number of documents was enormously increased
and the total raised to 17,679. But the work had
not long been completed before a proposal was
set on foot by Professor Paul Kehr of Gottingen
for the production of a new Regesta Roma
norum Pontiflcum, and the amassing of materials
has been going on for nearly twenty years past.
But the plan of the catalogue is different from
Jaffe's. Instead of arranging the documents under
each Pope in order of time, Dr Kehr classifies
them under the headings of the region and the
person or institution to which they were addressed.
Consequently, until the work is finished, its value
wiU be appreciated principaUy by students of
those regions and churches, rather than by students
of the history of the Papacy; and not until the
work is complete and fully indexed wiU it be
permissible to remove Jaffe from the front rank
of books of reference. At present five volumes
dealing with Italy ^ have appeared; and a sixth,
beginning a German series 2, has been edited in
association with Kehr by Professor Albert Brack-
mann of Marburg.
The existence of this multitude of scattered
1 Italia Pontificia: i. Roma (1906), ii. Latium (1907), iii.
Etruria (1908), iv. Umbria, Picenum, Marsia (1909), v. Aemilia
(1910). ^ Germania Pontificia: i. Salzburg and Trent (1911).

The Earliest Registers 29
letters leads us to the question in what form the
Popes caused their documents to be preserved, in
other words to be registered, at or about the time
of their production. The practice of keeping tran
scripts of documents on rolls of papyrus is known
to have prevailed among the officials of the Roman
Einpire. These Commentarii were the models on
which the Papal Registers were based ^ ; and in the
beginning it was the rule to enter in such books
not only the documents which issued from the
office of the person to whom the Register belonged
but also many of the documents which were
received at that office. But no Papal Register of
ancient date is known to be in existence. That
of Gregory the Great is but a selection from his
original Register, made several centuries later ;
and until recent years it was supposed that no
Registers were made in the Papal Chancery until
his time. The erroneousness of this opinion has
been proved by an analysis of several compila
tions of Papal and other letters, and each of
these in turn has carried back the system to an
earlier date.
First, the examination of an important collec
tion transcribed at the beginning of the twelfth
century and known as the CoUectio Britannica^
made it certain that Gelasius I (492-496) had
1 This was shown by Dr Bresslau, Die Commentarii der
Romischen Kaiser und die Registerbiicher der Papste, in the
Zeitsehrift der Savigny-Stiftung fiir Rechtsgeschichte, vi. (1885),
Roman. Abth. pp. 242-260 ; cf. R. von Heckel, Das papsthche
und SiciUsche Registerwesen, in Archiv fur Urkundenforschung,
i. (1908), 394r-424.
" Addit. MS 8873, in the British Museum.

30 Excerpts from the Registers
a Register^. Then it was shown from the coUection
published by QuesneP that a group of Decretals
was available for reference as early as 443*, and
their transcription could hardly have been made
from any but official Registers. Thirdly, a remark
able composite collection of documents derived
from four different Registers, those of Ravenna,
of the Roman Prefecture, of Carthage, and of
the Roman Curia, and distinguished as the CoUectio
AveUana*, furnishes evidence that Papal Registers
existed not only under Zosimus (417-418) but
even fifty years before him under Liberius (352-
366) ^. It may therefore be inferred that the adop
tion of the civil practice began almost coincidently
with the new political powers which the Church
acquired under Constantine.
Our knowledge of the fact that Registers
were kept depends upon the accident that docu
ments were transcribed from them for legal
purposes, to define rules and lay down the canonical
practice in doubtful matters. It would be im
possible within my limits, even were the subject
strictly relevant, to touch upon the considerable
^ See Paul Ewald, Die Papstbriefe der Brittischen Sammlung,
in Neues Archiv, v. (1880), 277-414, 505-596.
' App. ad Leonis Magni Opera, 1675; and in Migne, Ivi.
' See Duchesne, La premiere CoUection Romaine des D6cr6-
tales, in Atti del ii° Congresso de Archeologia Christiana, 1900
(Rome, 1902), pp. 159-162.
* The manuscript formerly at Fonte AveUana (Cod. Vatic.
Lat. 4961) is now regarded as inferior to the Vatican Cod. Lat.
3787. See O. Giinther, Epistulae Imperatorum Pontiflcum
aUorum (Corp. Script, eccles. Lat. xxxv.), 1896, proleg. pp. xviii-
xxiii. ' See Harold Steinacker's important paper Uber das alteste
papsthche Registerwesen, in Mittheilungen, xxiii. (1902), 1-49.

The System of Registration 31
critical apparatus which has been accumulated
in the past thirty years relative to the transmission
of Papal letters when the Registers are preserved
neither in the originals nor in copies ; stUl less
would it be appropriate to enter into the discussion
of a number of intricate questions about which
controversy has arisen. To us the coUections to
which I have referred are of immediate interest
only as furnishing evidence for the preservation
through many centuries of the actual Registers
of Papal documents which are now lost. Their
study for their own sake belongs not to the history
of the Chancery but to that of the sources of
Canon Law^. StiU it may be here noticed that
one deduction can be drawn with reasonable
confidence from these materials, namely, that the
documents were entered in the Register as they
stood, without abbreviation of the Protocols or
of other formal parts 2. The same fact has been
demonstrated from an examination of the Papal
letters quoted by the venerable Bede* from the
copies which Nothelm had made from the Registers
at Rome*. Hence from these transcripts we are
enabled partly to reconstruct the Registers from
1 See Friedrich Maassen, Geschichte der Quellen und der
Literatur des canonischen Rechts im Abendlande, 1870.
* Steinacker, ubi supra, pp. 14, 36 ff.
* Mommsen, Die Papstbriefe bei Beda, in Neues Archiv, xvii.
(1892), 387-396. Bede indeed expressly says that Nothelm
'Romam veniens nonnuUas ibi beati Gregorii papae simul et
ahorum pontiflcum epistulas, perscrutato eiusdem sanctae eecle
siae Romanae scrinio, permissu eius qui nunc ipsi eeclesiae praeest
Gregorii pontiflcis invenit, reversusque nobis nostrae historiae
inserendas . . . adtuht ' : Hist. eccl. Gent. Angl., praef., i. 6, ed.
C. Plummer, 1896.

32 The Registers of Gregory the Great
which they are taken. It may further be observed
that the custom of registering documents received
as weU as documents despatched broke down in
the course of the sixth century, and that thereafter
documents received, together with misceUaneous
minutes and memoranda, only appear by way
of exception. The Register of Gregory the Great cannot be
reconstructed in its entirety. We know that it
existed in the ninth century : there were fourteen
volumes on papjo-us, one for each year of Gregory's
pontificate, arranged by the Indictions. But what
we now possess is a series of some 850 letters pre
served in three independent coUections. These
cannot at aU represent the entire number ; indeed,
at least 77 other letters have been found outside
these coUections : and it is evident that an average
number of 66 letters a year must be only a smaU
proportion of the documents actuaUy despatched
by the Pope. It is almost certain that the tran
scripts preserved were taken directly from the
original Register. The entire text of the letters
was inserted in the Register, and when in the
transcripts the Protocols are abbreviated, this
change is attributable to the copyists i. It may
therefore be laid down that in Gregory's time the
documents were stiU transcribed into the Register
as they stood, without any omissions of substance,
and that the shorter form in which some of them
are now preserved is due to the desire of tran
scribers to retain all that was of material impor
tance while sparing their labour by the omission
1 Cf. Steinacker, uhi supra, pp. 8ff., 41 f.

and of his Successors 33
of detaUs which did not affect the value of the
document as a statement of law. It was sufficient
for them that the Pope had laid down a particular
rule or principle; it was indifferent at what date
he laid it down or to whom he directed his letter.
The documents were transcribed for legal, not
historical purposes.
For the time foUowing Gregory the Great
it is possible to trace the continued existence
of the Registers for nearly three hundred years,
but in aU cases but one the evidence is obtained
from coUections made for canonical purposes
in the Hildebrandine age. The book compiled
by Cardinal Deusdedit and the British Museum
collection contain documents expressly stated to
be taken from the Registers of Honorius I^ in
the seventh century, of Gregory II ^ and Gregory
III* in the eighth, and of Leo IV*, Nicholas I^,
John VIII«, and Stephen V (885-891) in the ninth.
Only of John VIII do we possess a distinct Register
comprising his last seven years, from 876 to 882,
and containing 314 letters. This is preserved
in a manuscript of the second half of the eleventh
century, written in the hand characteristic of Monte

• Die Kanonessammlung des Kardinals Deusdedit, I. 235, 236,
m. 138, 139, ed. V. Wolf von GlanveU, 1905.
=> Ihid. III. 140. 141.
3 Ibid. I. 237.
* Forty-flve letters in the British Museum JMS : see Ewaid,
ubi supra, pp. 376-396 ; Deusdedit, in. 63.
" Ewald, p. 587, n. 54 ; Deusdedit, i. 269.
« Fifty-flve letters, Ewald, pp. 295-320; Deusdedit, n. 90.
' Otherwise Stephen VI. Thirty-one letters, Ewjild, pp. 399-
414 ; Deusdedit, i. 244, rv. 183.
P. P. o. 3

34 The Register of John VIII
Cassino ^. It was formerly believed not to represent
the actual Register but to consist of a selection
of letters made from it in order to iUustrate and
define the Pope's political activity. This opinion
has been disturbed by the proof that the scribe
of the existing manuscript was a mere copyist
without the capacity of making a selection himself.
But it does not follow that the book from which
he transcribed was not itseU a selection from the
original Register 2. The circumstance that it only
includes one single Privilege*, — and that a docu
ment which reserved a particular lawsuit for the
Pope's hearing, and was therefore of canonical
importance, — seems to favour the conclusion that
the older hypothesis was essentiaUy correct*. An
average of about one letter a week can manifestly
not represent the Pope's complete correspondence.
On the other hand it must be admitted that we
know too little of the principles on which in the
ininth century Registers were drawn up, and what
sorts of documents were normaUy inserted in
them, to be able to lay down with confidence that
the coUection of letters of John VIII is not his
^ Cf. E. A. Loew, The Beneventan Script, 1914, p. 20. Appar
ently the second and third volumes of the Register were taken
to Monte Cassino, and the first left at Rome. Hence the compiler
of the Collectio Britannica was able to include only documents
from 872 to 876. See Erich Caspar, Studien zum Register
Johanns VIII, in Neues Archiv, xxxvi. (1911), 105 f.
^ Dr Caspar contests this view, p. 103, principally on the
ground that technical phrases used in Registers are reproduced
in the book.
' N. 100, in Caspar's edition, Monum. Germ., Epist. vu. 93
(1912). 4 Cf. Bresslau, i. 106 note 5, and 740.

The Register of John VIII 35
actual Register. StiU the examination of his
book, which has been conducted with great
thoroughness 1, has at least established that the
system of registration which prevailed in the ninth
century was less complete than had been observed
in earlier times : the title and greeting were sup
pressed, and the address abbreviated^. It is also
clear that the letters in the Register were tran
scribed not from the originals as prepared for dis
patch, but from their draughts*. The chronological
order of the documents was apt to be deranged
when the Pope was on his travels ; but even when
he was in Rome an amount of irregularity is found
which has led to the supposition that the dates
were inserted by the author or the transcriber
of the Register, or at least that when the draughts
were undated the registrar automaticaUy inserted
the words Data ut supra, which have caused much
perplexity to critics *-
These questions have deserved mention, though
their final solution is not perhaps yet decided,
because the existence of so large a fragment of a
ninth-century Register is a unique phenomenon,
^ See A. Lap6tre, L'Europe et le Saint-Si^ge k I'ifipoque
Carolingieime, i., Le Pape Jean VIII, 1895, pp. 1-29 ; and Caspar,
in Neues Archiv, xxxvi. 77-156.
2 Caspar, ubi supra, p. 107, and in Mittheilungen, xxxiii.
(1912), 389.
' The appearance however of words hke igitur in the opening
clause of a document does not, as Caspar thinks (Neues Archiv,
xxxvi. 124), necessarily involve the omission of an Arenga by the
registrar : exactly the same use of igitur and similar particles
may be foixnd in Anglo-Saxon charters ; e.g. Offa, 794, in Heming's
Chartulary, p. 64, and Coenwulf, 814, in Facsimiles of Ancient
Charters in the British Museum, ii. 14.
4 See Caspar, pp. 127 ff.
3—2

36 Possible Cessation of Registers
and because, but for the scanty extracts from
the Register of Stephen V, no further trace is
known of any Papal Register having been kept
until the time of Alexander 11^ in the latter part
of the eleventh century. It has even been sug
gested that in this interval of Papal obscurity
no Registers were ever kept 2, and it is certainly
a remarkable coincidence that at the same point,
in the middle of the Life of Stephen V, the Liber
Pontificahs ceases abruptly in the middle of a
sentence* ; but though this suggestion cannot be
excluded, it is more probable that the lack of evi
dence is due to the fact that the Registers contained
no documents which would be of service to the
compUers of the coUections which with the one
exception mentioned supply the only proof that
documents continued to be registered after the
time of Gregory the Great.
* See below, p. 123, note 3.
^ Lap6tre, p. 16.
' ii. 196, ed. Duchesne.

IL
The earhest papal document of which the
original is known to be preserved is a fragment
of a letter of Hadrian I of the year 788. For the
time before this nearly 2500^ exist in transcripts ;
but, apart from a large number of admitted
forgeries, they were so often abbreviated or modi
fied in their formal parts that we cannot deduce
from them with confidence the exact shape which
the documents assumed under different Popes.
The second original preserved is a PrivUege of
Paschal I of 819, but though the number of originals
gradually increases, the growth is slow until the
second quarter of the eleventh century, when
papyrus was superseded by parchment in the
Chancery of Benedict VIII (1020-1022)2. But
from the moment that our originals begin we are
enabled to analyse their forms and to trace the
changes which they underwent from time to time.
StiU it is to be remembered that out of about
1600 BuUs in existence belonging to the period
^ The second edition of Jaffa's Regesta enumerates 2461, but
that was published 33 years ago.
^ Bresslau, i. 73. Parchment came into use some time earUer,
but the supposed earhest original written on it, John XVIII's bull
for Paderborn (1005, Spec. 10), has been shown by Paul Ewald, in
Neues Archiv, ix. (1884), 332 f., and Dr Bresslau, in MittheUungen,
ix. (1888), 16-24, to be a facsimile copy.

38 Periods in the History of
from Hadrian I to Leo IX only some forty are
preserved in originals.
Apart from the fact that originals now begin
to be avaUable for our study, the pontificate of
Hadrian I is marked out as the proper date for
beginning the Second Period of the history of
the Chancery ; not his accession to the Papacy,
but his tenth year. In the course of that year,
as we have seen, at Easter 781, Charles the Great
was in Rome, and shortly afterwards Hadrian
abandoned the practice of dating his documents
by the regnal years of the Emperor in the East.
The mention of the Imperial year with the Con
sular year and the Indiction had been required
in documents by a rescript of Justinian of 537^,
and the practice was adopted by the Popes at
least as early as 550 2. It was never used by them
after the winter of 781. Hadrian also introduced
a new and conspicuous feature into the structure
of his documents drawn up in the more solemn
form. He separated the work of the writer from
that of the superior officer who 'dated' it, that
is, who certified the Pope's subscription. The
first was the business of the ordinary notary ;
the second task belonged to one of the six officers
of the Chancery, who was responsible for the
authenticity and the completion of the document.
This Data or Datum is derived from the practice
of the Roman Empire*, but its revival in the
> NoveU. XLVii. (Autheht. CoU. v. 2).
2 Mommsen, Das Romisch-Germanische Herrscherjahr, in
Neues Archiv, xvi. (1891), 63 ff.
3 Bresslau (ed. 1), i. 860.

the Papal Chancery 39
form of a separate addition to the document
appears to be due to Prankish influence ; and this
explanation^ is strongly conflrmed by the precise
time at which the change was made. Whatever
be the meaning of Datum in other Chanceries,
it may be laid down as established that with the
Popes it did not indicate the delivery of the
document to the recipient or to a messenger who
was to take it to the recipient : it marked the
final stage, the completion, of the document 2.
The distinction between the Scriptum and the
Datum continues until the pontificate of Calixtus
II ; but the Scriptum, for reasons which will be
explained hereafter, had for some time earher
been passing into desuetude.
The Third Period begins with the pontificate
of Leo IX, in 1049. This is marked by a striking
and pictorial device distinguishing PrivUeges from
Letters. A PrivUege, or Great BuU, must show
a circle on the left hand giving, among other
things, the Pope's name ; this is caUed the Rota :
and on the right it must bear the Pope's Farewell
contracted into a large decorative Monogram,
accompanied by an ornament caUed the Comma.
It is usual to make a Fourth Period beginning
with the accession of Innocent III in 1198 and
continuiag untU the termination of the Great
Schism by the election of Martin V in 1417, but
such a period is marked by no change of form,
but only by the establishment of complete
uniformity and precision in the Papal Chancery,
1 Bresslau (ed. 1), i. 869.
2 Ihid. pp. 847 ff.

40 Structure of the Papal Bull
and by the accident that with the accession of
Innocent III the regular series of Papal Registers
begins. If a break is needed it would be best
placed at the accession of Innocent II in 1130,
when the regulation of the simpler, less ornamental,
and more business-like forms of documents becomes
more closely defined^. The modern Periods, the
age of Briefs from Martin V to Sixtus IV, and
that of the Motu Proprio from Innocent VIII to
the present day, he beyond the range of this work.
I now come to examine the elements of which
a Papal BuU is composed. I have already ex
plained that the word Bull properly indicates the
leaden seal which was attached to the document.
The document itself was described as epistola,
litterae, pagina, scriptum, privilegium, auctoritas,
praeceptum, the last three terms being reserved
for special uses. We may caU them Rescripts,
but this name is never found in the documents.
Decretum and litterae decretales also are sometimes
employed ; and the word constitutum or constitutio,
which strictly does not mean a letter at aU, but
a document recording the Acts of a Synod presided
over by a Pope^, came to be applied to the Popes'
letters after the eighth century. The choice
among these various names was partly a matter
' See below, pp. 112-118.
2 Such a document began with an Invocation and the Date,
the names of the Pope who presided and of the members of the
synod present. Then followed the record of the Acts of the synod,
often including the text of documents read before it. At the
end came the Pope's suhscripsi and the Signatures of those present.
See, for instance, Monumenta Moguntina, pp. 136 ff.

Privileges and Letters 41
of fashion, but by degrees a Letter or Decree
came to be sharply distinguished from a PrivUege,
and it is now usual to employ these two terms.
Privilege and Letter, to indicate the two main
types into which Papal documents fall. For
technical purposes it may be best to observe this
practice, though the older names of Great and
Little BuUs are stUl admissible, at least in Enghsh.
It must however be remembered that a Privilege
could be conferred by a Little BuU, and that all
Privileges were not necessarUy of the nature of
title-deeds. The two types are clearly distinguished
by their formulae both in the First and Second
Periods, but it is not until the Third under Leo IX
— and even then not regularly — ^that PrivUeges
are marked out by a conspicuous difference of
external appearance.
In describing the structure of a Bull I shaU
retain the Latin names for the different parts,
because it is convenient to have a nomenclature
which is intelligible in aU countries ; but I add
the Enghsh equivalents for more famihar use.
A Bull, as I have mentioned, consists for
mally of a Text placed between two Protocols.
The opening Protocol states the Intitulatio, the
Pope's name and title, his name (without his
number^) foUowed almost invariably by the words
episcopus, servus servorum Dei. This may have
before it an Invocatio ; but it is seldom that this
is expressed in words. If it appears at aU, it takes
the shape of a Chrism {^) or a plain Cross. After
the title comes the Inscriptio or Address, giving
1 The number came in with the Brief in the flfteenth century.

42 The Salutatio, Arenga,
the name of the person or persons to whom the
document is sent, and the Salutatio or Greeting.
This greeting graduaUy assumes the form which
has persisted down to modern times, salutem et
apostolicam benedictionem ; but some varieties
may stiU be found, as perpetuam in Domino
salutem^ or the like. It was only used in Letters.
Privileges have no Greeting: their Protocol ends
with the solemn words In Perpetuum. Occasion
aUy, perhaps through imitation of the Prankish
emperors, the Pope gives his Title alone without
Address or Greeting, and introduces the name of
the person on whose behalf the document is drawn
up, later on in the Narratio^. There were occasions
too when the Pope expressly refrained from giving
his blessing because the person whom he addressed
was unworthy of it*.
The Text may include four elements :
First, the Arenga, Proem, or Preamble, enun
ciates the obligation of the Pope's duty or authority.
A large coUection of such aphorisms existed, out of
which a choice could be made of the formula ap
propriate to a particular case. Famihar examples
are those beginning Pie postulatio voluntatis
effectu debet prosequente compleri, &c. ; Quotiens
illud a nobis petitur quod religioni et honestati
1 Clement II for Bamberg, 1047 : Acta, u. 68 n. 103 [Jaff 6,
Reg. 4149].
^ Thus John XIX for Grado, 1024: Acta, u. 66 n. 101 [Jaff6,
Reg. 4070].
^ Alexander III to Count Miroslav, 1181, where the greeting
is erased and the text begins, ' Quod tibi benedictionis alloquium
non inpendimus, non de duritia nostra sed de tuis credas potius
meritis provenire, qui ea te penitus reddidisti indignum ' : Acta, ii.
377 n. 431 [Jaff6, Reg. 14408].

Narratio, and Dispositio 43
convenire dinoscitur. . .; Apostolice sedis auctoritate
debitoque compellimur. The Arenga had a sonorous
ring in it which made the document start impres
sively. As increased care was given to the obser
vance of rhythm, the balance of the phrases was
skilfully modified and adjusted ; and even after
the best days of the Chancery were past and the
style of its productions had degenerated Boniface
VIII could stUl open a BuU with tremendous
force : TJnam sanctam ecclesiam caihoUcam et
ipsam apostolicam urgente fide credere cogimur et
tenere'^. I take the next two elements in the document
together. The Arenga is foUowed by the Nar
ratio or Statement of the Case and the Dispositio
or Enacting Clause. The Pope seldom makes
a Promulgatio or Notification ('Be it known to
you,' 'I would have you to know') as the Frankish
sovereign did 2. He proceeds straight to the
Statement, and then to the Enacting Clause,
his order or judgement thereon. But these
two elements in the document were Yevy often
combined, the Enacting Clause including within
it, in a relative or dependent clause, an indication
of the particulars necessary for the understanding
of the facts. Thus Alexander II writes to the
Abbot of St Benedict at Taranto : ' Moved by
^ The secret of the effect here is the heavy tread of the dis
syllables at the opening. See below, pp. 80 f.
2' As an exception I note Leo IX's Bull to the abbot of St Pierre
auMont (dio. Chalons), 1049, 'Idcirco novorit omnium prgsentium
et futurorum regum et episcoporum seu omnium apostolicg sedis
fidelium imanimitas.' Acta, i. 12 n. 15 [Jaffe, Reg. 4184]. This
was written at Rheims.

44 The Narratio and Dispositio
thy devout prayers, in which thou hast besought
us to take under our apostolic protection the
monastery which a certain Leucius buUt on his
own land, we receive the said monastery under
the guardianship of apostolic defence and confirm
to it aU its possessions^.' In such cases the Enact
ing Clause was generaUy Unked on to the Arenga
by a conjunction or an adverb, 'Therefore,' 'And
so,' 'Verily' [Ideo, Eapropter, Quocirca, Itaque,
Nos igitur, Inde est. Sane). The Statement, when
it appears as a separate sentence, describes with
greater or less detail the situation with which the
Pope has to deal. It may be that the rights of
a monastery have been impugned : the house
desires that they should receive protection. Or
irregularities may have been reported which caU
for the Pope's intervention. Whatever the matter
in question, it is stated at length. If abuses had
to be spoken of, rhetoric demanded that they
should be pictured in vigorous phrases, but we
must not always accept these phrases as more
than hterary embeUishments.
When the Statement is ended, the Pope makes
his decision. The Dispositio, or Enacting Clause,
according to the nature of the case, may take the
form of a grant or confirmation of rights, of the
grant of hcence or dispensation, or of an appoint
ment of delegates to enquire into disputed claims
or aUeged abuses. These three classes are those
of Privilegia, of Litterae de Gratia (or Tituh), and
of Litterae de Justitia (or Mandamenta), as they
came in course of time to be distinguished.
1 1071: Acta, h. 114 n. 149 [Jaff6, Reg. 4686].

The Sanctio 45
Fourthly, it was necessary that a grant of
privileges should be safeguarded and the enforce
ment of an order or judgement secured. This
was done in the Final Clauses comprehended under
the name of Sanctio. These may be three in
number, aU of which are found in a BuU of Gregory
the Great for St Mary's at Autun^. First, the
Sanctio proper, the Prohibitive Clause, which
forbids any one to obstruct or contravene the
execution of the Pope's will. It first appears as
a participial clause, grammaticaUy dependent on
what goes before, but commonly beginning with
a capital letter as though it were a new sentence :
Statuentes^, 'Enjoining under pain of excommunica
tion that no man shaU presume to do injury' to
the monastery taken under the Pope's protection
' or to alienate its goods or possessions.' GraduaUy
the form develops into a separate sentence, known
from its opening words as the NuUi ergo. It
runs after this fashion : Nulli ergo omnino hominum
liceat prefatam ecclesiam temere perturbare, or
according to another form : Decernimus ergo ut
nulli omnino hominum, &c. Both these forms
make their appearance in the second half of the
eleventh century. The details of phraseology
vary, and they were intentionaUy modified in
order to improve the rhythm, but the sense remains
the same.
1 November 602, Reg. xin. 12.
" The development of the formula may be traced in Bulls of
Paul I for Monte Soratte, 761-2, in Cod. Carol, xxin. (Monum.
Germ., Epistt. in. 626 f., 1892) [Jaff6, Reg. 2349], and of Sylvester
TI for St Saviour's on Monte Amiata, 1002, printed from a facsimile
copy on papyrus in Spec. ii. 66 n. 92 [Jaff6, Reg. 3925].

46 The Sanctio
The second clause is caUed the Penal Clause,
or the Curse, or from its opening words the Si
Quis : ' If anyone presume to attempt such a thing
let him know that he wiU incur the wrath of
Almighty God and of his blessed apostles Peter
and Paul,' Si quis autem hoc attemptare presumpserit,
indignationem omnipotentis Dei et beatorum Petri
et Pauli apostolorum eius se noverit incursurum^.
This form is sometimes elaborated, but seldom
with the minute specification of penalties which
we find in judicial sentences. An older type
includes not only the threat of penalties to those
who disturb the grant but also the assertion that
the grant shaU remain nevertheless firm and esta
blished : this is derived from an ancient Roman
usage which persisted in private charters. Qui-
cunque autem hanc nostre concessionis praeceptionem
violare praesumpserit, perpetuo anathematis vinculo
religetur, et haec nostra concessio stabilis et firma
permaneat^. The third clause, which is less frequent, is the
Benedictio, which promises a blessing to those
who carry out the provisions of the charter :
' May the keeper of this privilege and the restorer
and helper of the monastery aforesaid deserve to
be enriched by reward blessed for ever and ever*.'
^ Alexander III for Beaune (dio. Autun) : Acta, i. 259 n. 283
[Jaff6, Reg. 12627].
2 Benedict VIII for Salerno, 1021: Acta, u. 65 n. 99, from
a copy [Jaff6, Reg. 4032]. Compare the form in Anglo-Saxon
charters, e.g., OethUred a.d. 692-3 (Facsimiles of Ancient Charters
in the British Museum, i. n. 2, 1873) ; and Regesto di Farfa, i. 25
A.D. 718.
' Leo IX for St Stephen's in Chieti, 1053: Acta, ii. 79 f.,
n. 113 [Jaff6, Reg. 4298 a]. Gregory I, Reg. xiii. 12, has 'Cunctis

The Amen, Subscriptio, and Scriptum 47
The Text sometimes ends with the Apprecatio
or Amen. It does not take the form of Feliciter
which we find in Frankish documents. It is a
simple Amen, sometimes repeated thrice, seldom
twice. In the Triple Amen a difference of writing
comes to be observed between the three words,
each being written in a different type of character.
The initial A is by turn a rustic capital, an uncial,
and a curial cursive.
When the Text is thus completed, it needs the
addition of the Pope's Subscription. This begins
the final Protocol. So long as papyrus was
used for the production of documents, this took
the form of the words Bene valete written in fuU.
It might be written either between the Scriptum
and the Datum, or after them, or alongside of the
Datum. From the beginning of the eleventh
century it ceased as a rule to be autograph, though
some apparently autograph specimens occur ^.
When it was not autograph, it was foUowed by
three points ( . . ,) or by an abbreviated subscription
(^) in the Pope's handwriting 2. It was super
seded under Leo IX by the Monogram*.
The second element of the final Protocol is
the Scriptum, the record by the writer that the
document is his work. It names the month but
not the day or year on which the document was
written ; the day was reserved for the last stage,
autem eidem loco iusta servantibus sit pax Domini nostri lesu
Christi, quatenus et hie fructum bonae actionis recipiant et apud
districtum ludicem praemia aeternae pacis inveniant.'
1 Gregory VI, Spec. 13 (2).
2 Benedict VHI, Spec. 10 (2).
* See above, p. 39.

48 The Datum
the Datum. It names also the Indiction and the
notary who drew up the document. I shall speak
of the notaries later on in connexion with the
changes in the Papal Chancery.
The last place in the document is occupied
by the Datum. This names the day of the month
in the Roman style, with the regnal year of the
Emperor after 800, the Pontifical year, and occa
sionaUy from John XIII (968-970) the year of
grace. It states that the document was ' given by
the hand of one of the higher officers of the
Chancery, to whom I shaU return later.
I may add two or three notes on points of chro
nology. First, when in December 781 Hadrian I
gave up the mention of the regnal year of the
Emperor in the East, he inserted before the ponti
fical year which he substituted for it a formula of
great antiquity ^ which had not a chronological
but a rehgious purport : it ran ' In the reign of
our Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ,' Regnante
Domino Deo et Salvatore nostra lesu Christo cum
Deo Patre et Spiritu Sancto per infinita (or immor'
talia) saecula'^. A simUar but briefer form was
used by John VIII for a short time after the death
of the Emperor Lewis II in 875 and again for
a short time before the coronation of Charles III.

' It is found in a shorter form in the seventh century collection
of Marculf, xvni. (Monum. Germ., Formulae, 1886, p. 86), and in
Anglo-Saxon and Italian charters of the eighth (Facsimiles of
Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts, i. 1, 1868, from Canterbury; Regesto
di Farfa, u. 122, &c.).
2 Baluze, Miscell., ed. Mansi, in. 3 [Jaff6, Reg. 2435] ; Mittarelli,
Annales Camaldulenses, i. (1765), app. iii. p. 12, from an eleventh-
century transcript [Jaff6, Reg. 2437].

Chronological Notes 49
Then f oUows a period of irregularity, until at the
coronation of Otto the Great in 962 the Imperial
year was restored. But it did not persist long.
Under Conrad II it only once appears in a PrivUege,
and that when the Emperor was in Italy; under
Henry III it is found but twice. Leo IX finaUy
abolished it, and after his time no Imperial year
is recorded in the Datum with two exceptions :
one, a document of the Antipope Clement III in
1086^; the other, two documents of Paschal II
after his humihation by Henry V^.
Secondly, the Indiction, which marks the posi
tion of the year in a cycle of fifteen years*, has been
reckoned at different times from the 1st of Septem
ber, the 24th of September, and from Christmas.
The Popes untU the death of Victor III in 1087
admitted only the first of these : for all this period
therefore the Indictional year begins four months
in advance of what we should caU the calendar
year, only with the Popes this calendar year began
not on the 1st of January* but a week earlier, on
1 MittarelU, iii. 39 f. [Jaff6, Reg. 6322].
^ 'Romae in insula Lycaonia,' 16 April 1111, two days after
the Imperial coronation: Monum. Bamberg, ed. Jaff6, 1869,
pp. 277 ff., and Migne, clxiii. 286 f. [Jaff6, Reg. 6291, 6292];
Bresslau (ed. 1), i. 837 f.
' The flrst Indiction is generally supposed to begin in A.D. 312
(i.e. 1 September 311); but Otto Seeck has a good argument
in favour of a.d. 297, Die Entstehung des Indictionencyclus, in
the Deutsche Zeitsehrift fiir Geschichtswissenschaft, xii. (1896),
279-296. The question is unimportant from a chronological
point of view, for the number of the Indiction was never stated,
but only the number of a given year within an unnamed cycle.
* This date was expressly rejected on account of the pagan
usages with which it was associated. See St Boniface's letter
to Pope Zachary, Monum. Mogunt. p. 116, and the Pope's answer
(April 743), pp. 120 f.
P. P. C. 4

50 Chronological Notes
Christmas Day. But this mode of beginning the
year cannot in fact be said to have prevaUed except
when the computation of years of the Christian era,
a nativitate Domini, was adopted ; and this was a
reckoning which was introduced from England into
the Frankish realm in the eighth century and passed
to Rome, under Imperial influence, in the tenth^. It
is first found in the pontificate of John XIII in 968,
but it was only intermittently used before the time of
Leo IX. In Papal documents preserved in originals
errors in dating are not often found, but in tran
scripts we must be prepared for a confusion between
the abbreviated forms, for instance, of January and
June, or between the numerals u and ii'^.
The last stage in the production of the docu
ment was the attachment of the leaden seal or
bulla by means of tags of parchment or more
commonly of hempen or silk strings*.
The description which I have given of the con
tents of a Papal document applies in strictness
only to the more solemn form of the Privilege
and of that down to the middle of the eleventh
century; the number of simple Letters preserved
in originals during this period is too smaU and the
type is too httle developed to enable us to lay
down precise rules about their external structure.
1 The Popes then seldom inserted the annus Domini except in
documents addressed to churches in Germany.
^ See Bresslau (ed. 1), i. 841, with whom I agree that apparent
mistakes in date must not be hastily corrected : they are generaUy
susceptible of explanation.
3 The story in the Nouveau Trait6 de Diplomatique, iv. 298,
V. 163 f., that Hadrian I was the first to order that Bulls
should be sealed with lead, is traceable to Polydore VergU, De
Rerum Inventoribus, vin. (pp. 664 f., ed. 1561). The authors
of the Nouveau Trait6 have themselves abundantly refuted it.

IIL
A remarkable document which in its existing
form has been incorporated into several later
compUations but which may be confidently assigned
to the time of Otto III, describes the organization
of the Roman notaries^. It enumerates seven
Indices Ordinarii or Palatini, as a clerical staff.
They had their functions in the appointment of
the Emperor and in the election, together with
the Roman clergy, of the Pope. These seven
Indices were the Primicerius and Secundicerius
Notariorum, the Arcarius, the SacceUarius, the
Protus, the Primus Defensor, and the Ammi
niculator, the last name being a corruption of
Nomenculator. AU but one of these have already
been described^. The exception is the Protus or
Protoscriniarius, sometimes caUed the Primi-
scriniarius. We find no mention of him before
861*. It is clear that he was not a member of
the CoUege of Notaries and Scriniarii, — stUl less,
as GaUetti* and Hinschius^ supposed, was he its
1 See Appendix iv.
a Above, pp. 13-19.
' Galletti, II Primicero, p. 134, says 827; but he relies
on a Bull ascribed to Gregory IV, 20 June a. 1 (Jaff6, 2672),
"which was exposed by Muratori, Antiq. Italicae, iii. 40 ff., 1740.
* II Primicero, p. 133.
= Kirchenrecht, i. 382.
4—2

62 The Tdbelliones and
chief. He might be and in more than one instance
is known to have been a layman. He belonged in
fact to a quite different department from that of
the Papal Notaries. He was the head of the
TabeUiones or pubhc scriveners, whose duties were
regulated by the civil law^, and who were placed
by it under the Magister Census.
In origin these TabeUiones had nothing to do
with the Church. But with the extension of the
Pope's local activity they became attached to his
staff and they are found signing their names as
Notarii et TabeUiones Urbis Romae. They formed
in fact a town guUd, which graduaUy passed into
the service of the great government office estab
hshed in the Pope's household. But they were not,
except in quite unusual circumstances, employed
for writing the Pope's documents: their business
was confined to drawing up deeds for private per
sons. In the tenth century they seemed to wish to
abandon the title of TabeUiones. . They now caUed
themselves Scriniarii sanctae Romanae Eeclesiae^.
But this description was known to be incorrect:
a gloss to the Decretals caUs it vulgare Roma
norum^. It involved a confusion with the Notarii
et Scriniarii Regionarii who ordinarily were alone
competent to write documents for the Pope. StUl
the use of the word prevailed, and the Magister
Census was caUed the Protoscriniarius*. But though
he acquired this title, he was in no sense the head
^ Novell. XLiv.
^ Regesto Sublacense, pp. 162, 193.
^ Gloss to cap. Ad audientiam, lib. ii. Decretal, de Praescript.,
ap. F. Oesterley, Das deutsche Notariat, i. 88 f., 1842.
* Regesto Sublacense, pp. 166f.

the Protoscriniarius 63
of the Scriniarii et Notarii Regionarii, the proper
officers of the Papal Scrinium; and hence it
was possible for him to be a layman. In course
of time, however, the office became a clerical one,
and its holder ranked as one of the Indices Palatini.
In reviewing the history of the organization
of the Papal Court, we notice that while originaUy
two or three of the principal officers were not,
or were not of necessity, notaries, the whole
body was known as the CoUege of Notaries,
and the office as the Scrinium. The lowest in
rank was the Protoscriniarius, who had risen
above his older function as the head of the civic
scriveners and had become attached to the
Scrinium, but was stiU sharply distinguished
from the superior officers in that he had charge
only of the writing of documents : he was excluded
from the more responsible duty of dating, that
is of authenticating and completing documents
for pubhcation or dispatch. These two stages
in the production of solemn Bulls were established
during the pontificate of Hadrian I^. In the
final Protocol there is now a settled usage of
separating the statement as to who wrote the
document and who dated it, and this distinction
between Scriptum and Data continued until the
twelfth century, when the Scriptum died out
under Cahxtus II. The distinction between these
elements comes to possess a special palaeographical
interest; it also enables us to foUow out the
part which the different Indices Palatini took
in the preparation of documents.
1 Seeabove, pp. 20, 38f.

54 The Writers of the Chancery
The person who wrote the document is, as
a rule, described as Notarius regionarius et
Scriniarius sanctae Romanae Eeclesiae^. When
this is not the case, the exception is due to
peculiar circumstances. An interesting example
is furnished during the pontificate of Leo VIII,
who was set up by Otto the Great in 963 on the
deposition of John XII. Leo was soon driven
out ; then John died in May 964, and the Roman
party proceeded to elect Benedict V as his suc
cessor. The Emperor thereupon went with his
army against Rome, with Pope Leo in his train,
and took the city after a siege. Leo was restored
on 23 June; and almost immediately he issued
a document confirming a monastery in the north
of Italy in its possessions 2. But although he
had recovered possession of the Lateran Palace,
he had as yet no secretarial staff. Quite possibly
the Notaries attached themselves to his rival. So
he was obhged to employ one of the civic scriveners,
a Tabelho, to draw up the document. In hke
manner, in 980 Benedict VII had to flee from
Rome to Ravenna, and necessarily employed a
local TabeUio*. Such exceptions have an historical
interest; but they do not affect the rule that
documents must be written by the Notaries.
GeneraUy, even in the greatest difficulties, the
Popes tried to have their documents drawn up
^ Thus Nicholas I, 863, Spec. 3. But regionarius may
be omitted, as in Benedict III, 865, Spec. 2.
* Printed from a transcript in Acta, u. 43, n. 82. The
date is given 'tertio decimo mensis lunii,' ten days before
Leo's restoration. Possibly lunii stands for lulii.
' UghelU, ItaUa sacra, ii. 599, ed. 1717; Bresslau, i. 226.

The Dataries 55
by their regular accustomed clerks. The writing
was done by simple Scriniarii et Notarii, very
seldom by any of the higher officers of the CoUege.
In early times, indeed, under Gregory the Great,
there is evidence of the Secundicerius so acting;
but so soon as the Protoscriniarius came to take
charge of the writing, no officer of superior rank
is normaUy found to intromit himself in this
work. The function of the higher officers was to date
the document, that is to say, to ratify it and
guarantee that it had the Pope's authority.
They were, to use a later term, the Dataries.
The proper officer for this purpose was the
Primicerius notariorum ; but he was too important
a man to be able to act personaUy in aU cases.
He was often absent on diplomatic missions or
otherwise engaged. Therefore his place was fre
quently taken by the Secundicerius^ or by one
of the four officers next in rank; but hardly
ever by the Protoscriniarius.
The innovation made by Hadrian I had the
object of providing greater accuracy and security
in the texts of documents by requiring that they
should pass through two sets of hands. But
the disadvantage stiU remained that the whole
work of the Chancery was carried out by the
CoUege of Notaries, a body of men who, though
technicaUy the officers of the Pope, came in fact
to represent the aims and pohcy of the Roman
nobihty, to which most of them belonged. The
1 ' Secundicerii sanctae sedis Apostolicae,' Benedict III,
856, Spec. 2.

66 Supersession of the Notaries
Pope needed a personal subordinate, a secretary.
This was found in the Librarian. Now the
Papal Library had for many ages not been
separated from the Archives. Both were in the
charge of the Primicerius, the SacceUarius, or
some other of the Indices Palatini. But under
Hadrian I a special Librarian makes his ap
pearance; and from the first quarter of the
ninth century, under Paschal I, he comes to act
in dating documents^. His employment in the
Chancery was found convenient when the Pope,
as so often was the case, had trouble with the
powerful Romans, and documents came to be
more and more frequently dated not by a notary
but by the Librarian 2. The Librarian was the
Pope's nominee, a man who ranked high in his
confidence and stood outside the Roman profes
sional circle. He was almost always a bishop,
and after a time was regularly chosen from among
the suburbicarian bishops. Once for a short
while, in 877-878, two bishops, who are styled
Missi et Apocrisiarii, act in his place; they are
foUowed by the Bishop of Porto from 878-879.
But as a rule it was the Librarian himself who
had charge of the Chancery.
Thus the old Indices Palatini found them
selves excluded from its business. After the
1 Until lately it has been believed that an officer styled
Bibliothecarius et cancellarius eeclesiae Romanae dated two
documents of Leo III in 799. The documents are admittedly
spurious, but they were conceived to be modelled upon a genuine
original. I follow Dr Bresslau, i. 212, note 1, in rejecting
their evidence altogether.
" Thus John XIII, 967, Spec. 8.

by the Librarian 67
coronation of Otto the Great in 962 only seven
documents are known to have been dated by
the Primicerius or the Nomenculator; no other
of the officers is found. After 983 they disappear
altogether, and only the Protoscriniarius is men
tioned in the foUowing century. They had indeed
stiU their appointed functions at the coronation
of the Emperor and retained certain powers as
magistrates; but the Pope's secretariate had
passed entirely into other hands. The title of
the Primicerius was preserved longest, but the
last holder of it in 1299 was not styled Primicerius
Notariorum but Primicerius ludicum. The other
six are found mentioned for the last time at dates
ranging between 1185 and 1217 1.
The reign of the Librarian continues sub-
stantiaUy unbroken, with one brief interval; but
the organization over which he presided entered
in the first half of the eleventh century into a state
of confusion, almost of revolution. The Popes
were striving to hold their own amid contending
forces, and elements of disturbance entered the
Chancery from opposite sides. These were the
Roman tradition, pressure from the nobles of
Tusculum, the influence of the Imperial system.
For 36 years, from 1012 to 1048, the Papacy was
in the hands of members of the Tusculan famUy
whose relations to the Empire were more friendly
than they were to the citizens of Rome. AU
these factors threatened to break up the working
^ See L. Halphen's lists, ifitudes sur 1' Administration de Rome
au Moyen Age (1907), pp. 89-146.

68 The Eleventh Century
of the Chancery. The forms in which documents
were vahdated become altered, and it is long
before an estabhshed type is attained. The
Cardinals begin to take part in their drawing up,
and the diction is a mixture of old and new.
The large number of documents of this period
preserved in the original enables us to trace
the details of their workmanship in a way that
it is not possible to do for earher times, and
these particulars have been explored with a
minuteness which I cannot here foUow. It must
suffice to say that recent investigations have
thrown a new and welcome hght upon one of
the most intricate episodes in the history of the
Papacy ^.
At first the notaries, who stiU style them
selves Notarii Regionaru et Scriniarii sanctae
Romanae Eeclesiae, write in the time-honoured
Curial hand 2. This was a corrupt development
of the Ancient Cursive, having affinities with the
Beneventan script; but it had acquired in the
schools of the Roman notaries a special artificial
character. It persists in the Chancery down to
the beginning of the twelfth century; but it is
graduaUy beaten out of the field by the beautiful
Minuscule which was imported from the Imperial
system, and which acquired in the Papal Chancery
a dehcacy and refinement unmatched elsewhere.
It is the fight between the Roman Curial and
1 See particularly Paul Kehr, Scrinium und Palatium, in
the 6th Erganzungsband of the Mittheilungen (1901), pp. 70-112,
in the light of whose results I have rewritten my account of
this matter.
2 Thus Sylvester II, 999, Spec. 9.

The Title of Chancellor 69
the Carohne Minuscule which furnishes the clue
to the unraveUing of the history of the Chancery
in the eleventh century. The documents, I may
add, continued to be written on papyrus beyond
the middle of the century i, though none is known
to be preserved later than 1020-1022 in the pon
tificate of Benedict VIII; but parchment had
come into use before his time 2.
I have said that on one occasion the Librarian
was displaced by another officer. This was during
the pontificate of John XVIII. Between Decem
ber 1005 and May 1007 there are found seven
documents of this Pope dated by the hand of
Peter Abbas et CanceUarius Sacri Lateranensis
Palatii, and three of them were not only dated
but written by his hand*. That the same person
should both write and date is a manifest anomaly,
since the chief object of dating was to secure a
double control. More striking is the substitution
of the sacred Lateran Palace for the Holy Roman
Church, which connects itself naturaUy with the
introduction of the Frankish title of ChanceUor*.
It is the first authentic instance of the employment
of the name by the Pope^; and it looks as though
1 There is mention of a papyrus BuU of Victor II, in 1067 :
Marini, I Papiri diplom. pp. 86 ff., n. 50, and p. 241.
^ See Bresslau's paper on Papyrus und Pergament in der
papstlichen Kanzlei, in the Mittheilungen, ix. (1888), 1-30.
^ Spec. 10, datum et scriptum per manum Petri abhatis et
cancellarii sacri palatii (here without Lateranensis), 1005.
* It is clear that Peter was not a deputy acting in the
absence of the Librarian; for previously the Librarian had
often been away, but his place was taken by a suburbicarian
Bishop acting in his stead.
* See above, p. 56, note 1.

60 The Librarianship and Cologne
John XVIII not only appointed a new secretary
with an Imperial title, but also estabhshed a staff
of clerks of his own, his personal dependents,
as distinguished from the official, almost here
ditary, staff of the Scrinium. But it would be
imwise to draw any such large inferences; for
the appointment may have been dictated by
John Crescentius, the Pope's master: indeed,
our knowledge of the years in question is so
defective that we cannot say whether or not
the Pope may not have been absent from Rome,
and being thus deprived of his regular staff may
have been obhged to make use of the services
of some one in attendance on him. However
this may be, John XVIII's practice was not
continued. A step of a different nature, but one which
equaUy involved the removal of a suburbicarian
Bishop from the Librarianship, was taken in
1023 when Peregrine, or Pilgrim, Archbishop of
Cologne, was in Italy and Benedict VIII appointed
him Librarian. It has even been supposed that
the intention was to confer upon the occupant
of the See of Cologne the permanent dignity of
ChanceUor, just as the Archbishop of Mainz held
the analogous post of Royal Arch-Chaplain in
Germany. But it is difficult to make this out.
It looks rather as though the Pope merely desired
to give Peregrine a conspicuous mark of honour.
There is no evidence that the Archbishop ever
performed the duties of Librarian in person.
He appointed the Bishop of Porto to act for him,
and the only documents of the time immediately

and Selva Candida 61
foUowing are dated by him in Peregrine's place,
vice Pelegrini archiepiscopi Goloniensis \ Not long
afterwards both Benedict VIII and the Emperor
Henry II died, and the close ties which had for
the moment bound together the Papacy and the
Empire were broken. Benedict was succeeded by
his brother, John XIX, who ignored the position
of the Archbishop of Cologne. He did not indeed
restore the old Scrinium, but he placed the Chancery
once more under the management of suburbicarian
Bishops; and only once, in December 1026, when
Archbishop Peregrine was himself in Italy in the
train of the Emperor Conrad II, do we find his
position as Librarian recognized 2. He hved for
nearly ten years more, but there are no further
traces of his title of Librarian. It was a quarter
of a century later that the project of associating
the Archbishop of Cologne, as such, with the
Chancery was revived.
In the meanwhile, under the next Pope,
Benedict IX, it was expressly ordained that one
specified suburbicarian Bishop, the Bishop of
Selva Candida, and aU his successors should
hold the office of Librarian*. This was done
in November 1037, at a time when not only
Conrad II but also Peregrine's successor Herman
of Cologne were actuaUy in Italy; so that the
design of the ordinance cannot be misunderstood.
1 A different form stating that the Archbishop appointed
him is quoted by Dr Bresslau, i. 220, note 3 ; see too Spec. 10.
2 Dat. per manus Benedicti Episcopi Portuensis vice
Peregrini Coloniensis archiepiscopi bibliotecarii sanctae apos
tolicae sedis: Marini, p. 78, n. 46 [Jafl6, 4076],
s Marini, p. 83, n. 48 [Jaff6, n. 4110].

62 The Chancellor and the
As, however, Benedict was a mere boy at the
time^, we must probably attribute to the perma
nent staff a measure directed against German
influence at the very time when that influence
was being exerted in a particularly vigorous
fashion. The enactment was indeed shorthved:
it was superseded five years afterwards, under
the same Pope ; but it was changed not in favour
of the Imperial connexion, stUl less in that of the
old Roman tradition. The suburbicarian Bishop
was better than the old CoUege of Notaries; but
better stUl would be an officer appointed by the
Pope of his own choice, a personal secretary^.
Representing the Tusculan faction Benedict had
always been unpopular at Rome, and more than
once had been driven out of the city. It was aU
the more necessary that he should not rely upon
the local officers. So he set up Peter the Deacon
as Librarian and ChanceUor, Bibhothecarius et
CanceUarius sanctae Sedis Apostohcae; and Peter
retained the position under his three successors.
Moreover the appearance of this new Librarian
and ChanceUor is accompanied by that of two
scribes bearing a new title. They subscribe the
documents as Scriniaru et Notarii sacri Latera
nensis Palatu*. The Pope was forming for him-
1 At his election in 1033 Benedict is said by Rodulf Glaber
(Hist. rv. V. 17) to have been "puer ferme decennis.' Another
account makes him twelve years old (ibid. v. v. 26).
2 Dr Bresslau thinks that the Bishop of Selva Candida
remained technically Bibliothecarius, but that his work was
practically taken over by the Bibliothecarius et CanceUarius:
i. 223 f. But Chancellor Peter does not date in anyone's stead.
2 Or nostri palatii, Gregory VI, 1045, Spec. 13 (twice).

Notaries of the Lateran Palace 63
self a new clerical staff, attached to his person and
unconnected with the old organisation of Rome.
StiU, however, they adhere to the Curial style
of writing, so that they must have been recruited
from Roman sources.
The intervention of the Emperor Henry III
in 1046, the deposition of the rival Popes, and
the estabhshment of the German Clement II,
led to no immediate change in the Chancery.
Peter, Librarian and ChanceUor, remained at his
post down to the pontificate of Leo IX i, until
his death in October 1050. But it is interesting
to notice that an officer of the Imperial Chancery,
whose handwriting is known from documents
which he wrote for Henry when he was at Rome
in the winter of 1046-7, was employed by the
new Pope and drew up two of his documents
of which the originals are preserved 2. The fact
was that Clement was traveUing about in Italy
with the Emperor and had no Roman notary
avaUable. In such a manner non-Roman elements came
to enter into the composition of the Pope's
secretarial office. The change was not directly
a pohtical one, though it was influenced by pohtical
conditions. Quite possibly it was due to an
imitation of the practice of the Emperors that
the Popes sought to create a personal staff which
should not be necessarUy fixed at Rome. The
Emperors had no one capital or residence, and
their Chancery accompanied them from place
^ Thus, 29 December 1046 and 24 September 1047, Spec. 14.
* The second example in Spec. 14.

64 Foreign Notaries
to place. To the Popes on the contrary Rome
had been their single and unchanging home.
The head of his Chancery was a Bishop from the
neighbouring district; its staff was formed of
local officers attached to their district and church.
They had to accompany the Pope when he quitted
Rome for a time; but hitherto such absences
had been the exception and had not lasted long.
From the middle of the eleventh century on the
contrary the Popes came to make protracted
journeys away from the city; and they found
the old local organisation Ul-adapted to the new
circumstances. Benedict IX began the change
with his personal ChanceUor and his personal
staff of palace notaries. Clement II introduced
notaries from outside Rome. The foreign notaries
brought in their own handwriting, the Minuscule,
because they were not conversant with the Curial
style ^. But when the Popes were at Rome they
stiU to a large extent employed the old staff of
Scriniarii. We graduaUy discover two distinct
organisations going on at the same time.
1. The Scrinium, whose officers use the Curial
hand and generaUy write the note of the Scriptum.
In course of time they evolve a new title, com
pounded of the older and newer systems, and
sign as Scriniarii regionarii et Notaru sacri Palatii.
They remain permanently fixed at Rome.
2. The Sacrum Palatium, whose officers are
attached not to the city of Rome but to the Pope's
person, who attend him on his journeys away
from Rome, and who, when he is in Rome, take
* See for instance two pieces of the year 1047, in Spec. 16.

Changes under Leo IX 66
part concurrently with the local Scriniarii in
carrying on the business of the Chancery. They
did not know the Curial handwriting and were
not speciaUy interested in maintaining the Roman
tradition. They but graduaUy adopted the prac
tice of writing the Scriptum, and even then
only inserted it by way of exception. They
style themselves not Scriniarii Regionarii but
simply Notarii sacri Palatii and later on Scriptores.
Standing as they did in a personal relation to
the Pope, they could take upon themselves, as
no Scriniarius ever ventured, to date a document
as the representative of the ChanceUor.
The pontificate of Leo IX — Bruno, Bishop
of Toul — ^introduced important changes into the
system and forms of the Chancery. The Pope
was no longer a Roman official; he had to exert
his influence over a wide sphere of Western
Europe. He quitted Rome in May 1049, barely
three months after his consecration^, and from
that time was always traveUing. During a
pontiflcate of more than five years he spent hardly
more than six months altogether in the city. The
ChanceUor Peter he retained from his predecessor,
and he took him about with him on his journeys.
Peter not merely draughted and dated the docu
ments but drew up the fair copy himself ^. But
so large was the number of privUeges which the
Pope granted that he had to appoint a writer
1 During these months documents were written in the old
style by a Scriniarius.
2 Thus, 13 June 1049, Spec. 17 (1).
P.P. O. 5

66 Influence of Imperial Practice
to help him^. This writer was a German named
lietbuin and he naturaUy wrote a Minuscule
script 2. When the Pope returned to Rome in
April and May, 1050, he avoided employing any
Roman writers*. After his next journey he
appointed Frederick Archdeacon of Liege (after
wards Cardinal and Pope, as Stephen IX) as
Bibliothecarius et CanceUarius*, but for a whUe
he appears to have taken no personal share
in the work of the Chancery. About this time^
Leo conferred the dignity of Arch-ChanceUor of
the Apostohc See upon Herman, Archbishop of
Cologne, who was ex officio the Imperial Arch-
ChanceUor of Italy. The new title was plainly
borrowed from the usage of the Imperial Chan-
1 In September 1049.
2 Other writers were from time to time employed. One
was the famous Humbert, afterwards Bishop of Selva Candida.
3 Thus, 29 May 1050, Spec. 19. On leaving Rome in the
summer he took with him a notary who was apparently an
Italian but not a Roman. He wrote a Minuscule modelled
upon that of the Chancellor Peter (19 July, Spec. 19). On
Peter's death at Langres in October this unnamed notary
acquired the right of dating documents in his own hand, but
of course in the name of the titular head of the Chancery. Peter
was followed by a member of a great Lotharingian family,
Udo Primicerius (afterwards, in 1154, Bishop) of Toul; but the
anonymous writer did his work for him and wrote the Datum
(Spec. 20) from October 1060 to January 1061, and later on
when Frederick was Chancellor. He disappears after 3 February
1062, and is followed by two writers in succession, neither of
whom was a Roman. But their position was less assured than
that of their predecessor, and for a time the Chancellor intervenes
personally to date the documents (9 March 1062, Spec. 21 (4),
cf. Acta u. 76). Other scribes were also employed. See Kehr,
ubi supra, pp. 82 ff.
4 Thus, 22 July 1051, Spec. 21.
* The Papal biographer says in June 1049.

on the Chancery of Leo IX 67
eery; and it was not granted, as it had been in
1023, to a particular Archbishop of Cologne, but
was intended to be attached permanently to
the occupant of the See. There is, however,
no evidence that he ever acted in the Chancery.
He received the honour of the dignity and the
profits attached to it; but the dating was done
by ChanceUor Frederick \ Yet it is to be noticed
that, whUe Leo IX seems to have done every
thing in his power to break off from the Roman
tradition, there is evidence, during the time that
he was again in Rome early in 1053, of the employ
ment of Scriniaru; and these Scriniarii now
describe themselves by the remarkable style of
Scriniarii sacri Palatii.
I have dweUed at some length on the modffica-
tions of practice introduced by Leo IX, because
they show a resolute attempt to estabhsh the
titles, the forms, the officials, and the hand
writing of the Imperial Chancery in that of
the Pope. Over his immediate successors I shaU
pass rapidly. With them it is local conditions
rather than pohcy that determine the employ
ment of officials. Victor II (1055-1057) dismissed
ChanceUor Frederick who was treated as an enemy
by the Emperor Henry III, and the Chancery
feU into disorder 2; but during the three short
^ In January 1054 Frederick departed for Constantinople,
and we do not know what arrangements were made during
his absence. Only two documents of that time are known to
be extant, and they are preserved in defective copies. See
Kehr, p. 85.
* Victor at first availed himself of the services of the Sub-
deacon Hildebrand, the future Gregory VII, and then on his
6—2

68 The Chancery from Victor II
intervals at which he was at Rome he made
use of the Scrinium with its old officers and forms \
The reorganization aimed at by Leo IX broke
down partly in consequence of Victor's repeated
changes of residence and partly through the
removal from office of the ChanceUor Frederick.
When however Frederick became Pope as Stephen
IX (1057-1058) and appointed Humbert Bishop
of Selva Candida as his ChanceUor and Librarian,
the old Roman system again prevaUed, though
not exclusively^. His successor, the Tusculan
Benedict X, was whoUy Roman during the ten
months that he was aUowed to rule *. Nicholas II
(1059-1061) also began with Roman Scriniaru*,
visit to Germany employed the deacon Aribo, probably a
Bavarian (9 February 1057, Spec. 25). The name of the
Archbishop of Cologne is not regularly mentioned ; the documents
are usually dated by the writers themselves, one by Aribo;
and the dates on the only two documents of this pontificate
bearing Hildebrand's name are certainly not autograph (one, of
2 January 1056, is given in Spec. 24).
^ The writer was Oregorius notarius et scriniarius sanctae
Bomanae eeclesiae. As soon as the Pope left the city the Roman
writing ceased.
* The Pope lived partly at Rome and partly at Monte
Cassino : he may have taken a Roman Scriniarius with him
to his monastery, but he certainly employed another writer
who was not a Roman as well. See documents of 2 November,
4 December, and 18 October 1057, in Spec. 27, 28. Under
Stephen IX, it should be noticed, the dates of Cardinal Humbert
are regularly autograph.
' He was finally excluded from the hst of Popes, by a com
mission of which the late Cardinal Ferrata was president, in 1913.
Two documents of his are preserved: one written by Octavian
the Scriniarius ; the other, written and dated by the same Lietbuin
who had been employed as writer by Leo IX some ten years
earlier (Spec. 28).
4 Thus, 17 February 1069, Spec. 29.

to Alexander II 69
but unlike his predecessors he took one of them
away with him when he quitted the city for
journeys in central Italy. When however, in
November 1059, the Pope estabhshed himself
in Florence, Florentine scribes were employed ^
Humbert continued to be Librarian until his
death on 5 May 1061 ; then for a few months his
work was done by Bishops of two other suburbi
carian Sees, Mainard, his successor at Selva Can
dida, and Bernard of Palestrina ; but the office of
Librarian seems not to have been fiUed up 2.
The pontificate of Alexander II which extended
from October 1061 to 1073 is pecuharly anomalous.
On his election he found himself confronted by an
Antipope* and retired to his See of Lucca. His
documents therefore present a double character:
some of them are issued by the Pope, others by
the Bishop of Lucca. I note this merely by the
way, for we are only concerned with his Papal
documents. But hving at Lucca Alexander had
to employ local scribes, sometimes from Florence*,
sometimes from Lucca: one document seems to
be written by a notary of the Imperial Chancery.
StiU, in spite of irregularities, a type was growing
up, with Majuscule letters in the first hne and
Minuscule in the rest; and the special charac
teristic feature was that the name of the Pope,
1 See flve examples in Spec. 30.
2 Bernard possibly presumed upon his position, for at Bene-
vento in June he was described as cancellarius domini papae : see
Kehr, p. 93, note 4.
* Of this Pontiff, Cadalus or Honorius II, only a single
iudicatum is known to exist: ibid., note 5.
* Spec. 31.

70 The Chancery under Alexander II
between the Rota and the Monogram, was written
in square capitals. But when, early in 1063,
Alexander took possession of Rome he availed
himself once more of the Scrinium. There are
documents Avritten by two Scriniarii, Rainer and
Guinizo, each of whom subscribes himself in the
lately devised composite form of Scriniarius et
Notarius sacri Palatii, and uses a Curial hand^.
In his later stays in Rome also, in 1065, 1068, and
1069, the local notaries were again employed^,
and one of them goes back to the older style
of Notarius Regionarius et Scriniarius sanctae
Romanae Eeclesiae, or, in a blundered form, of
Notarius et Regionarius ac Scriniarius sanctae
Sedis Apostohcae. On the other hand when he
was in Rome in 1070 and 1071 Alexander seems
not to have returned to the use of Roman writers ;
he now, just as when he was away from Rome,
retained his notary from Lucca, whose hand
writing can be clearly distinguished*. After 1063
a suburbicarian Bishop was no longer Librarian
and ChanceUor : his place was taken by a simple
acolyte named Peter, who rose through the
successive orders untU in 1070 he was made
Cardinal Priest of St Maria Nova*; he retained
office through the pontificate of Gregory VII.
1 After he left Rome in 1064 his documents are no longer
written by Roman scribes: see Spec. 32.
^ Illustrations of the handwriting may be found in Spec. 36
(1069). » 3 March 1073, Spec. 39. This notary was afterwards
the favourite scribe of Gregory VII. His comma is charac
teristic: see Spec. 39.
* His data are usually autograph; when anyone takes
his place, he seems to be always a notary from Lucca.

and Ghregory VII 71
From 1064 the dignity of the Archbishop of Cologne
as Arch-ChanceUor is only intermittently recog
nized on the documents, and from May 1067 it
disappears. It ceases in fact concurrently with
the displacement of the Bishop of Selva Candida^.
It may be said that Alexander II had no Chancery
system, and this was largely due to the fact that
he continued until the last to be Bishop of Lucca.
The pontificate of Gregory VII was imeventful
from the point of view of the Chancery: first
because Rome was his ordinary residence; and
secondly because his active pohcy caUed more
for the issue of Letters than of Privileges, of
Little than of Great BuUs. Of PrivUeges he
granted only about one-third the number of those
of his predecessor ; and Letters were not protected
by the same elaboration of Chancery guarantee
as Privileges. Out of about 70 PrivUeges only
some 25 are known to be preserved in originals.
Most of them are written by the same notary
who had attended Alexander II from Lucca,
one Rainerius^, who slowly learned the Curial
hand and never wrote it weU. He put the Pope's
name in Majuscules, and often placed the Rota
in the middle of the sheet under the text. That
he was not a Scriniarius is shown by the facts
not only that he occasionaUy writes documents
away from Rome, but also that in the absence

^ The name of the Archbishop of Cologne is found again
in two isolated documents of 1111 (just as the Imperial regnal
year was for the moment revived) when Paschal II was in the
hands of the Emperor, but never afterwards.
2 1078, Spec. 40.

72 The Chancery from Gregory VII
of the Librarian he sometimes dates them^.
This seems to mark a decided break from the
earher tradition; yet there are also found traces
of the employment of the old Scrinium. It
^has been supposed that Gregory maintained the
Curial handwriting as a witness that he was
Roman in pohcy and resolved to withstand the
importation of the Imperial Minuscule. But this
theory is unfounded. We have a number of
his documents written in Minuscule, and there
is no doubt that he himself wrote Minuscule 2.
It was in fact largely a matter of accident which
clerk he employed: the details of the Chancery
did not interest him*.
Passing by the brief pontificate of Victor III *
we find under his two successors the alternation
of the old and new systems iUustrated by a large
number of originals. Urban II was elected in
March 1088 at Terracina and did not enter Rome

1 The head of the Chancery was stUl the Librarian, Cardinal
Peter; but other persons, Gregory the Deacon, Cono Cardinal
Priest, John Cardinal Deacon, often acted as his deputies.
They all most commonly wrote the data with their own hands.
2 See his subscription, June 1057, Spec. 26 ; and Kehr's
references, p. 100, note 3.
^ It may be mentioned that the only two known documents
of the Antipope Guibert of Ravenna (Clement III) are in Minus
cule (Spec. 42). Probably they were written by any clerks
he coiild flud at Cesena or Montebello. One written at Rome
is preserved in a transcript: see Kelxr, p. 102.
* But one privilege granted by him is preserved, and that
not in the original: see Kehr, p. 103. The importance of this
Pope must not be judged by what he did during the four months
that he occupied the holy See. As Abbot Desiderius of Monte
Cassino his influence had been powerfully and continuously
exerted.

to Paschal II 73
until the foUowing October. While he was at
Rome we find a document written by Gerard
a Notarius Regionarius. In July 1089 the Pope
went southwards, and then two of his documents
were written and dated by the same hand, probably
that of the Prosignator and ChanceUor John.
No one else being avaUable, the ChanceUor had
to be himself the engrosser. In the first half
of 1090 Urban was in Rome, and his documents
are written by a Scriniarius, Gregory, and in
the Curial hand^. But when he was away from
the city in 1092 and 1093, a new notary makes
his appearance; and he is the inventor of the
beautiful Minuscule which came to prevail for
the century foUowing. Sometimes he dates the
documents, and gives his name, Lanfranc^. On
the Pope's return to Rome at the beginning
of 1094 the Scrinium reappears, and the writer
uniformly inserts the Scriptum*. We can trace
his work exactly when Urban was in Rome and
never when he was out of Rome. In the autumn
he went to the North of Italy and to France,
and was not again in Rome imtil Christmas
1096: aU this time Lanfranc acted exclusively
as Scriptor for the Pope.
Under Paschal II we note the same charac
teristics: in Rome, the Scrinium; outside, the
1 Thus 6 March 1090, Spec. 43.
2 26 January, 1092, Spec. 43 ; 1 February, 1092, Spec. 46.
* This writer, Peter, and the others who appear in Urban's
documents bear the title of Notarius regionarius et Scriniarius
sacri Palatii, or Scriniarius sanctae Romanae Eeclesiae, or simply
Scriniarius. Lanfranc is Notarius sacri Palatii; unlike the
Scriniarii he can date. See Kehr, pp. 105 f.

74 Disappearance of the Scriptum
Palatium. But the handwriting of the one becomes
modified by the other; the Curial hand borrows
features from the Minuscule, and the Minuscule
absorbs Curial elements^. The Palace staff, how
ever, and the writing which it represented prevailed
more and more. After Paschal II if any Roman
notaries are employed they have to adopt the
forms prescribed by the officials of the Palatium
and omit the Scriptum. They retained indeed
some features of the Curial hand, but these
graduaUy disappeared. The suppression of the
Scriptum is the mark of the victory of the Pala
tium over the Scrinium. It is accomphshed under
Cahxtus II 2.
As for the head of the office Gregory VII's
ChanceUor, Peter, went over to the Antipope,
and Urban II had to find a substitute. He chose
a monk of Monte Cassino, John of Gaeta, Cardinal
Deacon of St Mary in Cosmedin, and appointed
him first Prosignator* and then in September
* In the Scrinium Peter was foUowed by John and Rainerius,
Gervase and Bonushomo. For Peter's writing see Spec. 47;
John's, 50; Rainerius, 51, 63; Gervase (1115), 55. In the
Palatium Grisogonus is the only notary named, because he is
found to write the Scriptum; but flve others have been
discriminated. ' This fact has led some writers to make a subdivision
of the Third Period in the history of the Chancery at his ponti
flcate. ^ The meaning of this name is not certain, but it is probable
that it indicates the share taken by the official in the authentica
tion of a Bull. This, it is considered, would be done by the
completion of the Rota, in the inner part of which the Pope
wrote his Device, and the officer added the writing on the
circumference. See Bresslau, i. 268, note 1 ; Kehr, pp. 95,
note 3, and 106, note 2. The practice, however, was not uniform ;
see below, p. 108.

John of Gaeta 75
1089 ChanceUor: he held the office for thirty
years, and always wrote the Datum with his
own hand ^. FinaUy he became Pope, as Gelasius
II, in 1118. He set a memorable landmark in
the history of the Chancery, not by altering its
system but by renovating its style. This style
must be the subject of a separate treatment.
^ When a substitute acted for him the Scriptum and Datum
are sometimes combined.

IVI.
The fact that the composition of Papal letters
was governed by precise and elaborate rules
determining the rhythmical proportion and the
cadence of each period is a discovery of compara
tively recent years. The system, known as the
Cursus Curiae Romanae, was perfectly understood
and was repeatedly expounded in the middle
ages; but because it was based not on metre
but on accent, and because its interpreters used
metrical terms for its exposition, the scholars of
the Renaissance, having found out the meaning
of quantity, rejected it with contempt and assidu
ously avoided the use of any of the phrases which
it prescribed. Hence, except in some time-
honoured formulae or in hturgical cadences, which
were retained from their famUiarity, we find
that the cultivated Latin of the modern age,
whether issuing from the Papal Chancery or
elsewhere, studiously arranges to end its clauses
or periods in a way which would not have been
permitted by the rules of the medieval chancery.
The system thus superseded passed not only
out of use but out of knowledge.
^ The draught of this lecture was composed more than
fifteen years ago, but it has been several times rewritten and
in the end vitally modified by the results as to the ancient Cursus
obtained by Professor Zielinski of Petrograd and by Mr A. C. Clark,
now Professor of Latin at Oxford.

The Ars Dictandi 77
It was indeed observed by Wattenbach in
1855 ^ that an affected sort of prose was developed
for epistolary purposes by Alberic of Monte
Cassino as early as the eleventh century, and
in 1868 Charles Thurot pointed out that the
rhetorician Buoncompagno in the thirteenth men
tioned the artificiosa dictionum structura which
some caUed cursus'^. Then in 1870 M. Paul
Meyer indicated that this style must go back
at least to the beginning of the tweUth century
and hinted that its examination would be of great
value for critical purposes*. But the suggestion
was not seriously taken up untU M. Noel Valois
pubhshed his classical essay on the Rhythm
of Papal BuUs in 1881*. The new element in
the enquiry is strictly hmited. It is not Dictamen
as a whole, but one particular feature in Dictamen.
Dictamen or the Ars Dictandi is the name
given to the instruction in letter-writing which
was a subject of special study in the schools of
^ Iter Austriacum 1863, in the Archiv fiir die Kunde Oster-
reichischer Geschichts-Quellen, xiv. 34 f.
^ 'Appositio, que dicitur esse artificiosa dictionum structura,
ideo a quibusdam cursus vocatur, quia, cum artiflcialiter dictiones
locantur, currere sonitu delectabih per aures videntur cum
beneplacito auditormn': Histoire des Doctrines grammaticales
au Moyen Age, in Notices et Extraits des Manuscrits, xxii. ii. 480.
^ 'On comprend maintenant de quel instrument pr6cieux
la critique sera pourvue lorsqu'on aura d6termin6 I'^poque oti
le cursus se montre pour la premiere fois et les combinaisons
employees par chaque auteur*: Revue critique d'Histoire et
de Litt^rature, v. i. 220.
1 Bibhotheque de I'lficole des Chartes, xUi. 161-198, 257-272.
When it flrst appeared as an academic thesis in 1880, a reviewer
described the subject as 'assez curieux, bien que peu attrayant' :
Revue critique, xv. i. (1881), 324.

78 Dictamen
the middle ages. Treatises in which the doctrine
is set forth are in hke manner entitled Dictamen or
Ars Dictandi^, Summa Dictaminis^, Forma Dic
tandi*. The definition of its province may be
thus stated.
Grammar taught the correct use of words;
Rhetoric, the appropriate combination of words
in phrases and sentences: Dictamen dealt with
a particular branch of Rhetoric, the rules of
composition primarily as apphed to the writing
of letters, and of letters conceived in a more or
less formal or ornamental style. The question
of rhythm was not necessarUy involved in it,
but when the system of the Cursus became fuUy
developed, it was considered as an integral part
of Dictamen; so that a writer of the early years
of the fourteenth century could speak of 'this
hterary Dictamen, which is neither altogether
prose, nor altogether metrical, but participates
in both*.' It is the history of this rhythmical
prose which we have now to examine; and
I shaU begin by quoting the rules for its composi
tion as they were laid down in the Forma Dictandi
of Albert of Morra and in the Dictamen of
Trasimund. Albert was ChanceUor to three Popes
from 1178 to 1187, when he was himself elected
1 By Trasimund: Valois, pp. 170, 171, note 2.
^ By Pontius of Provence: Thurot, p. 38.
' By Albert of Morra, see below.
* 'In hoc vero dictamine htteratorio, quod nee est ex toto
prosaycum neo ex toto metricum, sed utrumque participat':
Bibhotheque nationale, MS Lat. 11,384 fo. 94, cited by Valois,
p. 165, note 1. The work referred to is catalogued by Delisle as a
Formulahe de lettres, & I'usage de I'ordre de Citeaux : Bibhotheque
del'lficoledes Chartes, xxiv. (1863), 232.

The Cursus Curiae Romanae 79
to the pontificate ; and Trasimimd, or Transmund,
a Notary of the Holy Roman Church, acted as
Albert's deputy^, when he was perhaps sick or
absent, from 9 December 1185 to 13 March
1186 2. The two men were thus responsible for
or connected mth the preparation and issue of
Papal documents at a time when the system
of the Chancery, by common agreement, had
attained or was just about to attain its highest
perfection. Albert's work begins with the words, Cursus
dictaminis Romane curie taliter observandus est'.
the style to be explained is specificaUy that of
the Roman court. Since Albert became Pope
under the name of Gregory VIII the system which
he described acquired the name of Stylus Gregori-
anus, a name which has led to not unnatural
confusion. First something must be said of the
prosody. The terminology belongs to a time
when quantity had been for ordinary purposes
superseded by accent. A man would stUl observe
metrical rules if he wrote hexameters or other
classical forms of verse ; but he did this artificiaUy :
he pronounced the words by accent. And thus
he came insensibly to use the traditional names
of metrical feet to mean the equivalent number
of syUables governed by accent, no matter what
their quantity might be. Every dissyUable is a
spondee ; every trisyUable of which the penultima
^ In one manuscript of his work he is described erroneously
as vice-chancellor; others make him a monk (or even abbot)
of Clairvaux: see Valois, pp. 168 f.
" Bresslau, i. 247.

80 Albert of Morra's
is short (that is, unaccented) is a dactyP: so
that mare ranks as a spondee, dominus as a dactyl.
This being understood, we pass to the rules laid
down for the beginning and the body of the
period or sentence, and for its ending. The rules
concern only the Text of the document: the
opening Address and Greeting, and the Date at
the termination, fall outside the laws of Dictamen.
As to the closing phrases the rules are precise
and fixed: for the beginning and middle we
have only general directions.
If, says Albert^, you begin with a spondee or with a
trisyUable having the accent on the penultima, you may
weU foUow with a dactyl, as Deus omnium, Magister
militum^; but if you begin with a dactyl ('quod vlx aut
nunquam concedo,' adds Trasimund*), you must slacken
the pace by several spondees, as Dominus et magister noster
lesus Christus. Two or more consecutive dactyls are for
bidden ; they are too rapid : thus Negligens famulus aliquis.
But several spondees may foUow one another. After a
colon or a comma you may proceed either with a spondee
or a dactyl.
^ Thus Pontius of Provence in the thirteenth century:
Thurot, p. 481.
^ I summarize here from the passages printed by M. Valois,
pp. 181 f.
' The former of these alternatives is forbidden by the Libellus
de Arte Dictandi attributed to Peter of Blois, whose exposition
is in other respects taken from Albert's: see the extract in
M. C. V. Langlois' Formulaires de Lettres, iv. 12 (Notices et
Extraits des Manuscrits, xxxrv. u. 26, 1893). The same prohibi
tion occurs in a thirteenth-century treatise (apparently based
on Trasimund) in the Laurentian Library at Florence, from
which M. Langlois gives a quotation, ibid. v. 6 (Notices et
Extraits, xxxv. h. 410, 1896).
* Valois, p. 182, note 4. But conjvinctions like Ideo, Igitur
were permitted: see Pontius, in Thurot, p. 481.

Rules for the Cursus 81
It is clear that it was held that the dignity
of an opening phrase was best secured by the
choice of a weighty dissyllable: Sane, Dudum,
Nobis, and the hke are frequently found in this
position. Secondly, there was a feehng in favour
of alternate accents, rather than of accents going
by threes : a dactyl must be guarded by spondees,
but spondees may be continuous. Albert omits
to explain that unaccented, possibly slurred
syUables may be introduced. Later writers called
them haU-spondees ; often they may be reckoned
as elements of dactyls^. But the matter is not
important, for it is evident that no very strict
rules were laid down in detaU as to how a sentence
should go on. How it should end, on the contrary,
was a matter of unyielding law.
Albert lays down the rule as f oUows :
It is to be noted that a foot as it were a dactyl must
always precede the final elements (dictiones). And the final
element of a period should be a word of four syUables with
the penultima long : as Ad eterna mereamur gaUdia pirvenire.
Or there may be at the end of the clause two words of two
syUables, of whatever length they be: as Inhumanitatis
est nimif in hominem dgere nimis dUre. Sometimes too a
monosyUable and a trisyUable, preceded by a dactyl, end
the period, so that the second syUable of the trisyUable has
the accent: as Donee per se sufficiant ad voldtum^.
This describes the first of the admissible endings.
It is a dactyl, foUowed by a word or combina
tion of words of four syUables, in the language
^ Monosyllabic words were regularly treated as enclitic or
prochtic. 2 Valois, pp. 188 f.
P.P. C. 6

82 The Ending of the Clause
of the time two spondees. It is the termination
which came to be known as the Cursus Velox.
Albert proceeds:
Sometimes again two trisyUables end the period: as
Petitiones honestas, ius, et ratio avdiri compillunt. Sometimes
it is a word of four syUables foUowed by a trisyUable: as
Quicquid adversvs eum proposui, astruere confidenter avdibo^.
This is the Cursus Planus. But Albert has con
fused the matter by talking of the length of the
words {dictiones) preceding the final trisyUable.
The point is that a concluding paroxytone word
of three syUables must be preceded by a word
of three or any number more syUables, of which
the penultima is long. To these two Trasimund
adds a third, which completes the series of
admissible endings. Albert had made no provision
for a dactyhc termination; if such an ending is
required, Trasimund says that it must consist
of a word of four syUables with the accent on
the antepenultima (or a monosyUable and a
dactyl), preceded by a word accented on the
penultima: as Ille certe videtur operdri iustitiam,
or tunc facta dirigentur in exitus \ This became
distinguished as the Cursus Tardus, also caUed
Durus or Ecclesiasticus.
These are the three forms with which a sentence
or principal clause invariably ends. They wiU
be most conveniently arranged, as they were
in fact in the thirteenth century*, stiU retaining
1 Valois, p. 189.
2 Ibid. p. 193.
' See an extract in Thurot, p. 482, from a work which,
according to M. Valois, p. 173, note 2, is by Master Lawrence

and the Caesura 83
the medieval names for the measures, in the
foUowing order:
1. Cursus Planus : dactyl -^ spondee _-|- —
2. Cursus Tardus : dactyl -i- dactyl

3. Cursus Velox : dactyl + 2 spondees  |  .
I reserve the explanation and analysis of the
three types untU a later stage, and only here
lay emphasis on the caesura, which is duly noted,
though not emphasized, by our earhest authorities.
There must be a caesura before the last three
syllables in the Cursus Planus, and before the
last four syUables in the other two types.
Our authorities, I have said, worked in the
second half of the twelfth century. From whom
did they have their model ^? So soon almost as
the question was raised, Monsignor Duchesne
supplied the answer ^ by a reference to one of the
continuations of the Liber Pontificahs. In that
work the appointment as ChanceUor by Urban II
of John of Gaeta, who afterwards became Pope
of the city of Rome, who was apparently connected with Aquileia
(cf. L. Rockinger, Briefsteller und Formelbiicher, i. 951 f., 1863).
' It was unlucky that M. Valois should have impaired the
value of his admirable work, which must always be consulted
for the period from the twelfth century onwards, by excursions
into the early history of rhythmical composition. But in 1881
the distinction between the metrical and accentual systems
had not formed the subject of detaUed study, and M. Valois
could not be aware that his remarks on the ancient rhythmical
writers were not reaUy relevant. He has, however, the merit
of haviag observed correctly the ages during which some form
of Cursus prevailed and the intermediate period during which
it was neglected or even forgotten.
* Note sur I'Origine du 'Cursus,' in the Bibhotheque de
l':ficole des Chartes, 1. (1889), 162.
6—2

84 John of Gaeta
Gelasius II (1118-1119), is recorded by his con
temporary biographer Pandulph in the foUowing
terms :
Then the Pope, a weU-lettered man and of ready speech,
perceiving brother John to be both vsdse and prudent, ordained,
promoted, and from careful deliberation appointed him his
chanceUor, so that through his eloquence which the Lord
had granted him, John might under the guidance of the
Holy Spirit by the grace of God reform the style of ancient
grace and elegance in the apostolic see, which was now almost
aU lost, and might restore the Leonine rhythm with its lucid
rapidity 1.
Here John of Gaeta is expressly stated to have
been the author of the revival of the ancient
Cursus, which is described, for what reason is not
clear, as Leonine. Now it can hardly be a mere
coincidence that at the same date the formulary
which had been long in use in the Papal Chancery,
the Liber Diurnus, suddenly disappears from view.
It was used in 1087; it is not found afterwards.
It looks as though, because its rhjrthm and periods
were not those of the Cursus, John of Gaeta, as
Prosignator and then as ChanceUor, suppressed it.
^ 'Ut per eloquentiam suam a Domino traditam antiqui
leporis et elegantiae stilum in sede apostolica, iam pene omnem
deperditum. . . .reformaret, ao Leoninum cursum lucida velocitate
reduceret': Lib. Pontif. clxii. vol. ii. 311. In a continuation
of the Liber Pontificahs preserved in the Harleian MS 633 (of
the second half of the twelfth century) it is said of Gelasius II :
'Hie fuit in scripturis divinis vir eruditus, rectus, et multe simplici-
tatis, et ordinis atque consuetudinis sancte Romane ecclesie
studiosissimus indagator, miserorum quoque adiutor pussimus.'
See W. Levison, in Neues Archiv, xxv. (1910), 411. Professor
Levison is inclined to connect the compilation from which the
existing manuscript is copied with Archbishop Ralph of Canter
bury (p. 421).

and the School of Monte Cassino 85
John was a disciple of Alberic of Monte Cassino
in the Ars Dictandi. Alberic was a man of
learning, who took an active part in the contro
versy aroused by the opinions of Berengar of
Tours. He was a Cardinal Deacon, but there
is no evidence that he was ever employed in the
Papal Chancery. He might weU have acted
there, for he was an authority on Dictamen.
He wrote two treatises on the subject, dealing
with grammatical points and with rules for prose
composition. These works may be dated about
1075 or a httle earher^. They begin with a
classification of dictamina as metrica, rithmica,
and prosaica, but the author expressly limits
himself to this last variety 2, so that one cannot
tell whether the other subjects formed part of his
system of instruction. It is, however, certain
that he employed the Cursus, though not
uniformly, in his own compositions*; and this
fact raises a presumption that it was from him
that John of Gaeta learned the art which he
introduced into the Roman Chancery. In any
case, it need not be doubted that the Cursus
came from Monte Cassino. John of Gaeta may
have been there when Frederick of Lorraine,
afterwards Stephen IX, was Abbot; he was
professed there under Desiderius *, who was Abbot
^ See A. Biitow, Die Entwicklung der mittelalterlichen Brief
steller bis zxa Mitte des 12. Jahrhunderts, a Greifswald disserta
tion of 1908, pp. 15-20.
^ Rationes dictandi ii. in Rockinger, i. 9.
^ See the Rationes Dictandi and De Dictamine, ibid., i. 9 ff.,
29 ff. *¦ His biographer says, under the next abbot Oderisius (Lib.

86 John of Gaetd's Reform
untU he became Pope as Victor III in 1087.
It was a time of hterary activity in the monastery.
Desiderius caused the Registers of fifth-century
PopeSj now lost, to be copied out^; and the
existing transcript of the Register of John VIII
Was made there very probably under the super
vision of John of Gaeta himself. A contemporary
monk, Leo, wrote letters for Urban II, and had
to do with the composition of his Register 2;
and John of Gaeta had been engaged in hterary
production before he was caUed as Prosignator
and then ChanceUor to Rome. There are there
fore many reasons for beheving that John brought
with him the Cursus into the Papal Chancery
from a training which he had learned at Monte
Cassino. John of Gaeta' s reform did not at once attain
complete prevalence, and it was not untU after
the middle of the twelfth century that the rules
of the Cursus were uniformly observed. In par
ticular, men .were slow to alter old-estabhshed
formulae. Thus the clause Nulli ergo omnino

Pbntif. clxii. vol. ii. 311); but the error is exposed by the
editor, p. 318, notes 2 and 10. See Peter the Deacon, de Viris
illustribus Casinensibus, xlv. (Migne, clxxui. 1046).
1 Chron. Monast. Casin., iii. 63, in Monum. Germ, hist.,
Scriptores, vii. 746.
^ ' Scripsit ex nomine Urbani papae epistolas, fecit et registrum
eius': Pet. Diac, de Viris illustr., xxxi. p. 1039. He may be
the Leo, Cardinal Deacon, who dated documents for Paschal II :
Jaff6, i. 702. But he is to be distinguished from Leo Marsicanus,
afterwards Cardinal Bishop of Ostia, who wrote the continuation
of Peter's Chronicle of Monte Cassino: see E. Caspar, Studien
zum Register Johanus VIII, in Neues Archiv, xxxvi. (1911),
96, note 3.

The Ancient Cursus 87
hominum liceat hanc nostre constitutionis paginam
infringere, or Nulli ergo hominum fas sit hanc
nostre constitutionis paginam ausu temerario refrin-
gere, persisted untU the middle of the twelfth
century. But then by a shght modification the
ending was set right; and we find temerario
ausu infringere or ausu temeritatis infringere, or
again temere perturbare, or by a somewhat larger
change hanc paginam nostre confirmationis infrin-
gere^. SimUar changes may be noted in other
formulae; but these constituted the more rigid
parts of the document and did not yield to the
new rules as easUy as the phrases which were
elaborated afresh by the Dictator.
In 1892 M. Louis Ha vet endeavoured to
explore the origin of the Cursus by means of a
minute analysis of the clause-endings in the
writings of Symmachus, a rhetorician of the
last part of the fourth century ^. He estabhshed
beyond dispute that the principle here was that
not of accent but of metrical quantity; but he
was led on a false track by supposing that the
rhetorical close must consist of entire words or
groups of words. The truth is that it is composed
of two metrical phrases and that these metrical
phrases are formed out of feet which do not
at aU necessarily correspond to the division of
separate words. M. Havet said in effect, You
take a word of almost any number of syUables
^ I take these examples from M. Valois, p. 260.
" La Prose metrique de Symmaque et les Origines m6triques
du Cursus.

88 The Metrical Cursus
or any form you please for the end of a clause,
and according to the form it bears it must be
preceded by a word of two or three syUables of
a prescribed measure^. The final word might
assume any one of twenty forms ranging from
one foot to three and a half, and, the number
of its syUables determined the metrical form of
the word preceding, which might be a trochee,
an iambus, a pyrrhic, or a spondee, a tribrach,
an anapaest, a dactyl, or a cretic; each final
form being assorted with a choice of antecedent
forms. To state M. Havet' s theory in this way
is to condemn it. It is infinitely too com-
phcated for practical use. He deserves our
gratitude for his painstaking tabulation and
classification of the facts, but he did not
succeed in deducing from them a working
system. A great step forward was taken by Dr WUhelm
Meyer, of Spires, Professor at Gottingen, in the
year foUowing the pubhcation of M. Havet' s
essay ^. WhUe doing fuU justice to the merits
of the work of the French scholar, he pointed
out its fundamental error. M. Havet' s theory
depended upon entire words (or groups of words)
and made the form of the final word (or group)
determine the form of the word before it. But,
as Dr Meyer showed, it is not a question of the
combination of single words ; it is the combination
of syUables which make up the close of a rhetorical
^ See M. Havet's exposition, pp. 31-66, and the table on
pp. Ill f.
* Gottingisohe Gelehrte Anzeigen, 1893, pp. 1-27.

The Clausula Rhetorica 89
period, the ClausiUa Rhetorical. We must not
count the separate words, but consider the syUables
or feet which compose the Clausula. The key
to this he found in the Cretic, (- « -) which from
Cicero's time was regarded as constituting one
of the two most appropriate schemes for ending
a phrase ; the other being the Ditrochaeus {-^-^).
We must give up all the medieval terminology
of Dactyls and Spondees. The accentual Dactyl
originates in a metrical Cretic, and the accentual
Spondee comes from a metrical Trochee. The
Clausula Rhetorica consists of a Cretic base
foUowed by a Trochee, a Cretic, or a double
Trochee 2.
It would not, however, be correct to say
that these three terminations were the only
'ones allowed in early times. It was lawful to
substitute for the Cretic three long syllables,
a Molossus, for special emphasis; the first or
the last syUable might be resolved into two
short syUables, forming a Paeon; or again
a Trochaic cadence might be prolonged by an
additional syllable, making the close consist of a
^ This is laid down by Quintilian: 'Nee solum refert quis
[pes] claudat, etiam quis antecedat. Retrorsum autem neque
plus tribus, iique si non ternas syllabas habebunt, repetendi
erunt. . ., neque minus duobus; alioqui pes erit, non numerus':
Inst. IX. iv. 95.
^ Dr Meyer somewhat impaired the clearness of his exposition
by avoiding the word Trochee, which he called a half-Cretic,
and by treating the Ditrochaeus as an anomalous feature (a form
of his 'free Cretic '). He also invented some needless irregularities,
for instance, through carrying the Clausula too far back and
so producing what he termed the 'inverted Cretic' But the
main principles which he laid down are quite established.

90 The Metrical and
Cretic, a Trochee, and another Cretic. These varia
tions indicate the flexibihty of the system developed
by the earher rhetoricians. They gave free play
to expression governed by the rules of an har
monious close. Thanks to the elaborate analysis
of the terminations in Cicero's speeches made
by Professor Ziehnski^, we are enabled to arrive
at some precise results as to the proportion
which the three main forms constitute to the total
number of endings. If we admit the Molossus,
they are found to be 60 per cent.; and if we
aUow a few other licences in the base, they come
to nearly 87 per cent.
The Caesura in the ancient system was not
invariable. Dr Ziehnski has arranged a convenient
system of notation to indicate the possible modes
of dividing up the phrase. He caUs the Cursus
Planus, Tardus, and Velox, 1, 2, 3 (Professor Clark's
happUy chosen examples^ are easy to remember,
1. Vincla perf regit;
2. Vincla perfregerat;
3. Vinculum fregeramus).
Then he denotes the possible divisions by letters
of the Greek alphabet. If the whole phrase
is one word, it is a: iudicabatur is 1 a. If
there is a Caesura before the second syUable,
^ Das Clauselgesetz in Cicero's Reden, 1904. A summary of
the author's results is given in a notice of the book by Mr Clark
in the Classical Review, xviu. (1905), 164-172. Mr Clark's
collection of texts and examples printed in his Pontes Prosae
Numerosae (1909), and his paper on The Cursus in Mediaeval
and Vulgar Latin (1910), are also invaluable.
2 The CuTBus, p. 10.

the Accentual Cursus 91
it is /3, and so forth. ' In Mr Clark's examples
Vincla perf regit is 1 y ; Vincla perfregerat is 2 y ;
Vinculum fregeramus is 3 S. Now in the ancient
practice a great deal of freedom was aUowed as
to where the Caesura should faU. We find
Beatitudine fruitur (2 8), terminos quaerit (1 8),
and the hke. But the three forms of Caesura
which appear in the medieval Cursus show from
very early times a marked preponderance. What
is pecuhar to the medieval system is the law that
no other Caesura could be admitted.
It was supposed by M. Louis Havet that
the medieval accentual Cursus arose from a
misunderstanding of the ancient metrical system.
The ancient system was observed down to the
seventh century; it then fell into complete
desuetude. It was forgotten, and was suddenly
revived in a blundered form towards the end
of the eleventh century. If the facts were true,
the critical inferences to be drawn from them
would be very valuable. For we shoiUd be in
a position to decide the genuineness of many
disputed texts assigned to a date between about
650 and about 1080: if they contained the
metrical Cursus they were before the earher
date; if the accentual, they were after the later
date. This critical canon for some years held
the field 1. But unluckUy neither the facts nor
consequently the inference drawn from them
can be maintained.
1 See Julien Havet, (Euvres, i. 312-317, 1896. It is right
to mention that the paper there reprinted was left unfinished
at the author's premature death in 1893.

92 The Sermo Vulgaris and
So far from the accentual Cursus being an
invention of the eleventh century, it can be
traced back to ancient times as an element in
the Sermo Vulgaris. It has been noticed in
Vitruvius, Frontinus, and Petronius ; and Mr Clark
has made the very interesting discovery that it
is a characteristic of the coUoquial style of Cicero's
letters to Atticus, in contrast with aU his other
writings^. The vulgar accent made inroads on
the system of the metrical terminations. 'The
result,' says Mr Clark, 'of the enfeeblement of
quantity and the stress of the accent was to
produce what some writers have caUed a cursus
mixtus, a very convenient term which means
that some of the clausulae are metrical, whUe
others foUow the accent without regard to the
quantity. All that is necessary is to have the
accents in the right place. The resiUt is that the
metrical prose of St Cyprian, Symmachus, and
Sidonius gives way to accentual or rhythmical
prose 2.' When the sense of quantity yielded
before the pressure of accent, it was inevitable
that the metrical forms which were inconsistent
with accent should disappear and only those
which admitted of an accentual treatment survive*.

1 The Cursus, pp. 26 f.
2 p. 10.
^ It would be out of place here, even did I profess the know
ledge, to do more than advert to the fact that in Greece a similar
system, based on prosody, is found as early as the Attic orators.
It was by degrees modified in accordance with a change of pro
nunciation, and the result was not imlike that which came
about in Latin. See Eduard Norden, Die antike Kunstprosa,
1898.

the Accentual Cursus 93
The Cursus of the Roman Chancery was
therefore no new invention, stiU less a revival
based on a misimderstanding of the ancient
system. Its author, be he Alberic of Monte
Cassino or some Itahan before him, no doubt
started from the study of the classical or sub-
classical writers on rhetoric; but he adapted
their rules to the facts of the pronunciation of
his own day. He thus reflected an historical
development: accent, not quantity, was the
one element that could be considered. Beyond
introducing the system as a rigid code for the
Chancery, the only vital change made by John
of Gaeta and his successors was not an innova
tion but a hmitation. By forbidding any other
Caesura than that now laid down for each of the
three endings, they made less demands on the
memory of the Dictator, but at the same time
they deprived the Cursus of the variety and
flexibihty which it had possessed in early times.
It was soon found that the strict rules excluded
some sonorous phrases which on other grounds
appeared weU suited for the close of a period;
these were after a time admitted exceptionaUy,
but not in the purest period of the Chancery.
Some of these hcences are in fact the accentual
representatives of ancient forms when the Cretic
was resolved: thus Compositioni, Sxcommunicd-
tionem, Virtutis operdtio. The medieval theorists
treated these as a succession of Spondees, but
there can be hardly a doubt as to their proper
analysis. Again the Cursus Velox might be
extended by a syUable, Fletibus silpplicdntium^

94 The Cursus in Papal
which coincides with an accepted metrical type
(Ziehnski's Form 4). Of the three anomalous
types remaining, two {e.g. Precibus nostris, lugiter
postulat) differ from the Cursus only in the Caesura,
and may have survived from reminiscence of
the ancient forms when the Caesura was not
arbitrarily restricted; and the third {Fovemur
meritis) may possibly have arisen from a confused
apphcation of the Molossus base to an accentual
phrase. But aU these hcences are rare: they
are either excrescences upon the strict Cursus,
or they are survivals which could not be sup
pressed. It has been already mentioned that there
were some parts of the document which were
by common agreement exempt from rule. These
were the Protocols, the Title, Address, and
Greeting, and the Date ; secondly, quotations (for
instance) from the Bible or from documents;
and thirdly, the enumeration of properties granted
or confirmed. Nor were the rules ever completely
carried out except with regard to the terminations.
As for the beginning and middle of a sentence
I have said that httle was done more than to
lay down general directions; and even these
were not consistently observed. The law against
consecutive Dactyls, for example, was often
violated. In the twelfth century the regularity of the
rhythm of Papal Bulls increases from pontificate
to pontificate. Under Innocent III the system,
hke everything else in the Papal administration.

Letters and Privileges 95
reaches its highest point of perfection so far as
Letters are concerned. But in Privileges we
stiU find such terminations as Apostolice sedis
auctoritdte. Pax Domini nostri Ihesu Christi, even
aliena fiat. The Cursus was in fact more slowly
introduced into the more solemn documents than
it was into Letters. Probably the notaries were
reluctant to alter the traditional forms of PrivUeges,
aU the more since the beneficiaries would not
welcome a document the style of which did
not accord with what they had been in the habit
of seeing. Besides, it was the Letters which
gave most free play to originality of composition,
so that in them the new rules would naturaUy
first find expression. It has indeed been supposed
that the reason for this distinction lay in the
fact that the Cursus could be recognized at once
as the special product of the Papal Chancery:
it was a safeguard which was desirable for Let
ters which had not the protection of the grand
dating with the Monogram and Rota and the
other conspicuous marks of PrivUeges; whereas
Privileges were sufficiently protected by the so
lemnity of their external aspect. But this ex
planation wiU not serve, for the Cursus quickly
passed into the schools of Western Europe, and
there were writers everywhere who were able
and ready to apply its rules. It cannot have
served long as the special cachet of Papal
documents. I beheve the true reason why
Privileges yielded less promptly to the re
formed system is that which I have just
indicated, that people liked to have their title-

96 Alternation of Endings
deeds drawn up in a form to which they were
accustomed ^.
Writers on Dictamen in the thirteenth century
attempted to construct precise rules as to choices
of terminations appropriate for the several divisions
of the sentence, for the comma and the period,
the half-close and the fuU close. There was a
general agreement that the sentence should end
with the Cursus Velox; but some writers laid
down that the Planus and Tardus should alternate
in the course of the phrase, whUe others considered
the Tardus suitable for the smaUest pauses (as
of a comma), and the Planus for the half-close,
or colon 2. It wiU not, however, be foimd that
these elaborations of the system were ever regularly
carried out in practice. The Cursus Velox indeed
formed the normal termination of the sentence,
but it also occupied a place, nearly as frequently
as the others, in the middle; and whUe a sense
for variety recommended that the same cadences
should not be used consecutively, and much
pains were taken that documents setting forth
important definitions or decisions should be com
posed with the utmost attention to the hterary
canons of the age, it was deemed sufficient in
ordinary business letters to see that the plain
rules of the Cursus were not violated without
paying regard to the further refinements of its
^ Since this lecture was completed I have had the pleasure
of reading Mr Clark's admirably lucid survey of the metrical
and accentual Cursus contained in his lecture on Prose Rhythm
in English (1913).
2 See Valois, pp. 194 f.

Specimen of a short Mandate 97
use. I give a specimen of such a letter in a
mandate of Innocent III making an appointment^,
in which I have indicated the accents and have
noted the type of Cursus by the letters p, t, and
V in the margin.
Inter omnes muniti6ne3 et castra p
quae Romana t6net eccl6sia, t
munitionem et castrtim Montis Fiasconis non solum intendit p
sed ciipit
et provid6ntius giibernari v
et studi6sius ctistodiri. v
Cum ergo de tuae fidei ptiritdte v
indubitam fidiiciam h&beamus, V
et de tuae discreti6nis indiistria t
notitiam geramus exp6rtam, p
custodiam et gubernationem ipsius muniti6nis et castri p
tibi quandiu nobis aut successoribus n6stris placiierit t
tanquam fideh et vassaUo nostro diiximus c6mmitt6ndum : v
Per apostohca scripta mandantes, p
quatenus, sicut charam habes gratiam divinam et nostram, p
munitionem ipsam et castrum P
cum omni di1ig6ntia et caut^la V
cust6dias et gub6rnes, v
adhibens uni versa quae fiierint necessaria, (Form 4) v
ita ut de contingentibus nihil omittas. P
Nos enim dilecto fiho B. castellano Montis Fiasconis per p
apostohca scripta mandamus,
ut palatium cum omnibus quae sunt in 60 resignet, p
et servi6ntibus tmiv^rsis v
ut tibi rever6nter int6ndant; P
consuhbus etiam atque populo quod tibi tanquam suo respdn- v
deant cdtstellano 1 Reg. VI. 105, 30 June 1203,

P.P.C.

Our survey of the changes through which the
Papal Chancery passed and of the characteristics
of its productions has now advanced to two
different points of time. I began with the history
of the CoUege of Notaries, and described the
general structure of Papal documents and the
modes by which the earlier specimens of them
have been transmitted. This brought me down to
the pontificate of Hadrian I and the reign of
Charles the Great, and ended the First Period of
the history. Next I examined the forms of
documents during the two centuries and a half
of transition, extending to the accession of Leo IX
and making up the Second Period, a time in which
there exist a fairly large number of documents pre
served in originals. Then I resumed the history
of the Chancery from the time of Hadrian I, but
I carried it on seventy-five years beyond the
election of Leo IX, because, though his pontificate
marks a clear line of division so far as the forms of
documents are concerned, and though it introduced
important foreign elements into the Chancery, yet
the pohcy which he instituted was such as his
immediate successors were unable to maintain
consistently, and it was not until the early part
of the twelfth century that the old local elements

Forms of Documents from Leo IX 99
in the Chancery were finaUy excluded. But by
continuing my account down to Cahxtus II I
passed beyond the time at which the style of
composition of Papal documents was reformed,
and it seemed therefore best to introduce at
that stage a description of the Cursus Curiae
Romanae. Thus the history of the Chancery has reached
1124; the employment of the medieval Cursus
begins in 1088 ; whUe I have left the forms of the
documents lagging behind in 1049. This irregu
larity, which I confess, was not unintentional.
I wished to vary the subjects with which I had
to deal, and it was impossible to make a sharp
dividing line for each of them at the year 1049.
I now go back to that year and proceed to consider
the forms which documents assumed after the
accession of Leo IX, the Third Period in the
diplomatic history of the Roman Chancery^.
From an external point of view the great
features brought into the system by Leo IX were
^ As the subject involves the consideration of a large number
of smaU details, many of which I ara obliged to leave unnoticed,
I may refer to the fuUer discussion of them given by F. Kalten
brunner, Bemerkungen iiber die ausseren Merkmale der Papstur-
kunden des 12. Jahrhimderts, in Mittheilungen, i. (1880) 373-410,
and by W. Diekamp, Zum papstUchen Urkundenwesen des xi.,
xn., und der ersten Halfte des xiii. Jahrhunderts, in Mitthei
lungen, ui. (1882), 665-626. In reviewing my account I have
derived assistance from Dr von Pflugk-Harttung's work on Die
BuUen der Papste, 1901, which is in fact a commentary on his
huge coUection of Specimina. While the author's proposals for
the classification of the documents are pedantic and his hypo
theses often fanciful, it is right to acknowledge his great in
dustry in the accumulation of facts, his accurate palaeographical
observation, and his conscientious record of details.
7—2

100 Privileges and Letters
the aboUtion of the Bene Valete written at length
and the substitution of a Monogram, and the
introduction of the Rota to match it on the left-
hand side of the lower part of the document.
These characteristics are only found on PrivUeges,
a form of document which henceforward is con
spicuously distinguished from the less imposing
Letter. The distinction between these two types,
and the estabhshment of their nomenclature, were
first plainly laid down by that great scholar
Leopold Delisle^, to whom the study of Papal
diplomatic owes perhaps as much — and it is
difficult to say more — as any other branch of
medieval criticism. Previous writers had spoken
obscurely of Great and Little BuUs, without
clearly bringing out their fundamental difference
in external form and indeed in purpose. The
terms PrivUege and Letter precisely indicate this
distinction. The PrivUege is as a rule the instru
ment of the grant or confirmation of rights of
property and jurisdiction to churches and rehgious
houses. It was a title-deed, to be preserved in a
muniment chest and produced on solemn occasions.
Therefore it was drawn up on a great skin of
parchment and made imposing by means of
elaborate formulae and attestations and certificates
of authenticity. Letters, on the other hand, were
down to the middle of the fifteenth century the
regular vehicle of the Popes' official correspondence
whether on spiritual or pohtical subjects. They
form a class of much greater historical and legal
1 M^moire sur les Actes d'Innocent III, in the Bibhotheque
de r]Scole des Chartes, 4th series, iv. (1868), 16-22.

The Rota 101
importance than Privileges. Decretals, encyclical
letters, buUs defining the Pope's authority or
denouncing aUeged invasions of it, equaUy with
commissions, licences, and other documents of
every-day business, aU belong to the form of Letters.
For the present I limit myself to the Privilege,
and begin by describing the Rota and Monogram.
These were the first public marks of Leo's activity.
After his election at Rome in February 1049 he
did not enter the Lateran Palace until 13 April,
and on the 22nd the Rota makes its appearance i.
This is an elaboration of the Cross which preceded
the Bene Valete ; but now it is surrounded by two
concentric circles. At first between the hmbs of
the Cross we read simply the Pope's name.

But this arrangement was not apphcable to the
names chosen by Leo IX's successors, and a
number of new forms were employed. In the
foUowing hsts the names of Antipopes are placed
within brackets^.

IHS
Victor II : 
PETETJS

XPS
PAULTTS

Stephen IX: ^r Tr
ic|xc
1 Montfaucon, Diarium Itahcum, pp. 325 ff., 1702 [Jaffe,
Reg. 4166]. Cf. Spec. 18.
^ The writing on both parts of the Rota varies between
capitals and minuscules. As I do not attempt to give facsimiles
I have used capitals throughout and have extended some of the
contractions. I have also disregarded variations in spelling.

102

The Rota

PAX

Benedict X:

Nicholas II:

Alexander II:

Gregory VII:

[Clement III :

XPI

XPC

OMNIBUS

PETBUS

MAGNUS

FIDELIBUS

VINCIT

ET MAGNA

MISEBATIONES

PAULUS

DNS NE

SUPEB OMNIA

IHC

VIETUS EIVS

TUE DNE

DNS

OPEEA TUA

XO

NE

with CONFIEMA HOC DEUS QUOD OPBEATUS ES IN NOBIS Written
on the arms of the Cross.]

Urban II :

SOS
PETEUS

UE PP

scs
PAULUS

BANUS n

The style adopted by Urban II became the
accepted one. It had the advantage of simplicity ;
and besides it reproduced the legend on the two
sides of the leaden bulla attached to the document,
and thus formed a hnk between the Privilege and
the seal which authenticated it.
Round the circumference, between the two
circles, is written the Device. This is almost always
a text from the Bible which was adopted once for

The Device 103
aU by each Pope and retained throughout his
pontificate. The foUowing is a hst of the Devices
found from their introduction to the time of
Innocent III^
Leo IX : miseeicoedia domini plena est tbeea.
, Victor II: victoeis -n- sanctae eomanab et
apostolicae sedis papae 2.
Stephen IX: ipse est pax nostea.
Benedict X: domni benedicti decimi papae.
Nicholas II: conhema hoc deus quod opeeatus es
IN nobis.
Alexander II : i. exaltavit me deus in vietute beachii
sui.
u. deus nostee eefugium et vietus^.
Gregory VII: (No device round the circle).
[Clement III : i. Domini est teeea et plenitudo eius.
U. VEEBO DOMINI CAELI ITEMATI SUNT.]
Victor III: (No original preserved).
Urban II: i. benedictus deus et patee domini
NOSTEi lESU oheisti (sometimes fol
lowed by amen).
U. LEGIMUS • EIEMAVIMUS*-
1 I have taken almost all the Devices from Dr von Pflugk-
Harttung's Specimina, and have completed the series from the
data supplied by Jaff6 at the beginning of each pontificate.
The list given in Cardinal Pitra's Analecta novissima Spicilegii
Solesmensis, i. 310-312 (1885), is inaccurately drawn up; it does
not distinguish between the texts written round the Rota and
those in the centre and even includes one found only on the
bulla. Antipopes of whose Devices I have found no examples
are omitted.
^ An alternative form is victobis pbime sedis episcopi et
¦DNTVEBSAtlS PAPAE SECUNDI.
^ A document of 15 May 1066 contains both these devices,
the second written between the circles, the first outside them.
Spec. 39 (1). The second text is sometimes miswritten, with dei
for DEUS and nostbum for nostbe.
* This inscription (Spec. 48 [4]) or legimus • amentiemavimus ¦
AMEN (Spec. 48 [2 and 3]) is foimd occasionaUy, from October
1096 onwards. In a Privilege for St Basle near Rheims Urban
wrote LBGIMTJS • EIBMAVIMT7S • SANCTE • BASOLE (SpCO. 48 [1]).

104

The Device

Paschal II: veebo domini celi fiemati sunt.
Gelasius II: (No specimen of a solemn Privilege^).
Calixtus II: eiemamentum est dominus timbntibus
EUM.
Honorius II: oculi domini supee iustos.
Innocent II: adiuva nos deus salutaeis nostee.
[Anacletus II: dominus foetitudo plebis sue.]
Celestine II : fiat pax in vietute tua et habun-
dantia in tueeibus tuis.
Lucius II : ostende nobis domine miseeicoediam
TUAM.
Eugenius III: fac mecum domine signum in bonum.
Anastasius IV: custodi me domine ut pupilla oculi.
Hadrian IV: oculi mei sempee ad dominum.
Alexander III: vias tuas domine demonstea michi.
[Victor IV : tu es gloeia mea tu es susceptoe meus
tu exaltas caput meum domine.]
[Paschal III: adiutoe meus esto domine; ne deee-
LINQUAS ME.]
[Calixtus III: consbeva me domine quoniam speeavi
IN TE^.]
Lucius III: ADIUVA nos deus salutaeis NOSTEE.
Urban III: ad tb domine levavi antmam meam.
Gregory VIII: dieige me domine in vbeitate tua.
Clement III: doce mb domine faceee voluntatem
TUAM.
Celestiae III: peefice geessus meos in semitis tuis.
Innocent III: fac mecum domine signum in bonum.
Thus in a century and a half the principle that
the Device should contain a text continued almost
unbroken. Shortly after its introduction indeed
Victor II and Benedict X (if he be reckoned a
Pope) preferred to inscribe their title preceded by
a smaU Cross, which was sometimes repeated at
intervals more than once; but the form once

1 Pflugk-Harttung, Die BuUen der Papste, p. 263.
" So in Spec. 95, from Psalm xv. [xvi.] i; in Spec. 94 (3) the
last three words are transposed.

The Monogram and the Comma 105
chosen was maintained unaltered by all the ac
knowledged Popes except Alexander II and
Urban II. The change made by the latter sub
stituted for the Device what was in effect an
additional confirmation^. But Urban's example
was not foUowed by subsequent Popes. It will
be observed that, while Lucius III adopted the
Device of Innocent II, and Innocent III that of
Eugenius III, every other Pope invented a text
for himself 2.
As the Rota was an amphfied Cross, so con
versely the Monogram which stands on the right
hand was a compressed Bene Valete. It is like
other Monograms such as had long been used by
the Emperors. But their monogram contained
the letters of the Emperor's name, while that of
the Pope represented the final Greeting. The
letters of the words are there, but the same letters
have to be used more than once. The Monogram
varies in size: sometimes it is nearly four inches
high. Closely associated with it is the Comma
placed on its right. But this was not an invention
of Leo IX ; it is found a good deal earlier. It has
been explained as a mark of punctuation^; but
its place is often taken by strokes which look hke
an abbreviation of Subscripsi^. Possibly the
1 Pflugk-Harttung, Die BuUen der Papste, p. 223.
^ Later Popes were less ingenious. Honorius III and Gregory X
borrowed the Device of Celestine III ; Gregory IX, Urban IV, and
Innocent VI that of Eugenius III and Innocent III ; Clement IV
and Innocent V that of Hadrian IV ; and Eugenius IV actually
that of the Antipope Paschal III : see Pitra, pp. 311 f.
2 Pflugk-Harttung, in Mittheilungen, v. (1884) 434; Giry,
Manuel de Diplomatique, p. 620; cf. p. 697.
* Ibid., p. 671.

106 The Comma
Comma is a corruption or ornamental perversion
of this abbreviated Subscripsi, for it takes the
place of what unmistakeably stands for Subscripsi.
At the time when the Bene Valete was written in
fuU it was usuaUy preceded and foUowed by a
Cross. Then under Benedict VIII the second
Cross is replaced by a very distinct • // • -^ ; and under
his successor John XIX this • /J • becomes a complex
of commas (. ' .)^. Under Clement II it may be
reduced to a single comma ^, or it may be three
composite signs, one above the other (>)*; l>ut
rehcs of a long / may stiU be found^. The Comma
had become conventional, and probably its origin
was forgotten. What Leo IX did was to magnify
it enormously, so that it becomes more than half
as taU as the Monogram itself (.•. O)®- But
it did not survive long. Under Stephen IX and
again under Nicholas II its place was taken by a
httle rosette or quatrefoiP. Nor was it always
written, and when it does appear there are usuaUy
signs of a long J ^ which seems to be a reminis
cence of the Subscripsi. I do not think that the
Comma is found after Gregory VII. A brief
interval foUows, and then the Comma is finaUy
superseded by the Pope's Subscription in fuU^.
The great innovation made by Leo IX was a
1 Spec. 10, 11. " Ibid. 12.
3 Ibid. 14 (1). < Ihid. 14 (2), 16.
5 Ihid. 16. 8 Ihid. 17 (2).
' Ihid. 17; Kehr, Scrinium et Palatium, in MittheUungen,
Suppl. vol. vi. 90.
« Spec. 30, 35 (4). » See below, p. 109.

Varieties of Writing 107
pictorial one. The Rota and Monogram and the
exaggerated Comma stand out conspicuously from
the rest of the document. But Leo did not alter
the formulae: In Perpetuum had for ages con
cluded the' address^. Nor was he the inventor of
the tall lateraUy compressed Minuscule letters in
which the first hne was written. That hne had
long been written in Capitals or Uncials of various
types, and Leo employed every sort of style;
while on the other hand the compressed Minuscule
in the opening Protocol had made its appearance
a httle before his pontificate, under Clement II 2.
Apart from the Rota and Monogram, which
emerge immediately after Leo's election, though
they are not found quite invariably^, the distinctive
marks of the Privilege are only developed by
degrees. In some BuUs of 1062 and 1063 the
name of Alexander II is written in Capitals between
the Rota and the Monogram*; and exceptionaUy
under Victor II and Nicholas II ^ we may find
witnesses. These witnesses are of interest, because
they lead us to the question of the autograph
element in the document. A BuU of Victor II
for Monte Cassino, June 1057, is not only written
throughout by the hand of Humbert, Cardinal

* As an instance of the confusion which prevailed in the
Chancery of Alexander II I note a document with some of the
features of a Privilege which has only the Pope's name in
Capitals and in which the Address is foUowed by the epistolary
Greetmg: Spec. 102 (1) [Jaff6, Reg. 4490].
2 Spec. 16.
^ See Kehr, Scrinivun et Palatium, p. 86, note 4.
* See three examples in Spec. 31.
Spec. 29 (2), 30 (4).

108 Autograph Elements in the Device
Bishop of Selva Candida, but is subscribed by
him and by Hildebrand, Cardinal Deacon^. Hilde
brand's autograph as Pope appears in the Device
which he wrote in the field of his Rota 2. Before
him there are examples of the handwriting of
Nicholas II and of Alexander 11^ in at least the
upper half of the field. Apparently this part was
reserved for completion by the highest authority
that could be obtained, if possible by the Pope him
self ; and sometimes its completion was omitted*.
It was the technical Firmatio. Possibly the same
hand inserted the Cross, or at least the horizontal
bar of it. When this was finished the Device was
added^. The type of Privilege slowly evolved, under
the manifold changes of organization which were
made in the Chancery during the eleventh cen
tury, was not completely estabhshed until the
pontificate of Paschal II (1099-1118) when John
of Gaeta was ChanceUor. Under him begins the
1 Spec. 26 [Jaff6, Reg. 4368]. Humbert's handwriting wiU
also be found in the Data of all the Privileges of Stephen IX and
in most of those of Nicholas II of which the originals are pre
served. See Kehr, Diplomatische Miszellen, ill., in Nachrichten
von der Koniglichen Gesellschaft der Wissensehaf ten zu Gottingen,
PhiloL-hist. Klasse, 1900, pp. 104 f.
^ Four examples will be found in Spec. 41. These are of
18 January 1074 [Jaff6, Reg. 4818], 7 March 1074 [n. 4940],
24 March 1074 [n. 4945], and 4 April 1080 [n. 6160].
^ See Pflugk-Harttung, Die BuUen der Papste, pp. 184,
196 ff.
* Thus Nicholas II, 25 April 1061 : Spec. 28 (2).
' This at least was the rule later, and an examination of
the ink leads to the opinion that it prevailed from the time
of Cahxtus II: see Kaltenbrunner, in Mittheilungen, i. 383;
Diekamp, ibid., iii. 574 ff. But it may have been observed
earher: see above, p. 74 note 3.

Characteristics of the Privilege 109
Subscription of the Pope^ written at length
between the Rota and the Monogram.
Ego PaschaUs Cathohce Ecclesie Episcopus //.
We may now expect to find the foUowing features
in the document^.
1. The opening Protocol is written in lateraUy
compressed Minuscules, the Title and Address
being terminated by In Perpetuum.
2. The Text ends with one or more Amens.
3. There are the Rota and the Monogram.
4. Between them are the Subscriptions of the
Pope and of some Cardinals, the latter each pre
ceded by a Cross 3; if there are many they are
arranged in three columns, the Bishops in the
middle and the Priests and Deacons to left and
right*. 5. The Scriptum and the Datum may both
appear; but the former is dying out and is not
found after 1124^. Of the officers concerned with
these elements I have already treated^. After
Calixtus II the ChanceUor no longer writes the
^ This is said to be only partly autograph. Diekamp thinks
that Hadrian IV wrote the Ego and Alexander III and his
successors only the E; ihid., pp. 578 f.
^ See for an instance Spec. 64.
* According to Kaltenbrunner and Diekamp, after the docu
ment had received the Pope's Subscription and been adorned
with the Rota and Monogram, it was chculated among the
Cardinals, who each wrote a Cross and began the Subscription,
but left it to be finished by a clerk; uhi supra, i. 387, ui. 580-687.
* Spec. 74 (1).
* See above, p. 74. It has been suggested that it was the
omission of the Scriptum which led to the elaboration and the
multipheation of the Amens by way of compensation. An
example of the Scriptum in 1122 is in Spec. 69.
• Above, pp. 64r-75.

110 Modes of reckoning the Year
whole Datum, but inserts, or occasionaUy omits to
insert, his name in a gap left open for it^. The
Datum was from the time of Victor II, but not
always, furnished with the name of the place
where the document was dated: Datum in castro
Casino^ or the like.
The date of time requires special attention, for
towards the end of the eleventh century both the
reckoning of the Christian year and of the Indiction
became subject to variation^. Down to Urban II
the former was regularly understood to begin with
Christmas. The only exception was during a
fortnight in 1060, when Nicholas II was at Florence
or in its immediate neighbourhood from 8 to 20
January and employed the calculus Florentinus
beginning on the 25th March after the commence
ment of our calendar year. But with Urban II
uniformity ceases. He made use of the Florentine
computation and of that of Pisa, which began the
year twelve months earher*, alternatively with
the year of the Nativity; and this chronological
laxity persisted until the death of Innocent 11^.
With Eugenius III the calculus Florentinus became
the estabhshed style ®.
Moreover, after Gregory VII the old Greek
Indiction beginning on 1 September no longer
always prevailed: the Indiction of 24 September
1 Spec. 64, 74; cf. 80. ^ Stephen IX, 1057: Spec. 27.
3 Compare above, pp. 49 f.
* The Pisan style is found especially in documents of 1096
and 1096.
5 Calixtus II does not seem to have favoured the Florentine
reckoning. ' But even later Alexander III sometimes began the year at
Christmas.

and the Indiction 111
known as that of Bede, and the so-caUed Roman
Indiction of Christmas, forced their way in. The
first of these is seldom found in the documents of
Urban II, who generaUy employed the other two ;
under his successors on the contrary, down to
and including Eugenius III, no example of the
Bedan style has been noticed, the Greek and the
Roman Indictions being the only reckonings used.
Then under Anastasius IV and Hadrian IV the
Roman Indiction prevails exclusively. FinaUy,
Alexander III, though he uses this sometimes,
generaUy adopts the Indiction of Bede. Thus
the practice of Alexander III, which continued
in the Papal Chancery down to modern times,
represented in both points the rule observed at
Florence, where the year began on 25 March of
our calendar year and the Indiction on the pre
ceding 24 September^.
The form of Solemn Privilege, or Great BuU,
with its manifold elaboration, was found incon
venient for use on aU occasions, and a simphfied
type was constructed early in the twelfth century.
Indeed, before this time there are examples of
the more pictorial features of the Privilege being
^ I take these chronological statements from the data supphed
by Jaff6 at the beginning of the Regesta of the several Popes.
To verify them would involve the examination of several thousand
documents and the recalculation of every date in them. But
I should add that in some particulars Jaffa's results have not
always been accepted. Thus Dr H. Grotefend asserts that
Urban II used only the Indiction of Bede, and that Eugenius III
(from 1147) and his successors employed all three systems:
Zeitrechnung des Deutschen Mittelalters und der Neuzeit, i. 93 6,
1891.

112 Simple Privileges
dispensed with. It is possible that John of Gaeta,
with his long experience as ChanceUor, designed,
when he became Pope, as Gelasius II, in 1118, to
abohsh once for aU the Rota and Monogram, and
in their place to write at the foot of the document
his autograph Subscription and Device^:
Ego Gelasius ecclesie catholicf episcopus //. Signum
manus mee. Deus in loco sancto suo^-
But if this was his intention, it was not carried
out by his successors. They might omit the Rota
and Monogram, but they hardly ever wrote the
Device after their subscription^. What they did
was to create — ^what had been used occasionaUy
before* — ^the type of the Simple PrivUege, which
is marked not only by the absence of the Rota
and Monogram but also by the substitution of
the epistolary Greeting, Salutem et apostolicam
benedictionem, for the majestic In Perpetuum. But
for these two changes the characteristics of the
Privilege are retained: the document stUl begins
with taU Minuscules; it usuaUy bears the Sub
scriptions of Pope^ and Cardinals; and above aU
there is the fuU Chancery Date, Datum per manum
lohannis cancellarii, or the hke. Intermediate
varieties may for a time be found, and the fixed
form of the Simple PrivUege is not established
until the pontificate of Innocent II (1130-1143).
1 Cf. Pflugk-Harttung, Die BuUen der Papste, p. 93.
2 Spec. 103.
^ One instance exists under Innocent II, 5 June 1133: Spec.
106. * Thus, by Urban II : Spec. 102.
<• To make up for the absence of the Rota Calixtus II prefixed
)^ to his name, and his successors a Cross.

Letters 113
Before that time a Simple PrivUege may look very
much hke a Letter, and one may be deceived by
the Greeting, Salutem et apostolicam benedictionem ;
but if it has the fuU Chancery date, as 'Given at
the Lateran by the hand of so and so, or at aU
events a date written on a line by itseK separated
from the text, it is a PrivUege; if the words
' Given at the Lateran,' at such a date, immediately
foUow the text, it is a Letter. The Simple
Privilege was in fact a modification of the form of
the Solemn Privilege which adopted some of the
features of the Letter. It died out under Inno
cent III when it had been found possible to effect
the same object by a development of the Letter^.
The type of the Letter had been settled long
before the Simple PrivUege came into existence,
and for the sake of clearness it wiU be best to
leave this intermediate form out of our minds, and
to contrast the Letter with the Solemn Privilege.
The distinction in appearance and in structure is
a broad one. To begin with, the Letter is a much
smaUer document. It has no Rota or Monogram,
no Subscriptions, no statement about the writing
or the official dating. There is a Greeting after
the Address, and the Text of the document is
directly foUowed, on the same hne if there is room,
by a simple record of the place, day, and month 2.
But this precise method of dating did not come
in untU the time of Urban II. The Indiction
may sometimes be added untU Cahxtus II, but
1 See Kaltenbrunner, in Mittheilungen, i. 403 f .
" Spec. 110.
P. P.O. 8

114 Dates in Letters
it was omitted by his successor Honorius II.
This remained the rule, except during the short
pontificate of Gregory VIII (1187-1188) and the
beginning of that of Clement III, until 11 February
1188 when the Pontifical year, pontificatus nostri
anno primo (or the hke), was introduced into
Letters. This Pontifical year came to rank as
the most important element in the date. It was
never abbreviated, but always written out at
length^- These details are of service in helping
us to ascribe to the right Pope Letters of which we
do not possess the originals, as Popes of the same
name were many and their number was never
given except on their seals. Dehsle has shown how
they enable us to distinguish between the Letters
of Innocent II, Innocent III, and Innocent IV.
Moreover, the date of place wiU often of itself
settle the proper attribution. By these means
also we are furnished with a prima facie argu
ment against the genuineness of Letters in which
a form inconsistent with the period makes its
appearance 2.
During the earUer part of the period very few
Letters are preserved in originals. We have three
of Alexander II and two of Gregory VII. They do
not become abundant untU the time of Innocent II
and Eugenius III. They are written on smaU
obloiig pieces of parchment, and space is econo
mized in every possible way. This is a great
mark of distinction from the form of the PrivUege,
in which considerations of space were disregarded.
^ See Delisle, M^moire, pp. 59 f.
« Ibid., pp. 60-67.

Letters of Grace and of Justice 115
In the earher time the Pope's name was indicated
only by his initial; it was not until Innocent II
that it was usually written out in fuU. The Text
commonly consisted only of a Statement of the
Case and an Enacting Clause, a Narratio and a
Dispositio ; but in the twelfth century, for reasons
which wiU be explained immediately, certain kinds
of I.ietters came to appropriate some of the features
of PrivUeges. Letters were in the first place the instruments
of the record of the Pope's administrative and
judicial acts: they contained his orders and in a
large proportion of cases may be described as
Mandates. But an order to redress a grievance, a
commission to enquire into aUeged irregularities,
and the Uke deal with an affair of the moment,
and when the command has been executed the
purpose of the document is accomphshed. In the
twelfth century the scope of the Letter was ex
tended and it began to deal with matters which had
previously formed the subject of Privileges ; that is
to say, it came to confer permanent rights. There
thus arose two varieties of Letters, which while pre
serving a common type were distinguished not only
in their purport but also in their mode of writing
and in the attachment of the leaden bulla. These
two classes are TituU or Litterae de Gratia, and
Mandamenta or Litterae de lustitia. According
to their contents the one may be caUed Licences
or Indults, the other Mandates or Commissions.
In the former the seal was attached by a sUk cord,
in the latter by a string of hemp ; and so they were
caUed litterae cum filo serico and litterae cum filo
8—2

116 Litterae de Gratia
canapis. In earher times Letters, hke PrivUeges,
had silk ties more commonly than string: now,
grace is uniformly associated with the softer
material, justice with the rougher '^. , Another
reason for the choice of string for Mandates was
very hkely that these were not intended to be
preserved after their order had been carried out,
so that it was unnecessary to go to the expense of
silk. These distinctions were developed by degrees.
The special use of silk and hemp was first adopted
by Innocent II (1130-1143), but the distinction
was not perhaps inflexibly observed untU the
niiddle of the thirteenth century. The employ
ment of an elaborate and ornamental caUigraphy
for Tituh appears under Lucius II (1144-1145).
I shaU now say something of these two classes
of Letters separately. Letters of Grace or Tituh
are documents by which the Pope grants or
confirms rights, confers benefices, promulgates
statutes or decrees, or decides causes. Their
characteristic sentences open with Auctoritate prae-
sentium indulgemus or inhibemus, Auctoritate apos
tolica confirmamus, Auctoritate sedis apostolicae
confirmamus, or the like. They are grants, con
firmations, hcences, indults, decrees, of many sorts.
Frequently they fulfil the same purpose which had
in earlier times been effected by the PrivUege,
and from the Privilege they adopt three elements,
though these are not necessarUy present: the
^ This distinction was first pointed out by Dehsle, M6moire,
pp. 19 f. It may be said to have been regularly observed, for
the few exceptions which have been noticed can be accounted
for by special circumstances.

Litterae de lustitia 117
Preamble or Arenga, and the Final Clauses Nulli
ergo and Si quis autem. These are taken over
without alteration into the Letter of Grace. The
Text is more formal than that of the Mandate, and
the wiiting is more decorative, because the docu
ment was intended to be preserved. And thus,
after a period of fluctuating forms, it came to be
laid down that the Pope's name must be written in
elongated letters hke the first hne of a PrivUege,
the initial letter being raised higher with open
spaces within it and sometimes floriations. The
Address must begin with a large Majuscule initial.
Marks of abbreviation are made with an orna
mental sign (8 or 7), and what is most conspicuous
ct and st are written with a space between them
and a horizontal hgature resembling the 6t stiU
used in certain types. These features are borrowed
from the Privilege.
As distinguished from Tituh, Letters of Justice
or Mandates convey the Pope's administrative
orders, by injunction or prohibition or by the
appointment of commissioners to carry out some
definite work; they include also the mass of his
official correspondence on matters of aU sorts,
both pohtical {Litterae secretae) and administrative
{Litterae de Curia) as they came in time to be dis
tinguished. They were produced in great numbers,
and practical considerations demanded that they
should be as flexible and as httle encumbered by
formulae as they could be. They may read hke
the ordinary letters of other churchmen, but when
they declare the Pope's command they usuaUy
contain such words as Per apostolica scripta or

118 Litterae in Forma Communi
Praecipiendo mandamus. The Address often omits
the name of the dignitary to whom the mandate
was sent and gives instead two fuU points. This
was done not from ignorance of the name but in
order to secure that the order should be carried
out in the case of another dignitary having been
appointed after the document was issued. As
for the writing, when the type was fuUy settled,
only the initial letter of the Pope's name was
written in Majuscule. In hke manner the first
word in the Address began with a plain Majuscule
initial. Signs of abbreviation are simple and
without ornamentation^.
The immense increase in the Pope's business
in the twelfth century made it impossible that he
should personaUy read and examine every docu
ment for the issue of which he made himself
responsible. If it was a Letter of a normal pattern,
a Licence, Dispensation, or the like, it was sufficient
that he should satisfy himself that it carried out
his intention: it was caUed a Letter in forma
communi or sub forma communi, and its terms were
left to the Chancery officials. But if it contained
new or disputable matter, a definition of law or a
statement of pohcy, it was kept back for the Pope
tp hear it read through and approve it. Such
documents were caUed Litterae legendae. By the
end of the thirteenth century these two categories
1 For these rules see below. Appendix v. There are good
facsimiles, on a reduced scale, of Mandates of Iimocent II (1138),
Eugenius III (1145), and Innocent IV (1254), in F. Steffens!
Lateuiische Palaographie (1903-1906), plates Ixvu, Ixxv. The
last may be compared with a Letter of Grace of Boniface VIII
(1299) on the same plate.

The Seal 119
were distinguished by the form of the Capital
initial which foUowed the Greeting ^
AU Papal documents, whether PrivUeges or
Letters, were authenticated by the bulla or leaden
seaP, which was attached by a string of sUk or
hemp. We have seen how these two materials
came to be appropriated to special tjrpes of
Letters. The seal itseU, which is of high antiquity,
contained simply the Pope's name in the genitive,
LEONIS PAPAE, with some decoration ; thus Leo IX
inserted his number in the middle, ™. His
successors attempted more ornamental forms,
sometimes with inscriptions round the circum
ference. Thus Victor II and Nicholas II showed
the bust of St Peter and a hand dehvering to him
a key, with a legend round it, in the one case
+ TU PRO ME NAVEM LIQTJISTI SUSCIPE OLAVEM,
in the other + tibi petke dabo claves rbgni
celorum; and the counter-seal of Victor bore a
view of a church and that of Nicholas the design
of a gate of Rome, surmounted by the words
AUREA ROMA, and encircled by the Pope's name,
VICTORIS papae n, SECUNDI NICOLAI PAPE^. But
before long a fixed pattern was laid down by

1 See Dehsle, M6moire, pp. 21 f.
^ No example of a golden bulla is known in the Middle Ages,
but the use of such a material is attested in the thirteenth century.
See Bresslau, i. 939 note 6 (1st ed.). On two occasions, in times
of difficulty, Gregory VII dispensed with his leaden bulla lest
it should be seized and attached to a forged document : Reg. vni.
40, Epist. Collect, xi (Monum. Greg., ed. Jaff6, pp. 492, 568).
Probably on these occasions he made use of a wax seal.
» Spec. 131 (7, 8).

120 The Designs on the Seal
Urban II, who placed his name in the nominative
on the seal, and the names of the Apostles with
a Cross on the counterseal^

vbba s -
NVSII PE
•PP- TEVS

PAV LVS

The Apostles' heads, which had appeared on
Gregory VII's seal, were restored by Paschal II,
a Cross was inserted between them, and the letters
s. PA. s. PE. written above; and this type, with
such modifications of detaU as approved themselves
to the taste of the designer, persisted thenceforward
unchanged^. In course of time a fixed number of
dots were required to surround the circumference,
to mark off the heads from the space occupied by
the Cross, and to fiU in the hair and beard of
St Peter; and as these dots were increased or
diminished in different pontificates, to count them
furnished a test of genuineness^.
The seal was attached as a rule by means of
a string looped through holes* in the fold of parch
ment at the foot of the document. After the
parchment was folded, the ends of the string
might be passed round it and tied together, so
1 Consequently the heads did not suffer so much from the
stroke of the hammer as the obverse did, and one die of the
counterseal might remain in use for nearly seventy years (1186-
1262). See Diekamp, in Mittheilungen, iu. 609, 613-626.
* See Spec. 130-138.
' On the Demi-Bull see below. Appendix vii.
* From the time of Innocent II, regularly two holes; pre
viously the number had varied : see Kaltenbrunner, in Mittheil
ungen, i, 409; Diekamp, pp. 611 f.

Attachment of the Seal 121
as to secure it in transmission i. If it was desired
to prevent the Letter being read without cutting
the string, a different method was employed, in
which the Letter was first folded across and then
downwards more than once, two holes were
pierced in the joined edges at the side of the
document, the hemp string was passed through
the multiple surfaces of the parchment, and finaUy
the seal was imposed. By this means it was
impossible to see any of the writing untU the seal
had been detached either by cutting the string or
ripping open the parchment. Such documents
were caUed Letters Close {litterae clausae) but
specimens of them are extremely rare. The first
known example occurs as early as the time of
Cahxtus II 2, and the system of ' closing ' Letters
was in fuU operation under Innocent III^.
The system of which I have indicated the
outhnes was the product of a century and a half
of trained experience. On the one hand, there
^ See below, Appendix vn.
^ This document (Jaff6, Reg. 6856) is dated 25 June 1120 and
is preserved in the Royal Archives at Munich. It is printed by
U. Robert, Le BuUaire du Pape Cahxte II, i. (1891), 266, n. 179.
The maimer in which it is sealed is figured in Monsignor P. M.
Baumgarten's Aus Kanzlei und Kammer (1907), p. 195. Two
Letters Close of Alexander III (1162 and 1164) at Barcelona are
described with illustrations by M. E. Martin-Chabot in Melanges
d'Arch6ologie et d'Histoire, xxiv. (1904), 65-74. Another specimen
of Alexander III is reproduced in Monum. Graphica medii Aevi,
ix. 4. ^ CL Delisle, pp. 20 f. Innocent mentions, evidently by way
oi diBtinotion, litterae patentee : Reg. vi. 165. It is interesting to
notice the emergence of these names at the very same time as
they first appear in the Enghsh Chancery.

122 Elaboration of Technical Rules
was a desire to make the instruments of the
Pope's authority more readily accessible; hence
the expensive tjrpe of Privilege was, except for
rare and opulent beneficiaries, superseded first by
the Simple PrivUege and then by the Letter of
Grace ^. On the other hand, the more documents
were multiphed and spattered abroad, the greater
was the risk of forgery; therefore they were
hedged round, in every point, by minute technical
prescriptions. These two causes conspired with
the natural tendency of a thoroughly organized
office towards order and exact routine, to develop
the severely regulated work of the Chancery of
the beginning of the thirteenth century which is
as perfect in its caUigraphy as it is diplomaticaUy
without fault.
1 A further blow at the Solemn Privilege was struck by the
invention under Iimocent IV of the Intermediate BuU. Its Text,
Final Protocol, and Dating were essentiaUy those of the Letter ;
but the first line was written in elongated characters, often with
great and even magnificent elaboration. Besides this feature, it
borrowed from the Solemn PrivUege the In Perpetuum but in a
modified form: the words are not always exactly the same, but
the phrase most generally used was Ad perpetuam rei memoriam
OT Ad futuram rei memoriam.

VI.
It has been noticed in an earher connexion that
for the interval of a hundred and seventy years
which elapsed between the death of Stephen V
and the election of Alexander II in 1061 there is
no trace in any quotation or excerpt that any
Papal Register was ever composed^. The fact
that aU this time the Chancery was continuously
active is an argument against the supposition that
the practice of registering Papal documents was
given up2; and the reason why no extracts from
Registers are preserved is probably that the Letters
of the Popes of that time did not furnish materials
which were of value for the compUers of canonical
coUections, and these compUers are our only
witnesses to the existence of Registers which are
no longer preserved. The Popes might issue
Privileges when required; but they were not in
a position, even if their aptitudes qualified them,
to declare rules of ecclesiastical order or judicature.
After the accession of Leo IX we find extracts
from the Registers of Alexander 11^, Urban II*,
1 Above, p. 36. ? See Bresslau, i. 107 f.
* Eighty-seven Letters are contained in the CoUectio Britan
nica (Add. MS. 8873) ; see Ewald, in Neues Archiv, v. 326-362.
Most of them are printed by S. Lowenfeld, Epist. Pontif. Roman.
ined., 1886, pp. 38-58. Others are given by Cardinal Deusdedit,
IV. 96, 423, &c.
* Neues Archiv, v. 362-366; Lowenfeld, pp. 59-64.

124 The Register of Gregory VII
and Alexander III^; and it is certain that the
Registers of Urban II and of several of his suc
cessors were stiU in existence in the thirteenth
century 2. But, if we except a smaU fragment of
a Register of the Antipope Anacletus II for the
year 1130^, only one Register remains to us.
That is the Register of Gregory VII, the sohtary
survivor of the time preceding Innocent III.
This famous book claims special attention, not
only on account of the supreme importance of
Gregory's pontificate, but also because it has
during the past thirty years been the subject of
voluminous and intricate discussion*, and it is
only within recent times that anything approaching
general agreement has been arrived at as to its
character, its composition, and its date. These
questions had been treated from critical, diplo
matic, and historical points of view, but the
palaeographical examination of the manuscript
was neglected; indeed, since Wilhelm von Giese-
brecht collated it in 1844, no one untU lately ever
undertook its systematic study. The book, pre
served in the Vatican Archives, is a quarto volume
of 258 leaves. It is arranged not as in earher
times by Indictions, but by Pontifical years, each
beginning on 30 June. If complete, it ought to
^ Trinity College, Cambridge, MS. R. 9. 17, printed by
Lowenfeld, pp. 149-208 (cf. Neues Archiv, x., 1885, 586 f.).
* Bresslau, i. 109, notes 2 and 3.
' A manuscript of the early part of the fourteenth century at
Monte Cassino: see Paul Ewald, in Neues Archiv, iu., 1878,
164r-168. * The two papers published by Father Peitz and Dr Caspar
in 1911 and 1913 extend to 436 pages, and that by Dr Blaul,
1912, dealing only with the Diotatus, adds 116 more.

The Register of Gregory VII 125
contain twelve books, but in fact there are only
eight, of which the first seven are markedly dis
tinguished in a number of detaUs from the eighth i-
The first seven contain documents entered sub-
stantiaUy in a continuous chronological order
down to 8 May 1080. The next month was a
time of disturbance, when the Pope had to with
draw to the border of Capua and an Antipope was
elected. It is not therefore surprising that the
eighth book should include some documents belong
ing to the closing weeks of the seventh Pontifical
year, which it had not been possible to register at
the time of their composition. But this eighth
book is not merely irregiUar in its beginning; it
goes on to include documents of the ninth and
eleventh years, but passes over the tenth year
entirely^. Moreover, the order of time is altogether
confused. It would appear that, in the troubled
years of the close of his pontificate, Gregory was
not in a position to secure that his Register should
be regularly carried on.
The number of pieces contained in the volume
is reckoned at 381, but the total is reaUy somewhat
larger^. StiU the coUection is so extremely smaU
^ In books I.— vn. the addresses are given without the formal
appellatives (dilecto in Christo fiKo, and the hke) which appear in
originals ; in book vni. they are written out in full but the name is
often merely indicated by an initial. Books 1.-VII. begin the date
with Data and state precisely the month, day, and Indiction;
book vin. has Datum,, hardly ever mentions the Indiction, and
frequently omits the month and day.
^ The division of the book into vm., rx., and xi., is due to a
later hand.
' Jaff6 numbers 86 pieces in book i., 77 in 11., 21 inni., 28 in rv.,
23 in v., 40 in vi., 28invn., 23 in vni. 1-23, and 37 in vni. 24-60;

126 The Register of Gregory VII
that it was natural that it should be considered to
be not the Pope's actual Register but a volume of
excerpts made from it for some particular purpose.
This was the view maintained by Giesebrecht and
Jaffe ^, which was accepted with hardly any dissent
untU a few years ago 2. The first seven books, it
was held, and perhaps the first thirty-two docu
ments in the eighth, formed a selection from the
original Register, — written some time before the
middle of 1081 ; and the remaining portion was
derived from any materials the compUer could
find. A miUtitude of ingenious and acute hypo
theses foUowed one another, as to the principle on
which the documents were selected, the reasons for
the chronological confusion which reigns in the
latter part of the eighth book, the date and
possible authorship of the compUation. Might not
the work be a sort of pohtical manifesto produced
in the interest of Gregory's cause against the
Empire? Was not the author perhaps Cardinal
Deusdedit, the eminent canonist ? or was the book
making a total of 363. But a good many numbers include more
than one document. Besides double numbers, a letter is often
entered a pari ; that is, several copies were made and sent to the
different persons named in it, with the necessary changes in the
address and, if required, in the date. It may be added that the
numbering of the letters is not contemporary.
'^ See Giesebrecht, de Registro Gregoru VTI emendando
(1858); Jaff6, preface to Monum. Greg. (1865), and Reg. Pontif.
i. 694. " One writer alone, unless I am mistaken, ventured to oppose
the prevailing opinion; and that was Father LapStre, who also
anticipated Dr Caspar ia his conclusions as to the Register of
John VIII. But he did not elaborate his argument. See
L'Europe et la Saint-Siege h I'fipoque Carolingienne, i., Le Pape
Jean VIII (1896), 18 ff.

The Register of Gregory VII 127
not completed untU the time of Urban II or
even later^? These and many other questions
have in the main been set at rest by the results
of a twice repeated analysis of the manuscript
itself. This work has been done with extreme elabo
rateness by Father Wilhelm M. Peitz ^ and Dr Erich
Caspar^, who have estabhshed the fact that the
book is not a selection at aU, but the actual
Register of Gregory VII, carried on from month to
month under the Pope's supervision*. It is not
a transcript from the original documents, nor from
an existing Register; nor is it a select or special
Register made concurrently with a larger general
1 References to most of this extensive hterature are given in
the works cited in the two following notes, and need not be
repeated here.
2 Das Originalregister Gregors VII, in Sitzimgsberichte der
Kaiserhchen Akademie in Wien, Philosophisch-Historische Klasse,
clxv. 5 (1911), 1-364. Father Peitz's main conclusion has been
admitted by scholars whose opinion is of unquestioned weight:
M. Tangl, in Neues Archiv, xxxvu. ( 19 12), 363 ff. ; E. von Ottenthal,
in MittheUungen, xxxiu. (1912), 142 ff. I have therefore adopted it
in my text. But I am bound to say that the Father's manner of
treatment excites suspicion. He is too positive in his statements,
and his cavalier attitude towards other scholars does not encourage
confidence. His hne of argument is over-refined, and he makes
many assumptions which caU for proof. But what perhaps more
than all leads me to hold my judgment in suspense is the fact
that Father Peitz bases his conclusions first and foremost on
palaeographical grounds ; the text and practicaUy all the rubrics
are in one and the same hand. Now the rubrics, it seems, have
gone by the board (see below, p. 128, note 3). I am not at all
sure that the argument about the text may not also have to
be profoundly modified.
* Studien zum Register Gregors VII, in Neues Archiv, xxxviu.
(1913), 143-226.
* Peitz, p. 92.

128 The Register of Gregory VII
Register; it is the only one that was ever com
posed^. The entries were copied from the corrected
draughts of the documents. The volume is all
written, with the exception of two or three inserted
pieces, in one hand; and Father Peitz contended
that this hand was that of the notary Rainerius,
whose name is found in documents from 1067 to
1080^, but this cannot be regarded as proved^.
The importance of the general resiUt is first that
it settles the authenticity of the contents of the
Register*, and secondly that it fixes the chronology
of the letters. It is not indeed to be supposed that
each letter was necessarily entered at the exact
time when it was drawn up. If there was a press
of business or if the Pope's movements were
disturbed, the draughts might be laid aside for
future registering, and when they were registered
the order might be disarranged. It is possible
that in the occasional absence of the ChanceUor
registering would be deferred. A batch of letters
might be accidentaUy overlooked and then in
corporated at a subsequent time. Besides, when
the Register was being written, it was not a bound
J^ p. 89. This last statement is of course one which cannot be
proved ; it is disputed by Dr Otto Blaul in the Archiv fiir Urkun
denforschung, iv. (1912), 114.
2 Peitz, pp. 92-97.
' Nor was Father Peitz successful in his argument that the
rubrics, marginalia, &c., are in the same handwriting (pp. 22, 33 ff.).
This has been shown by Dr Caspar (pp. 149 ff.) not only on
palaeographical grouijds but also from a comparison with an early
transcript of the book in the hbrary at Troyes. Cf. E. von
Ottenthal, in MittheUungen, xxxiu. 143 note.
* I may refer specially to the narrative of Gregory's election
(i. 1) and the much-discussed Dictatus Papae in ii. 55a.

The Register of Gregory VII 129
book but a series of loose quires. There are not
a few instances in which fresh leaves or quires
have been inserted, and these insertions might not
always be put in the right places ; some might be
mislaid 1. StUl, down to book vin. 23, that is
down to the spring of 1081, the chronological order
is substantially maintained. After that point it
breaks down: the next document belongs to near
the end of 1083. There are scattered documents
from Gregory's ninth and eleventh years ; there is
no trace that any Register was ever compUed for
his tenth. The book ends abruptly in the middle
of a sentence at some date in the winter of 1083-
1084. But the smaU size of the Register has not yet
been accounted for. Father Peitz explains it on
the principle that only documents dealing with
difficult questions were inserted 2; if there were
several documents relating to a particular business,
that which carried the matter a stage further, and
so far settled it, would be registered; the others
would be left on one side. This solution depends
on a doubtful interpretation of what GLraldus
Cambrensis said about the Registers of more than
a century later^, and the value of Giraldus'
unsupported testimony is not free from suspicion.
But it is certain that the Register was not composed
on this basis, because we possess letters of Gregory
not included in it which contain more important
^ Thus in book in., the text of which appears not to have been
transcribed concurrently with the writing of the documents, there
is a gap of some five months, from September 1075 to February
1076. 2 Pp. 206 ff. » See below, p. 135, note 2.
P. P. O. 9

130 Separate Registers of
decisions and definitions than those deahng with
the same matters which are found in it ^. The truth
appears to be that after the second book was com
pleted, the Chancery clerk became slack in writing
the Register. Documents were produced as re
quired, but their registration was neglected. It
may naturaUy be conjectured that this lax per
formance of the routine of official business was to
a great extent due to the inevitable disorganization
which arose in a time of trouble and stress. But
there were some documents of which it was
essential to keep a record : these were the Acts of
Synods, and it has been acutely observed that it
was often the meeting of a Synod which served as
a stimulus to the Chancery official to resume his
labours^. In an index added to the volume in the
fourteenth century it was not inappropriately
entitled Registrum Epistolarum et Concihorum^.
The Register did not include PrivUeges. Only
one is comprised in it, and this is a confirmation
of the primacy of the Archbishop of Lyons : it was
entered because it contained prescriptions relative
to the purity of the prelate's election which laid
down definitions of canonical order. But it was
not transcribed in fuU; the prohibitive clauses
and the sanction at the end were omitted, and a
reference added to the PrivUege contained 'at the
beginniQg of this book*.' That such a separate
Register existed is proved by the fact that one
1 Caspar, p. 198.
2 See ibid. pp. 206-212, 216.
8 Jaff6, Reg. i. 696.
* 'Et rehqua usque in finem, sicut in privUegio constat, quod
est in capite huius libelh ' : Reg. vi. 34.

Letters and Privileges 131
PrivUege stiU remains attached to a flyleaf pre
ceding the text of the book, and this too is entered
imperfectly with a reference to other documents
before it^. We cannot teU how large this coUection
of PrivUeges was, but it is clear that the principle
of separating such documents from the Letters was
observed in Gregory's time 2. When the volume
was bound it may be presumed that these queries
were intended to be kept distinct; but they were
somehow lost sight of and disappeared, and only
by chance a single PrivUege was found and was
prefixed to the volume.
The Privileges then were copied out into a
separate Register, not because they were less
important than Letters but because they formed
a distinct class of documents. They were not
consulted for the same reasons as Letters, and
when they had to be referred to it was probably
more convenient to seek them in a volume or set
of volumes by themselves. Letters on the other
hand were of much greater interest from the point
of view of the Papal Court. It was necessary to
have their decisions on matters of procedure, of
order, of canon law accessible for ready reference ;
and this object was attained by keeping them
apart from the copies of the Privileges, which
usuaUy extended to a much greater length.
If this plan was found desirable in the time of
Gregory VII, one woiUd have expected its advan
tages to have been stiU more recognized in the
twelfth century, when the bulk of the Pope's cor
respondence must have increased tenfold. It may
1 Peitz, pp. 122 f. 2 Caspar, pp. 213 f.
9—2

132 The Register of Innocent III
perhaps have been continued under Innocent II,
whose Register, no longer preserved, appears to
have been comprehended in a single volume^. But
it is certain that from the time when we possess
what claim to rank as complete Registers, that is,
from the accession of Innocent III in 1198 onwards.
Letters and PrivUeges are entered side by side.
There is no attempt at classification, except that
a special set of letters of a pohtical nature was
separated by Innocent from the rest and recorded
in a Registrum super negotio Imperu ^. The general
Register was comprised in nineteen books, of
which something more than ten remain to us in
the handwriting of Innocent Ill's time^. Whether
^ See Caspar, p. 217.
2 This special Register contains a large proportion of letters
addressed to the Pope.
* These are books i., ii., and two portions of ni., and books
v.-xii. Books xin.-xvi. are preserved in a later transcript. Of the
whole of m., rv., and xix. and of thirteen letters in xvni. there
exists a table of contents, which has been printed by A. Theiner,
Vetera Monumenta Slavorum Meridionahum Historiam iUus-
trantia, i. (1863), 47-70. From this it appears that book ui.
1-42 are really letters 170-216, and 43-67 are letters 260-275;
the numbers in the table are five higher because five letters'
entered a pari are counted separately. No trace remains of book
xvn. A description of the Registers is given by Delisle in the
Bibhotheque de r:ficole des Chartes, xlvi. (1885), 84-93; cf.
Denifle, Die papstlichen Registerbande des dreizehnten Jahr
hunderts, in Archiv fiir Literatur- und Kirchen-Geschichte des
Mittelalters, ii. (1888), 72-75 and notes. See also the introduction
to Specimina palaeographica Regestorum Romanorum Ponti
flcum, by Denifle and G. Palmieri (1888), and A. Luchaire, Les
Registres d'Innocent III (1904). The Register of the eighth and
ninth years passed into England in the eighteenth century and
was acquired by the fourth Earl of Ashburnham in 1848. His
son, the flfth Earl, presented it to the Vatican Archives in
1884.

The Register of Innocent III 133
they are the actual Registers drawn up from day
to day or fair copies made for reference is not quite
certain. Delisle first raised a doubt on the point^,
and he was supported by Heinrich Denifle, a man
of immense learning and exactness, who was for
many years in charge of the Vatican Archives 2.
It is probable that the Registrum super negotio
Imperii is the only volume which contains the
actual original Register, and that aU the rest are
contemporary transcripts from such Registers^.
There is sufficient evidence to show that they were
not copied directly from the original documents,
still less from their draughts. But the critical
question involved is of subordinate importance, for,
if they be fair copies, it is not disputed that these
were officially transcribed in the Chancery from
Registers already made* ; they only take us a stage
further from the original texts. It is not main
tained that the copjdst was more than a copyist.
If this conclusion is correct, the original
Register from which the existing volumes of
Innocent III were transcribed differed from that of
Gregory VII in that it was composed not from the
corrected draughts, the notae or minutae, but from
the finished documents after they were completed
1 Especially with regard to book ii. : M^moire sur les Actes
d'Innocent III, in Bibhotheque de I'ifioole des Chartes, 4th series,
iv. (1858), 6.
^ Archiv, uhi supra, pp. 59-64.
' Father Peitz in his thoroughgoing way claimed the whole
series as original Registers (vbi supra, pp. 169-184), but he was
only successful in convincing scholars with regard to the Registrum
super negotio Imperii. See Tangl, in Neues Archiv, xxxvu. 364 f.
* Cardinal Pitra alone held that books i. and ii. were a private
compilation: Analecta novissima, i. 173 (1886).

134 The System of Registration
for dispatch^. This of course presupposes a much
greater regularity of system and organization in
the Chancery than it had previously been possible
to secure 2. After Innocent Ill's time, though the
evidence is conflicting^, it seems on the whole
probable that the same method was pursued with
regard to Privileges and Litterae de Gratia, but
that Letters produced at the initiative of the Curia
were registered from the draughts. It may be
that the distinction arose from the fact that the
former classes of documents were not necessarily
registered unless a fee was paid*, and if a man had
to pay a fee it is natural to suppose that he would
demand that the registration should be made from
the completed document. This question of fees
• also worked in another direction. The recipient
who had already been put to expense in obtaining
his PrivUege or Letters would often be satisfied
with the possession of his document, and would
spare the further payment for registration^. But
economy was not the only cause of the incomplete-
'^ Cf. Kaltenbrunner, Romische Studien, i., in MittheUungen, v.
(1884), 234 f.
^ In aU probabihty the earhest known Registers were tran
scribed from originals (above, pp. 31 f.). It is in the transitional
period, represented by the Registers of John VIII and Gregory VII,
that they were taken from draughts.
' For the extensive literation on this subject see the references
in Bresslau, i. 116 and 117 notes.
* This is inferred from a notice of exemptioh from such pay
ments in particular cases; 'pro regestro ab eisdem nichil dari
consuevit' : Tangl, Papstliche Kanzleiordnungen, p. 66, n. 6, 1894.
Cf. Kaltenbrunner, p. 240.
* Every English Cathedral muniment room which I have
examined contains large numbers of Papal rescripts, in originals
or copies, which are not to be found in the Registers.

Incompleteness of the Registers 135
ness of the Registers, because they do not contain
aU the Litterae de Curia^, and for these of course
no pajmient for registration was ever made. It
was believed in the twelfth century that all
documents relating to important matters were
entered in the Registers^. But as a fact they are
by no means complete even in regard to the political
correspondence, a record of which, it might seem,
it was essential to preserve in an official form. No
satisfactory principle of selection has been sug
gested, and it is probable that the defective
character of the Registers is due to the over
whelming mass of business which confronted the
staff of the Chancery ^ and possibly also to the
negligence of the officials whose duty it was to
draw up the Registers*.
^ Innocent IV attempted to make provision for their regular
record by the institution of a distinct Register of Litterae
Curiales. 2 Bishop Stephen of Tournay says, ' Consuetude est Romanae
ecclesiaa quod, cum alicui de magno negotio mittit epistolam,
apud se retinet eius exemplum': Summa, dist. lxxxi., p. 104,
ed. J. P. von Schulte, 1891. No doubt Giraldus Cambrensis
meant the same thing when he wrote, ' Registrum autem suum f acit
papa quihbet, hoc est librum ubi transcripta privilegiorum
omnium et literarum sui temporis super magis arduis causis
continentur ' : De Invectionibus, rv. 9 (Opera, in., ed. J. S. Brewer,
1863, p. 90). Father Peitz thought that he referred to more
difficult matters: see above, p. 129.
* As it stands, the Register of Innocent III is enormously
more copious than that of Gregory VTI. The parts preserved
contain 3702 letters (Delisle, p. 10), and there exist the headings
of 720 more (see above, p. 132, note 3). If we assume the lost
xvTXth book and the xviilth, of which only scanty traces remain,
to have included some 400 letters — a moderate estimate — we
arrive at a total of about 4800.
* On the whole question of the reasons which determined the
inclusion of documents in the Register see R. von Heckel, in

136 Review of the Development
Having now considered the types of documents
produced in the Papal Chancery and examined the
manner in which they were recorded down to the
thirteenth century, I propose to go back and
briefiy summarize the main lines on which the
Chancery developed from the earhest times down
to the point at which I interrupted its history at
the pontificate of Cahxtus II, and then to pursue
that history for a century longer, with a glance
onwards to later times.
We have seen how the Pope's secretarial office
originated in the coUege of notaries attached to the
regions of the city. Of its seven principal officers
six might be charged with the duty of 'dating'
documents, whUe the lowest only, the Proto
scriniarius, was responsible for writing them.
The office in which they were written was the
Scrinium, and the handwriting employed was the
old Roman cursive, or Curial, hand. In the eighth
century, under Carohngian influences, the two
successive acts of writing and dating became
marked by distinct entries in the documents ; and
almost at the same moment we find for the first
time that the person who dates documents was not
any member of the notarial coUege but the Pope's
Librarian, who also adopts (though not certainly
until the eleventh century) the Frankish title of
ChanceUor^. In the eleventh century also the
beautiful Carohngian Minuscule began to invade
the Chancery. During aU the fiuctuations of
Archiv fiir Urkundenforschung, i. 430-442, and for later Registers,
pp. 488-500.
1 Above, pp. 12-19, 51-57.

of the Papal Chancery 137
usage during that time of change — of reform and
reaction — ^we find the general rule to prevaU, that
documents written at Rome were produced by the
old notaries or Scriniarii in their traditional Curial
hand but were dated by the Pope's personal officer,
the Librarian, who wrote in Minuscule^.
When however from the time of Leo IX the
Pope, as often happened, was more frequently
absent from Rome than resident at the Lateran,
he had to make such arrangements as he found
possible, and to employ local scribes at the various
places where he might be. Thus the handwriting
changes according to the circumstances, but the
rule of the dating by the ChanceUor and Librarian
remains estabhshed. One result of this change of
conditions was that outside Rome these occasional
scribes omitted to record their names : the Scriptum
more and more disappeared from the documents.
Through Imperial influences also it came about
that the Archbishop of Cologne, who was Arch-
ChanceUor of Italy, should be regarded as head
also of the Papal Chancery. He was such no
doubt in 1023 and again about 1051; but the
practice was intermittent. At certain times the
bishop of Selva Candida seemed established in
this position^. The very titles employed by the
officials indicate the manner in which the Pope
was attempting to estabhsh a personal staff of
clerks to take the place of the notaries whom he
found on the spot: they came to describe them
selves as notaries not of the Holy Apostohc Church
but of the Sacred Lateran Palace, and as they were
1 Above, pp. 64 f. ^ Pp. 60 ff.

138 The Chancellor
in no way necessarily connected with the traditional
Roman system, or indeed with Rome itself, it was
natural that they should more and more use the
Minuscule handwriting which was current among
educated people in the west rather than the
unpleasing and difficult Cursive which was the
mark of the Scrinium. After Cahxtus II the local
Scriniarii ceased to be employed^, and with their
cessation the Scriptum was discontinued.
This double change, the omission of the Scriptum
and with it the final abandonment of the Curial
hand, made a conspicuous difference in the general
aspect of the documents, but for the next twenty
years no change occurred in the uniformity of the
Chancery organization 2. The regular datary con
tinued to be described as ChanceUor or Librarian,
or both^; but from the death of Celestine II in
1144 he ceased to be Librarian*. The Archives and
the Library were now separated, and each had its
own chief officer^. The ChanceUor is now regularly
a Cardinal Priest or Cardinal Deacon, never a
Cardinal Bishop, except once under the Antipope
Cahxtus III (1168-1178) when the Cardinal Bishop
of Tusculum makes his appearance®. The Chan
ceUor almost always held his post for life or untU
he became Pope, as Gelasius II, Lucius II,
Alexander III, and Gregory VIII. The only
^ The name appears for some time longer, but only to indicate
Notaries Public, who were appointed by the Pope but not for any
service in the Chancery : see Bresslau, i. 267.
2 For the following see Bresslau, i. 240-248, where lists of the
ofiicers are given. ^ Spec. 67 (2), 59.
* Nouveau Trait6 de Diplomatique, v. 266.
5 Bresslau, i. 240, note 3. • Spec. 94 (3), 95.

and his Deputies 139
example of a change being made took place at the
accession of Innocent III, when Cencius the
Chamberlain, who held the office, without bearing
the title, of ChanceUor, was superseded^.
During this period the ChanceUor invariably
wrote his own name in the Datum; but after
Cahxtus II he ceased to write the whole date, and
inserted his name or its initial in a space left vacant
for the purpose 2. But the fact that an autograph
was required led necessarUy to the frequent employ
ment of deputies. For the ChanceUor might be
away on a mission^ or engaged in other business,
or he might be UI. His place was then fUled in
one of two ways. If he was absent from the Court
for a long time, a Cardinal signed in his stead as
Vice-ChanceUor, vices cancellarii gerens^ ; but if his
absence was only occasional, a deputy signed by
his own rank or office, Subdiaconus et notarius,
CapeUanus et Scriptor, or the hke, but did not
describe himself as Vice-ChanceUor^. This was
the practice at least until 1187, and the latter rifle
was always adopted when the Chancellorship was
actuaUy vacant, as happened for four years under
Eugenius III and for nearly twenty under Alex
ander III, It is possible that motives of economy
had something to do with this; for the Vice-
ChanceUor received the fees due to the ChanceUor,
whereas if his duties were performed by another
officer the fees were paid into the Pope's chest.
1 See Bresslau, i. 243, cf. 242, note 6. ^ Spec. 64, 74, 80.
3 Thus Chancellor Roland was sent as legate to Frederick I's
court in October 1167: Rahewin, Gesta Friderici Imperatoris,
in. 9.
* Spec. 81 (1). * Spec. 74 at foot.

140 The Vice-Chancellor
The Antipope Calixtus III employed persons of
a lower dignity than Cardinals as Vice-ChanceUors ;
and his example was foUowed by Urban III, who
made Moyses, a Canon of the Lateran, Vice-
ChanceUor in 1187. The ChanceUorship was then
left vacant by Gregory VIII and Clement III, and
Moyses, contrary to the earlier practice, continued
in office 1. When however in 1191 Celestine III
once more appointed a ChanceUor, Moyses reverted
to his proper rank and signed documents as Sub-
deacon and Canon. But the precedent established
by his former position was not without influence.
Innocent III began by not reappointing the acting
ChanceUor Cencius, and he aUowed three notaries
in succession to sign as Vice-ChanceUors. At last
in 1205 he appointed a ChanceUor and the title of
Vice-ChanceUor disappeared for twelve years. In
1213 this ChanceUor died and a vacancy foUowed,
in which a Notary and Subdeacon executed the
duties of the office. It is possible that he was
made ChanceUor in the last year of Innocent's
pontificate ; but if so, he was the last of the line.
From the accession of the next Pope, Honorius III,
no ChanceUor was ever appointed.
The importance of the change consisted in the
fact that thenceforward the Vice-ChanceUor, who
now became the real head of the Chancery, was
regularly appointed from outside the ranks of the
Cardinals. He was now chosen not for his dignity
but for his special competence; he rose from the
lower offices of the Chancery to be the head of his
department, and he almost invariably held the
* Spec. 99, 98.

The Vice-Chancellor 141
degree of magister. In one single instance in the
course of the thirteenth century a Vice-ChanceUor
was made a Cardinal and retained his office, but
he was not a Cardinal when he became Vice-
ChanceUor. He dates documents at first as can
cellarii vicem agens, but towards the middle of the
century the substantive vicecancellarius begins to
be used^. The Vice-ChanceUor was inevitably
becoming a more and more important person, and
it was natural that he should be admitted to the
coUege of Cardinals, as the ChanceUor had been in
the twelfth century. Hence from the time of
Boniface VIII it became usual to create him a
Cardinal soon after his appointment. In fact from
1296 the practice became invariable, with the
single exception of Peter, elect of Palentia, who
held office only from November 1306 to his death
in September 1307 2- But so soon as it had
become customary that a Vice-ChanceUor should
be made a Cardinal, it was an easy step to aUow
that vice versa a Cardinal might be made Vice-
ChanceUor. This seems to have become the rule
under John XXII, and so the reform effected by
Honorius III in the interests of administrative
efficiency was abandoned ^. In the time of Clement
VII, in 1532, the office of Vice-ChanceUor was
permanently attached to the Cardinal of the title
1 See Bresslau, i. 249, note 2. On the rare occasions when
there was a vacancy in the office the acting deputy signs by his
rank, as capellanus et notarius (1222-1226), subdiaconus et notarius
(1256-1257). ' Bresslau, i. 256 f.
^ From the fourteenth century the place of the Vice-Chancellor
was often taken by a deputy, regens cancellaria/m : ibid. i. 289 ff .

142 The Vice-Chancellor
of S. Lorenzo in Damaso^. But long before this
he had ceased to take any active share in the
productions of the Chancery. It is said that the
last appearance of his name in the Datum of a BuU
is under Clement VI (1342-1352)2. The practical
charge of the business of the Chancery passed into
other hands.

^ A. Cocquelines, BuUarum Romanorum Pontificum Collectio
amphssima, iv. (1746), 99.
2 Nouveau Traits de Diplomatique, v. 305.

vn.
In the twelfth century, as causes were evoked
to Rome in constantly increasing numbers, the
Papal Court developed a high degree of efficiency
in defining questions of law. These lie outside
our province ; but in the course of the prehminary
enquiries it was necessary to inspect and verify
documents. On such occasions the assistance of
the officials of the Chancery coifld probably as a
rule be dispensed with, for the CoUege of Cardinals
usuaUy included some members who had experience
of its technical business. It is of interest to notice
how in these circumstances principles of criticism
were by degrees evolved, and I shaU give some
examples of English cases to Ulustrate the manner
in which this criticism was performed. The
narratives come from writers who were naturaUy
partisans ; but I am concerned not with the merits
of the particular cases, but with the points to
which, in dealing with the genuineness of docu
ments, the Papal Court attached importance.
I take my first example from the proceedings
which arose in connexion with the notorious claim
of the Archbishop of Canterbury to primacy over
York. This claim was based on a series of nine
documents which were forged under the direction
of Archbishop Lanfranc in 1072, and was accepted

144 Criticism of Documents
on their authority by the Enghsh Court^. But
though Archbishops of York might be constrained
to make their profession personaUy to the Arch
bishop of Canterbury, they never admitted his
right to demand it. The documents were sent to
Rome but were left unnoticed. In 1102, if we
may beheve a letter written by the Chapter of
York, enquiry was made of the ChanceUor, John
of Gaeta, as to what evidence there was at Rome
bearing on the dispute between the two Churches,
and he rephed that Rome knew nothing except
what was contained in the Register of Gregory
the Great 2; and Gregory, we know, had granted
no primacy to Canterbury, he granted it to either
Archbishop according to seniority of consecration.
It is significant that in the long and elaborate
statement of the case for Canterbury which Arch
bishop Ralph addressed to Cahxtus II in 1120,
he made no aUusion to the forged documents^.
At length in 1123 when both the Archbishops,
WiUiam of Canterbury and Thurstan of York,
were in Rome, the representatives of Canterbury
took the opportunity of discussing the question,
though not as actual htigants, before the Papal
^ See H. Boehmer, Die Falsohungen Erzbischof Lanfranks von
Canterbury, 1902.
^ 'Denique decanus [Eboracensis], quando fuit Romae cum
Girardo archiepiscopo, sicut ipse testatur, a cancellario Romanae
eeclesiae dihgenter perscrutatus est de contentione harum ecclesi-
arum, quid inde Roma sentiret et quid in decretis suis haberet;
at ille dixit Roma[m] nee aliud sentire nee habere quam quod in
registro beati Gregorii scriptum est ' : Historians of the Church
of York, ed. J. Raine, u. (1886), 113 f.
' The letter is printed ibid., pp. 228-250. For the date see
Boehmer, p. 41 note.

at the Papal Court 145
Court. The narrative which we possess comes
from York; and although there is no doubt that
in the matter at issue York was right and Canter
bury was wrong, we must remember in reading
the account of Hugh the Chanter that he writes
throughout as the defender of the claims of his
Church. The Canterbury documents, he teUs us^,
were ordered to be read.
They were indeed entitled with the names of Roman
pontiffs, but they did not at aU savour of the Roman style.
When they had been read, and then at last that of St Gregory
to Augustine concerning the distinction of the two metro
politans of England, some .of the Romans asked them of
Canterbury whether those Privileges had seals (bullas); and
they said that they had left the sealed documents in the
Church and had brought transcripts of them. And because it
is not necessary to give faith to unsealed or unauthenticated^
Privileges or charters, they were asked whether they would
swear that they had originals of them with seals. They
withdrew, and consulting among themselves they said that
the documents bore no seals. But one wished to persuade
the others that he should swear for the cause of his Church,
which was no doubt sound and lawful advice. The others
however refused, fearing to perjure themselves if they swore
that the documents were sealed. They decided to return and
say that the seals were perished or lost. But when they made
this statement, some smUed, others wrinkled their noses,
others broke forth into laughter and said that it was very
odd that the lead was perished or lost and that the parchment
was preserved. Some may perchance think that this story
is made up and the narrator is talking nonsense ; but it is as
true as it seems fictitious. Afterwards they said that possibly
at that time seals were not in use. But the Romans bore
testimony that there were seals from the time of St Gregory
^ Historians of the Church of York, u. 204 ff.
^ 'Non bullatis vel non signatis.'
P. P. 0. 10

146 Criticism of Documents
and that some sealed Privileges of his were stUl preserved in
the Roman Church. So, as they had nothing more to say on
the matter, they departed in contusion, and their Privileges
were neither received with trust nor their words with praise
or favour. The Pope then caUed upon the Archbishop
of York to produce his evidences. Thurstan
rephed that he had brought none with him,
because he had come to attend a Council, not as
a party to a lawsuit. On being pressed however
he admitted that his companions had chanced,
without having been asked, to bring with them
some letters unsealed as weU as a copy of their
PrivUege. The Court desired them to be produced
and read. The documents consisted of the Letter
of St Gregory to Augustine which had already
been brought forward by the representatives of
Canterbury, and that of Honorius I to the two
Archbishops, together with four recent Letters of
Urban II and his three successors. An. examina
tion was made of the letters and no questions
were asked about the seals, for the documents
were weU known: omnes enim bene noverant.
Possibly the mo'dern documents were verified in
the Registers, the early ones in Bede or in some
compUation of Papal letters. The discussion of
course led to no result, because there were no
parties empowered to promote an appeal, and
there was no question before the Court with which
it could deal judiciaUy.
From this account it is clear that the first
thing to which the Papal Court attached import
ance was the authentication of documents pro-

at the Papal Court 147
duced by their leaden seals. In the absence of
the seals recourse was had to materials in the
Papal archives. The narrator says that the do
cuments produced by his adversaries were not
written in the Roman style, but he does not teU
us that this point was considered by the Court.
On one matter, according to his statement, they
displayed ignorance, for they assumed that the
original documents should have been written on
parchment, whereas if genuine they would un
doubtedly have been on papyrus.
In the same way, eighty years later, when the
Bishop of Worcester appealed to Rome on the
question of the exemption of the monastery of
Evesham, the only criticism made on the actual
documents produced related to the genuineness of
their seals. The case came before Innocent III
towards the end of 1205, and it was argued at
length. Thomas of Marlborough, a monk of
Evesham, who was proctor for the monastery
and wrote a narrative of the whole affair^, made a
fuU statement of the rights which it claimed, and
aUeged two BuUs of Pope Constantine, of the
years 709 and 710, as weU as recent Indults of
Clement III and Celestine III^. The documents
of Constantine were rank forgeries of the tenth
century^. Upon this Master Robert of Chpstone,
who appeared for the Bishop, rephed
1 Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham, pp. 141-200, ed. W. D.
Macray, 1863. " Pp. 154-168.
' They are printed ihid., pp. 171-173. Dr M. Spaethen, who
has pubhshed an interesting paper on the Evesham case in
Neues Archiv, xxxi. (1906), 629-649, supposes the forgeries to
have been made in the twelfth century. But they were known by
10—2

148 Criticism of Documents
Holy Father, our adversary would have weU said, if the
Privileges, in which he finds aU the force and power of his
contentions and which he lays as the foundation of his whole
case, were genuine ; whereas they are false, [though, he imphes,
we cannot prove it]. For the parchment (carta) and style,
the string and the seal of the Privileges of Constantine are
entirely unknown in our country. But the bearer of the
Indults of Clement and Celestine was Nicholas of Warwick,
a notorious forger, and therefore we beheve them to be
spurious; and we say the same of the others.
And the Lord Pope [proceeds Marlborough] commanded
that I should exhibit them, and I did so. And the Lord Pope
felt them with his own hands, and puUed them by the seal
and parchment, if perchance he could separate the seal from
the string. After examining them very carefully he passed
them to the Cardinals for examination; and when they had
gone round the circle and come back to the Pope, he held up
the Privilege of Constantine and said, 'PrivUeges of this sort,
which to you are unknown, are to us very weU known, and
they could not be forged.' And holding up the Indults he
said, ' These are genuine ' ; and he handed them aU back to me^.
Marlborough himself had no part in the fraud ;
he merely produced documents which he was
ordered to produce, and he confesses that he had
no knowledge whatever about the characteristics
of Constantine' s documents. On this matter pro
bably Innocent was no better informed. He was
not, it seems, then aware that parchment was not
the beginning of the eleventh : see Haddan and Stubbs, Councils
and Ecclesiastical Documents, iii. (1871), 279 note. The Papal
subscription which Dr Spaethen assigns to the twelfth century
(pp. 642 f.) is a feature of the Anglo-Saxon type of document.
But the BuUs were probably touched up after the time of Lanfranc,
as the qualification of the Archbishop of Canterbury as 'Brittan-
niarum primas' suggests (cf. Boehmer, uhi supra, p. 83); but the
use of this title is not decisive (see ibid., p. 91 notes 3 and 4).
1 Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham, pp. 160 f.

at the Papal Court 149
used in the time of Constantine^; very likely he
had never seen one of his seals : the only test he
applied was directed to ascertain whether the
seal and the document belonged to one another;
in other words, whether a forged document had
been attached to a genuine seal. In any case, he
was grossly deceived, and in the elaborate con
firmation of the exemption of the monastery which
he caused to be drawn up he recited both the
aUeged PrivUeges of Constantine 2. The truth was
that, however weU acquainted he might be with
regard to the current practice of the Chancery and
the forms of documents in use for a long time
earlier, he was entirely without the means of
judging the genuineness of a document professing
to be five hundred years old. There were no
materials for its criticism.
As yet we have found that the one practical
test applied to the examination of the genuineness
of a Bull consisted in the inspection of the seal
and of its attachment to the document. The
same method, according to Giraldus Cambrensis,
appears to have been used when in 1199-1200 he
brought before the Papal Court his appeal against
the failure of his election to the bishopric of
^ He had occasion later to learn that papyrus was the material
employed: see below, pp. 160 f.
2 18 January 1205, Reg. viii. 204. While the Pope's critical
faculty was at fault, his legal acuteness prevented him from
allowing the monastery the jurisdiction over the Deanery of the
Vale. Hence, when his rescript was inserted in an abbreviated
form (mentioning only one PrivUege of Constantine) in the
Decretals of Gregory IX, v. xxxiii. 17, it became a leading
authority for the doctrine that the exemption of a religious house
did not involve the exemption of its 'members.'

150 Advance in Criticism
St David's; but his statement suggests a further
stage of criticism. Two letters, he says, of
Lucius II and Eugenius III were produced by
him : they were inspected and read, and the seals
were observed^. The letters were read in order
that the Court might be apprised of their legal
content; they were inspected in order that it
might be ascertained whether there was anything
about the parchment, the manner of writing, and
perhaps the formulae, to excite suspicion. That
Innocent III was ahve to the importance of
examining the hterary structure of a text is shown
from a question which, Giraldus teUs us, arose in
connexion with a document of a different sort.
He was interested not only in securing his
own election to the see of St David's, but also in
asserting that Church's independence of the Arch
bishop of Canterbury. Now, one evening he was
discussing the matter with the Pope in his chamber,
when Innocent ordered the Register to be brought
'in which were enumerated for the whole Christian
world both the metropohtical churches of each
kingdom in order and the episcopal churches
suffragan to them.' The part relating to England
was read: 'The metropohs of Canterbury has
these suffragan churches, Rochester, London,' and
the rest in order. After this there was a rubric Of
Wales, and the text continued: 'In Wales the
church of St David's, Llandaff, Bangor, and
St Asaph.' The Pope smiled and said, 'You see,
1 'Quibus inspectis et lectis et auditis, et bulhs notatis': De
lure Menevensis Eeclesiae, ni.. Opera, iu. (ed. Brewer, 1863),
188.

under Innocent III 151
St David's is numbered among them.' Giraldus
rephed, 'But it and the other churches of Wales
are not numbered in the same way as the suffragans
of England, that is, in the accusative. If they
were, they might certainly be reckoned subject.'
' That is a good point,' said the Pope ; ' and there
is another thing which makes for you and your
church. There is a rubric inserted, which is
nowhere done in the Register, except where it
passes from kingdom to kingdom or from province
to province.' 'True,' quickly rejoined Giraldus,
'and Wales is a part of the English kingdom, and
not a kingdom by itself.' The Pope did not
commit himself further than to remark cautiously,
'You may take it that our Register is not against
you.' The facts here stated can be verified. We
possess a Provinciale of the type described in
the Gesta of Cardinal Albinus written in 1188 or
1189, which presents the grammatical features
and the rubrication mentioned by Giraldus; but
it is probable that the actual volume to which
reference was made was an earlier Register of the
time of Alexander III^.
Forgery has always been a favourite occupation,
and it has prevailed at aU times when the literary
skiU required for its exercise was avaUable. In
the middle ages it was employed especiaUy with
the object of acquiring rights of property or juris
diction or of obtaining benefices or other desirable
grants. As a large proportion of such documents
related to ecclesiastical lands and offices, very
* See below. Appendix vi.

152 Innocent Ills Measures for the
many claims needed the support of the Pope's
authority; and it became essential, for the pro
tection of persons whose rights or interests were
affected, that the correct forms of his documents
should be understood. Hence the books of Formu
laries which were drawn up for the use of notaries
contained many rules and specimens of the types
which genuine Papal Letters ought to present^.
But these models, which were set out as guides
against deception, served in their turn as materials
for the unscrupiflous, and simphfied the work of
forgery. It was urgently necessary to take steps
to check the evil, and Innocent III determined to
deal vigorously with it. All through his pontificate
he was ceaselessly on the watch for the detection
of forged documents. In May of his first year he
found that letters had been produced bearing seals
of Celestine III and himself which were not genuine.
He issued a Decretal on the matter, in which he
first laid down general rules to safeguard the
procedure by which BuUs were obtained. He
forbade that anyone should receive Letters at
Rome except from the Pope's own hands or
from his duly appointed officiaP ; only persons of
great authority were permitted to employ a
messenger^. 1 There are a good many examples of the thirteenth century
printed in Rockinger's Briefsteller und Formelbiicher.
2 This was the BuUator, as appears from Reg. i. 349 (below
p. 156, note 1).
» 'Acoidit enim nuper in Urbe quod quidam huiusmodi
falsitatis astutiam perniciosius exercentes, in suis fuere iniqui-
tatibus deprehensi ; ita quod bullas tam sub nomine nostro quam
bonae memoriae Celestini PP. praedecessoris nostri, quas falso

Prevention and Detection of Forgery 153
Innocent then passed to the particular case
brought before him. He commanded the Arch
bishop of Rheims — and a letter in the same terms
was addressed to all archbishops and their suffragans
severaUy — to make enquiry into the reception of
suspicious Letters. The first test to be employed
was the comparison of the forged seal with a
genuine one^; and to assist the examination the
Pope caused one of the spurious seals to be
appended to the document together with the
authentic bulla. A few months later a case arose
in which a clerk of MUan had made use of a
Mandate requiring the Chapter to admit him to
a canonry and prebend. The Chapter referred
back the document for the Pope's consideration,
and he at once had doubts about its genuineness.
The style of composition and the manner of
writing were indeed a little suspicious, but the
seal was genuine. Careful examination however
showed that the seal was a little swoUen on the
upper part, and the Pope was able without
difficulty to draw out the string, while the other
end of the string protruding from the lower part
of the seal remained unmoved. The inference
confixerunt, et quamplures Utteras bullis signatas eisdem inveni-
mus apud eos, ipsosque captos adhuc in carcere detinemus.
Nos autem. . .districtius inhibemus ne quis apud sedem aposto
licam de caetero litteras nostras nisi a nobis vel de manibus
iUorum recipiat qui de mandate nostro sunt ad illud officium
.deputati. Si vero persona tantae auetoritatis exstiterit ut
deceat eum per nuntium litteras nostras recipere, nuntium ipsum
ad cancellariam nostram vel ad nos ipsos mittat idoneum, per
quem litteras apostolicas iuxta formam praescriptam recipiat':
Reg. I. 235, 19 May 1198; cf. Decret. Greg. IX, v. xx. 4.
1 'Primo fiat coUatio de falsa bulla cum vera': Reg., I.e.

154 Innocent Ill's Rules for the
was clear : a genuine seal had been detached from
the document to which it belonged by cutting the
string ; the seal had then been heated at the upper
part in order to admit of the insertion of a new
string joining it to the forged letter, but the other
end of the old string was left hanging from the
lower part^.
The Pope proceeded to draw up a fuUer and
more elaborate set of rules for the criticism of
disputed documents. He enumerates five marks
of forgery. First, the seal itself might be spurious.
We have just seen that in another case Innocent
prescribed the comparison of suspicious seals with
ones acknowledged to be genuine. If no un
doubted specimen was at hand, it is probable that
the practice then was, as it certainly was not
much later, to count the number of points or dots
in the circumference and on other parts of the
seal, in order to see whether they agreed with
'^ Ca«terum cum easdem litteras, sicut viri providi et discreti,
ad nostram remisissetis praesentiam, ut ex earum inspectione
plenius nosceremus utrum ex nostra conscientia processissent, plus
in eis invenimus quam vestra fuisset discretio suspicata. Nam hcet
in stylo dictaminis et forma scripturae ahquantulum coeperimus
dubitare, buUam tamen veram invenimus; quod primum nos
in vehementem admirationem induxit, cum htteras ipsas sciremus
de nostra conscientia nuUatenus emanasse. BuUam igitur hinc
inde diligentius intuentes, in superiori parte, qua filo adhaeret,
eam ahquantulum tumentem invenimus; et cum filum ex parte
tumenti sine violentia quahbet ahquantulum attrahi feoissemus,
bulla in filo altero remanente, filum ex parte ilia ab ipsa sine
quahbet diffioultate avulsum, in cuius summitate adhunc etiam
incisionis indicium apparebat, per quod liquido deprehendimus
buUam illam ex ahis litteris extractam fuisse ac illis per vitium
falsitatis insertam, sicut ex litteris ipsis plenius agnosoetis, quas
ad maiorem certitudinem vobis duximus remittendas: Reg. I.
349, 4 September 1198.

Criticism of suspected Documents 155
what was known to be the correct number^.
Secondly, the seal might be genuine but the original
string completely removed and a new one inserted
to attach it to a forged document. Thirdly, the
string might be cut under the fold of the parchment,
where it would not at once be noticed, and the
seal attached to a forged letter, the string being
mended with another string of similar texture ; or
again, fourthly, the string might be cut at the
upper part of the seal, then passed through a
spurious document and reinserted into the lead.
This latter plan was that adopted in the case
which provoked the issue of Innocent's Decretal:
the test would be the condition of the lead, whether
it showed signs of having been heated. Fifthly,
genuine letters might be falsified by a shght
erasure2. The Pope then mentions two grounds for
suspicion which are more difficult to detect: if a
^ Once an appellant alleged a letter to be spurious for lack of
one point, 'htteras arguens falsitatis, et buUam volens astruere,
quia punctus deerat, esse f alsam ' : Reg. xin. 64. In a paper
on Leopold Delisle, pubhshed in the Proceedings of the British
Academy, 1911-1912, p. 216, I stated erroneously that the Pope
condemned the doomnent. This was not so. The Mandate
caUed in question was a Commission to enquire into the facts.
It did not come up for scrutiny at Rome, because the Pope
evoked the parties to appear before him and re-heard the case
himself. For the points on the seal see Appendix vn. 4.
^ Two further rules are added in the Decretals of Gregory IX.
Sixthly, parts of a letter might be effaced by some chemical and
the parchment blanched with chalk or some other application,
and new writing inserted; or again, seventhly, the whole text
might be deleted and a thin sheet of parchment glued on to the
surface, and then a fresh document written on it. These are not
found in Innocent's Register, or in Rainerius' Prima CoUectio
Decretalium Innocentii III, i. 14 (Migne, ccxvi. 1219).

156 Innocent Ill's Rules for Criticism
document is obtained in an unauthorized way ; or
if a forged letter is cleverly presented for sealing
among a budget of documents, and it is inadver
tently accepted and sealed. In such cases it is
necessary to examine the document in its hterary
composition, in its form of writing, and in the quality
of the parchment. This last criterion would only
be appreciated by the experts of the Chancery;
the other two have already been considered.
They depend on the rules of Dictamen, the observ
ance of the Cursus ; and on the laws for drawing
up particular kinds of documents. FinaUy, atten
tion is again directed to the manner in which the
strings are attached and to the collation of the
seal with an undoubted specimen : careful inspec
tion wiU discover falsity if the die has moved or
if the impression is blunt, if the seal is not level
but rises in one part and is depressed in another^.
^ Prima species falsitatis haec est, ut falsa buUa litteris
apponatur. Secunda, ut filum de vera buUa extrahatur ex toto,
et per ahud filum immissum falsis litteris inseratur. Tertia, ut
filum ab ea parte, in qua charta phcatur, incisum, cum vera
buUa falsis litteris immittatur sub eadem phcatura cum filo
similis canapis restauratum. Quarta, quod a superiori parte
bullae altera pars flli sub plumbo rescinditur et per id[em] filum
litteris falsis inserta reducitur infra plumbum. Quinta, cum
litteris bullatis et redditis aliquid in eis per rasuram tenuem
immutatur. [Sexta, cum scriptura litterarum, qiubus fuerat
apposita vera bulla, cum aqua vel vino universahter abohta seu
deleta, eadem charta cum calce et ahis iuxta consuetum arti-
ficium dealbata de novo rescribitur. Septima cum chartae cui
fuerat apposita vera bulla, totahter abohtae vel abrasae, alia
subtilissima charta eiusdem quantitatis scripta cum tenacissimo
glutino coniungitur.] Eos etiam a crimine falsitatis non repu-
tamus immunes qui contra constitutionem praenussam scienter
litteras nostras nisi de nostra vel buUatoris nostri manu recipiunt.
Bos quoque qvii accidentes ad bullas \leg. buUam] falsas litteras

in technical Details 157
With what precise care Innocent pursued his
enquiries in modo dictaminis and in forma scrip
turae may be briefly iUustrated. The style of
address was particularly technical. A bishop is
venerabilis frater; any one else, even an elected
bishop before consecration, is dilectus filiusK But
a special distinction, as we know from Formularies,
was reserved for Emperors and Kings: such a
caute proiiciunt, ut de vera bulla cum ahis sigillentur. Sed hae
duae species falsitatis non possunt facile deprehendi, nisi vel in
modo dictaminis vel in forma scripturae vel quahtate chartae
falsitas cognoscatur. In caeteris autem diligens indagator falsi-
tatem poterit diligentius intueri vel in adiunctione filorum vel
in coUatione bullae vel motione vel obtusione; praesertim si
buUa non sit aequaUs sed alicubi magis sit tumida, alibi magis
depressa : Beg. I. 349. The sentences in brackets are added from
the text of the Decretals of Gregory IX, v. xx. 5.
^ See the letter to the Archbishop of Antivari, 5 December
1200, in which Innocent states the grounds for condemning a
Letter on which the Archbishop had acted: 'Nos vero rescriptum
litterarum falsarum dihgentius intuentes, in eis, tam in oonti-
nentia quam in dictamine, manifeste deprehendimus falsitatem
ac in hoc fuimus non modicum admirati quod tu tales litteras a
nobis credideras emanasse, cum praesertim scire debeas sedem
apostolicam in suis litteris consuetudinem hanc tenere, utuniversos
patriarchas, archiepiscopos, et episoopos fratres, caeteros autem,
sive reges sint sive prinoipes, vel alios homines ouiuscunque ordinis
filios, in nostris htteris appeUemus ; et cum uni tantum personae
litterae apostohcae dirigantur, nunquam ei loquamur in pluraU,
ut vos sive vester vel his similia in ipsis litteris apponantur. In
falsis autem tibi litteris praesentatis, in salutatione dilectus in
Christo filius vocabaris, cum in omnibus htteris quas ahquando
tibi transmisimus te videre potueris a nobis fratrem venerabilem
appellatum: propter quod sic esse te volumus in consimilibus
circumspectum ut per falsas litteras denuo nequeas circumveniri
vel falli, sed sic litteras apostoUcas diligentius intueri tam in
bulla quam in filo, tajn etiam in carta quam stylo, quod veras
pro falsis et falsas pro veris aliquomodo non admittas': Reg. ni.
37. The document is included, with the blundered address
'Attinacensi episcopo,' in Gregory IX's Decretals, v. xx. 6.

158 Tests of Genuineness
person is not dilectus filius but charissimus in
Christo filius, and after his name is added imperator
or rex illustris; and in the Text of the letter
filius must be foUowed by noster'^. The name of a
bishopric or monastery must be written in a
Latin form ; if it appears in the vernacular
the Letter is spurious 2- The Pope now always
^ The noster was here essential, but its use was not strictly
confined to royal personages. The solecism of introducing it
into the Address is not mentioned in the rules De Salutatione
apostohca, printed by Delisle, M6inoire, pp. 68 ff., which are
assigned to the end of the twelfth century; nor is it found in a
Formulary of a century later, cited (ibid., p. 29 note 1) from the
Paris MS. 4163, where it is laid down, 'Vocat eos carissimos in
Christo filios. . .in salutatione. In prosecutione vero litterarum
addit nostros.' I doubt whether nostro appears in the Address
in originals of the time of Innocent III. It is absent, for instance,
from that Pope's Letter to John of England, 16 April 1214,
printed ex originaU in Rymer's Foedera, i. 119 (ed. 1816);
cf. pp. 104, 117, 119. Aletter of 14May 1214 printed in Dachery's
Spicilegium (ed. L. F. J. De la Barre, 1723), iu. 577, contains
nostro, but the source of this document is not stated. By far
the majority of Innocent's letters are preserved only with an
abbreviated Address. Honorius III inserted nostro occasionaUy,
to the King of Jerusalem (Epp. l. 1, ed. 1879), to Henry III
(I. 162), and to Phihp Augustus (i. 305, the letter is addressed
to his son) ; but not, for instance, to the Emperor of Constanti
nople (i. 3) or to the Kings of Bohemia and Hungary (i. 157,
181). ' ' Praef atae litterae nequaquam de nostra conscientia mana-
verunt, quia cum monasterium ipsum, non solum pubhco sui
nomine, verum etiam per sui negotia multiphcia, quae nos fre
quenter in instantia nostrae soUicitudinis occuparunt, notissimum
nobis existat, verisimile non apparet quod eius monachi de
Bwrguol, sicut in eisdem htteris continetur, Galhco idiomate
scripsissemus, quos sermone Latino Burgulienses consuevimus
appellare. In quo procul dubio deprehenditur quod si litterae
ipse quomodocumque a nostro auditorio processerunt, fraudu-
lenter fuit, ut insuetum, GaUicum nomen positum, ne per
Latinum, ut assuetum, monasterium ipsum fuisset redditum
nobis notum': Reg. xi. 144, 20 September 1208.

Tests of Genuineness 159
addressed an individual person in the singular,
tu not vos^. This practice was established in the
course of the twelfth century^, and perhaps the
use of the plural hngered longest in letters
addressed to the Emperor^.
But when documents aUeged to be forgeries
were produced before him Innocent refused to
condemn them on grounds which he regarded as
immaterial. On one occasion a document was
denounced because, besides some irregularities of
procedure, the capital S in Salutem was extended
too far in the hinder stroke*, and because it named
an archdeacon before a dean; the Pope overruled
the objections as frivolous and vain. Again, when
a mandate was claimed as a forgery, the Pope
on inspection found only an erasure of a few
letters, and at once declared the document to
1 See above, p. 22, note 2.
^ The statement in the Nouveau Trait6 de Diplomatique,
V. 174, that the last examples of the use of the plural in addressing
an individual person are found in two letters of Alexander III
to Suger Abbot of St Denis is not supported by the numerous
specimens printed in the Reoueil des Historiens de la France,
xvi. 436-462.
* See Wolfgang Michael, Die Formen des unmittelbaren
Verkehrs zwisehen den Deutschen Kaisern und souveranen
Fiirsten (1888), pp. 78-97. The singular became uniform
under Eugenius III. Conversely, about the same time Con
rad III adopted the more distant plural in addressing the Pope.
Frederick I in 1159, in a moment of irritation, restored the
singular, and a hvely passage of arms ensued. See ihid., pp. 98-
119, and Rahewin's narrative, Gesta Friderici Imperatoris,
IV. 19-22. The matter was comphcated by the fact that
Frederick insisted on placing his name before the Pope's in the
Address. * 'Quia S httera capitahs in hac dictione Sahitem nimis erat
in longum a posteriori parte protensa ' : Reg. x. 80, 20 June
1207.

160 Mode of Exemplification of
be genuine^. Even the most precisely regxUated
Chancery must be hable to occasional lapses, and
Innocent's judicial mind drew a clear distinction
between faults which were fatal and those which
arose merely from casual error in details of no
moment. We have noticed the exact fidehty with which
the rules of balance and rhythm in the composi
tion of documents were observed in his Chancery^,
and the striking difference ia caUigraphy between
Letters of Grace and Mandates which was now
elaborated^. Innocent was scrupulous too in the
care with which he prescribed the manner in which
old and mutUated documents should be recorded.
Of this we have only one example, but it furnished
a precedent for later Popes. In 1213 the monks of
Nonantula presented to Innocent three frayed and
tattered Privileges of Hadrian I, Marinus I, and
John IX. The Pope ordered a transcript of them
to be made, and incorporated it in a BuU ratified by
his seal, so that the monastery might possess an
authoritative exemphfication* of its title-deeds. His
Scriniarius caused aU that could be recovered from
^ 'Nullum in eis signum falsitatis vel suspicionis invenimus
nisi paucarum litterarum rasuras, quae nequaquam sapientis
animum in dubitationem vertere debuerunt' : Reg. i. 406, 20 Oct.
1198; inserted in the Decretals, v. xx. 9. Before Innocent's
time this had been laid down by Alexander III : ' Dicimus quod
propter abrasionem illam [litterae] iudicari falsae non possunt, nee
etiam haberi suspectae, praesertim cum et privilegia in possessi-
onibus abradantur et litterae in narratione facti (si erratum est)
possunt incunctanter abradi' : Deer. ii. xxii. 3. ^ Above, pp. 94 f.
* Above, pp. 116-118, 121 f. ; cf. Appendix v.
* This later English term corresponds to the phrase used by
Innocent, 'iussimus fideliter exemplari.'

Mutilated Documents 161
the papyrus writings, which had in part perished
by reason of their great age, to be set out in the
form of a notarial Act ; and the Pope supphed by
the help of the context portions which were pre
sumed to have existed in the originals when
perfect. These conjectural insertions were written
for distinction in a peculiar handwriting, tonsis
litteris^. 'Shorn letters' was the name given to
the character derived from the Half -Uncial which
had formed itself in the British Isles and passed
back to the Continent in the Carohngian time 2;
it was the same type of writuig as that which was
introduced in a modified form into the opening
line of the Papal BuU in the eleventh century 3.
The restoration was confined to syUables or
portions of words where there was practically no
doubt as to the reading. If there was a larger
lacuna a space was left in the transcript.
This single illustration shows how Innocent III
anticipated the methods of the modem critical
^ 'Ea quae de ipsis soriptis papyrus ex quadam parte prae
nimia vetustate consumptis coUigere potuit, in publicam formam
redigere procuravit: quibus nos, apostohci favoris praesidium
impendentes, in hac pagina fecimus sub bulla nostra conscribi,
supplendo quaedam quae secundum htterae circumstantias in
integris praesumebantur originahbus fuisse descripta, quae causa
discretionis mandavimus in hac charta tonsis Utteris exarari ' :
Reg. XVI. 61, 13 June 1213.
^ See L. Traube, Perrona Scottorum, in Sitzungsberichte der
phUos.-phUol. und der hist. Classe der K. B. Akademie der
Wissenschaften zu Miinchen, 1900, pp. 634-637.
3 See Delisle, Les 'Litterae tonsae '¦& la ChanceUerie Romaine
au xiiie Siecle, in Bibl. de r:6cole des Chartes, Ixh. (1901), 256-
263 ; where a facsimile is given of a BuU of Gregory IX presenting
similar features. Another specimen of the same pontificate will
be found in Mittheilungen, xxv. (1904), 291 f.
P. P. C. 11

162 The Chancery in the
editor, just as in his examination of suspected
documents in stylo et filo, charta et bulla^ he laid
down the principles which remain to this day the
foundations of diplomatic study. The features in
his aU-embracing activity to which I have drawn
attention serve to complete the picture which I
have attempted to draw of the exactness and
perfection with which his Chancery was regulated.
After his time the standard he had set was in
most respects long maintained, though the rules
of the Cursus were by degrees less strictly observed.
But to give even a summary account of the later
medieval system, with its constantly increasing
elaboration of procedure and routine, would lead
me far beyond my hmits. I conclude with some
passages from a famous poem on the State of the
Roman Court, which describes the Chancery as it
was during the pontificate of Urban IV ^.
1 Reg. VII. 34.
^ This poem was printed by Flacius lUyricus and by Mabillon
from different texts. It has been recently edited by Professor
Hermann Grauert, in an exhaustive work entitled Magister
Heinrich der Poet in Wiirzburg und die Romische Kurie, which
was published in the Abhandlungen der Konighch Bayerischen
Akademie der Wissenschaften, phUos..philol. und hist. Klasse,
xxvii. 1, 2 (1912). My quotations are taken from this edition.
The poem in some manuscripts is assigned to Geoffrey de Vino
Salvo (fl. 1200), but it is certainly of a later date than his time.
The, attribution to Master Henry is given in a Wiirzburg MS of
the poem, and is confirmed by the statement of Hugh of Trimberg,
who wrote in 1280: see his Registrum multorum Auctorum,
p. 41, ed. J. Huemer, 1888. It is placed beyond doubt by
Dr Grauert's minute examination of all the evidence. He dates
the composition of the poem in the time of Urban IV (1261-
1264): see pp. 410 f. I may notice that Dr Grauert is in error
in supposing that the Bodleian MS. Auct. F. 1. 17 contains this
poem as well as the Poetria nova of Geoffrey.

Thirteenth Century

163

Writers of
Petitions. Draughtsmen.The number of
Writers.

They engross the
draughts, and
the fair copies
are returned for
collation.
Notaries submit
Petitions to the
Pope.

The Petition is
drawn up
and presented;
then the Letter is
engrossed and
se^ed.

Ut muIte cemuntur apes in vallibus Ethne 215
Sic ope multorum Curia fulta viget.
Sunt ibi qui norunt formare negocia quevis,
Et sunt qui formas abreviare sciunt.
Scriptorum numeri non clara mente recorder,
Sed mihi cum quadam nube venire solent. 220
Nee facUe esset, eos numero deprendere certo,
Sed possunt deoies, ut reor, esse decern^.
Istorum labor est cartas grossare notatas
Et grossas cameris restituisse suis.
Sunt ibi qui ref erunt ^ sacri Pastoris ad aures
Ardua vota hominum soUicitasque preces . . .
Protinus expediunt quicquid datur expedien-
dum
Et mora soUicitos non tenet ulla viros.
Festinant urgentque die noctuque labores
Inceptum donee perficiatur opus.
Res quandoque datur tribus expedienda diebus
Quam tamen instanter expedit hora brevis.
Prima dies igitur scribet quodcunque petendum
est 240
Et tua portabit vota secunda Patri.
Tercia grossabit, buUatum quarta videbit
Et potes in quinta dicere, Roma vale 

225

233

235

The Corrector
Litterarum
Apostolicarum.

[Should a document be rewritten,]
Hoc Correctoris factum dependet in arte.
Qui iubet ut redeat carta sapore novo.
lUe tibi apponet per se vel demet, amice,
Rem quam non poteras consuluisse tibi.

270

1 Under Clement V they were about 110: see his order
of 27 October 1310, in Tangl, Papstliche Kanzlei-Ordnungen,
pp. 82 f.
" Hence when Petitions came to be entrusted to a distinct
class of officials, these were called Referendaries: see below,
Appendix vii. 2. Compare Dr R. von Heckel's Commentary,
in Grauert, p. 216. 11—2

164 The Chancery in the time
lUe oculus tuus est, et ne qua parte vaciUet
Res tua subtih lumiae lustrat opus 
lUe mihi quidam faber esse videtur et ipsos
Fabrorum ritus officiumque sequi.
Si producta nimis sit littera, ponit in ignem
Ingemi et crebro verbere curtat opus:
Si brevis est et eget ut sit producta, faviUas
Excitat et rursus massa sub igne calet;
MaUeus eductam tandem sie corripit Ulam,
Longius ut crescat, amphficetque viam. . . ,

275281

285

The Auditor
LitterarumContradictarum.

[7/ objection be taken,]
Contradictarum certus sedet arbiter Uhc,
Officio cuius discueietur opus.
Si res est simplex et non preiudicat uUi,
Expediet cursus absque labore sues.
Si vero tahs fuerit quod forte gravari
Inde potest ahquis, altera forma subit.
Tunc sub dissimUi ponetur iudice causa.
Nee poteris ventis ad tua vota frui.
Sic etenim servat sua Curia iura cuique,
Ne quisquam vere possit ab Urbe queri.
Cum fuerit concors convencio facta, repente
Mittitur ad bullam carta refecta saeram. . .

319

325

330

The Vice-
chancellor

brings Litterae
legendae before
the Pope.

[Of the Vice-Chancellor.]
lUe secunda manus Pape est, mediaque diei
Pondus et estatis parte levare solet 
Huius et hoc opus est et regula certa legendas
Ut ferat ante Patrem, cum vacat hora,
sacrum.
Plus aliis candoris habens hec ultima fomax
Fervet et ad purum quodque reducit opus. .

345

351

of Urban IV

165

The Lector may
reject Petitions.

The Bullator.

[But Petitions may be rejected by the Lector^ without
being thus presented.]
Omnia longinqui cognovit temporis usu 435
Que Pater admittit, queque negare solet:
Ne sacras igitur teneat sermonibus aures
Et det inutihbus tempera multa sonis,
Cassat eas quas Papa preces transire vetaret,
Quam cito prodiret primus ab ore sonus. 440
Que vero retinent formam cursumque probati
Tramitis, hec^ numquam supprimit, ymo
legit....
[After an account of the Cardinals and of the
Pope, we are introduced to the Bullator.]
Venerit ad buUam perfecte pauper et exul; 999
Promeruisse potest forte salutis opem.
Alter ab excelso si sit transmissus Olympo :
Ni prius enumeret munera, litus arat.
BuUa reclamatur si non in tempore certo,
Dentibus horrendis dhaeeratur opus;
Et nisi legales sint et sine crimiae nummi, 1005
Littera de buUa nuUa sequetur eos.

^ At this date he was a Notary, but not much later his place
was taken by a Referendary: see Bresslau, i. 683 f. (1st ed.).
* So corrected by MabUlon ; Dr Grauert prints hos.

APPENDIX
I. The Libee Pontificahs^
In the thirteenth century the earhest portion of the Liber
Pontificalis was supposed to be the work of Damasus^ because
it opens with a correspondence between St Jerome and that
Pope; but these letters are known to be spurious, and no
section of the existing book can be assigned to so early a date.
In modern times scholars went to an opposite extreme and
attributed the whole of the first part, ending late in the ninth
century, to Anastasius, the papal hbrarian of that time.
This opinion does not go further back than Panvinio and
BeUarmin about 1600 : it was refuted by Schelestrate so long
ago as 1692*, but nevertheless, through force of repetition, it
continued to hold its ground even until recent years*. The
only dispute now is whether the book, as a book, was com
pUed in any of its existing forms in the sixth or the seventh
century. But in this book, as we have it, are imbedded
earlier materials which carry back its evidence as far as
the middle of the fourth century and indirectly further
stm. The oldest elements of which the book is composed are
two hsts of Popes. One of these is contained in a chrono
logical coUection known as that of the Chronographer of the
^ See above, p. 5.
2 Thus Martin of Troppau says that he compUed his Chronicle
ex cronicis Damasi pape de gestis pontificum and from other
works: Monumenta Germaniae historica, Scriptores xxii. 407.
* See Duchesne's introduction to the Liber Pontificalis, i.
(1886), p. xxxv.
* In Migne's Latin Patrology the book is printed among the
works of Anastasius in volumes cxxvu., cxxviii. (1853, 1852).

The Liber Pontificalis 167
year 354^, which was drawn up on the basis of an earlier list
in 336 and revised during the pontificate of Liberius (352-
366) : this is distinguished as the Liberian Catalogue, or, from
the name of the Uluminator of Pope Damasus, who may have
been its scribe, the Catalogue of FUocalus^. The second
ancient source is the Catalogue, preserved only in a number
of derived copies, which is caUed by Bishop Lightfoot the
Leonine Catalogue* and is assigned by him and by Monsignor
Duchesne* to the fifth century : Mommsen, on the other hand,
who styles this text the Index, claims for it an antiquity
equal or superior to that of the Liberian Catalogue^. From
these two lists, for the earliest time chiefly from the Liberian,
the compUer of the Liber Pontificalis drew the skeleton of
his work.
At what date this was put together scholars are not
in agreement*. The record ending with the death of Pope
Felix IV (526-530), known as the Catalogus Pelicianus, is
regarded by Waitz and Mommsen as the nucleus out of which
the developed work grew, whUe Monsignor Duchesne holds
that it is an abridgement of an older form of it'. According
to Monsignor Duchesne the original work was compUed early
in the sixth century ; it was begun perhaps under Hormisdas
(614—523), and in its first form completed after the death of
Felix rv. The compUer of the original work, Monsignor
Duchesne infers from the vernacular style, was a Papal
notary attached to the administrative department of the
1 Printed by T. Mommsen, Chron. min. (Monum. Germ.),
i. 73-76 (1891), and by C. Frick, Chron. min., i. 123-129 (1892).
2 Duchesne, i. pp. vi.-x.
3 The Apostolic Fathers, I. i. 311 (1890).
* Introd., § iii.
^ Liber Pontificalis, i. (1898), proleg., p. xxix., in Monum.
Germ. This edition at present extends only to the pontificate
of Constantine (708-715).
* A useful summary of the questions in dispute as to the
origin and composition of the Liber Pontificalis is given by
A. Brackmarm in Herzog and Hauck's Realencyklopadie fiir
protestantische Theologie und Kirche, xi. (1902), 439-446.
' Duchesne, i. pp. xli.-xliii., xlix.-hv., Iviii., Ixiv.

168 Appendix I
Lateran Palace, probably to the Vestiarium or Wardrobe,
rather than to the Chancery. He was acquainted with
archives containing rescripts of Popes, but the only documents
irom which he has made extracts are the endowments of
¦pious foundations, which he seems to have taken from some
aort of chartulary 1. The great bulk of the information he
gives — and the same thing may be said of his continuators^ — ,
relates to matters which came within the province of the
Wardrobe. It does not concern the Papal finances or ordinary
expenditure, but with the Pope's 'privy purse' outgoings,
his bounty*. The original work was added to whUe the Goths
stiU ruled Italy, and the notices of the Popes between 530 and
537 are the work of a contemporary*: after this latter date
an interval elapsed before the record was resumed, probably
in the last quarter of the century, and its notices are meagre
and of small value. These additions were made either by
stages or at a single bound in the course of the seventh
century^- Waitz* and Mommsen', on the other hand, consider
that the finished work even in its first recension was not
composed until the early part of the seventh century, after
1 Duchesne, i. pp. clxii., cf. cxlv. h, clii. a.
^ Cf. ihid., p. ccxliv.
' Ihid., p. ccxliii.
* Ibid., pp. xxxvi.-xlviii. This portion of the work Mon
signor Duchesne (pp. ccvii. , ccxxxi. ) considers to represent a second
edition of it made towards the middle of the sixth century. It
has come down to us in at least two different classes of manu
scripts, and the text has undergone a good deal of redaction and
interpolation. ^ First there are the lives of Pelagius II and of Gregory the
Great, and then those of Gregory's five successors down to 625.
After this, with Honorius I, begins a series of lives apparently
composed in most instances one by one, though sometimes several
lives seem to be the work of a single writer. By the middle of
the seventh century there are signs that the biography might be
begun in the Pope's lifetime, and this was certainly the case in
the eighth: Duchesne, pp. coxxxiii., ccxxxi v.
' See his two papers in Neues Archiv, iv. (1879), 217-237
ix. (1884), 459-472.
' Liber Pontificalis, i. proleg., pp. xiii.-xviii.

The Liber Pontificalis 169
the death of Gregory the Great^, and that the second recension
was not made untU after the death of Pope Conon^ (687).
From this time onwards continuations were made to the
book extending to the death of Pope Constantine (715)*, to
Stephen II (757), Stephen III (772)*, and Hadrian I (795).
The narrative now possesses the value of a strictly contem
porary record. The Life of Hadrian was probably written
as far as chapter xliv in 774, the very year of which it gives
the narrative^. Its sequel presents a new text, which is
continued with greater or less amplitude down to late in the
ninth century ; but the manuscripts languish, and end abruptly
either in the third year of Hadrian II in 870, or after a gap of
three pontificates with a fragment concerning Stephen V*.
This is reaUy the end of the book as a coUection of Lives.
For the period foUowing we have nothing but jejune Catalogues
for two hundred years, from the accession of John VIII in
872 down to that of Gregory VII m 1073'. They teU us a
few personal particulars about each Pope, but only occasionaUy,
as in the case of John XII, do they contain any regular his
torical narrative. Prom the accession of Gregory VII to the
pontificate of Honorius II, that is from 1073 to 1130, the case
is very different. Here we have substantial if brief Lives of
each Pope, written for the most part by contemporaries and
containing a variety of valuable detaUs. They were put
together and the last three of them composed by one Pandulf ,
a subdeacon at Rome who did his work some time after 1133,
perhaps after 1137. AU this later part, from Hadrian II to
Honorius II, is contained in a manuscript written in 1142 by
' Mommsen admitted the existence of an earlier recension of
the book, ending with Felix IV, but he held that it had perished
and was only represented by epitomes.
' An abridgement ending with this Pope exists and is known
as the Catalogus Cononianus: Duchesne, i. pp. hv.-lvii.
' Ihid., pp. ccvii.-ccxix.
* Ibid., pp. ccxxv., ccxxvi., ccxxxiii.
° Ihid., p. ccxxxvii.
« Ihid., u. (1892) 195 f., and intr., pp. h.-vui. ; compare above,
p. 36.' Ibid., pp. xiii.-xx.

170 Appendix I, II
Peter sumamed WiUiam, librarian of the monastery of St GUes
on the Lower Rhdne^. Of the Lives at the beginning there are
other manuscripts, and of the Catalogues which foUow them
there are variant texts ; but Peter Wilham's book is the only
one which contains the Lives from Gregory VII onwards.
It is usual to append to these two great sections of the
Liber Pontificahs a continuation made by Cardinal Boso
which is contained in the Liber Censuum of the chamberlain
Cencius written in 1192 in a manuscript which stiU exists at
the Vatican^. But it is only in part a continuation. It starts,
like the Liber Pontificalis itself, with St Peter and is for the
greater part of its range a compilation from it. But it becomes
of great importance in the twelfth century, ending with the
Life of Alexander III. Subsequent coUections of Lives are
of a different character and composition, and come from
different sources: they caimot be ranked as parts of the
Liber Pontificalis*.

II. The Regions of Rome*
That there were at various times three different sets of
regions in the city of Rome is not disputed ; and another was
formed by the modern regions which only ceased after the
overthrow of the Pope's temporal government. The three
older systems were:
1. The fourteen ancient or civil regions established for
the purpose of administration by Augustus;
2. The seven ecclesiastical regions which served the needs
of the Christian Church and are traced back to the third
century ;
3. The twelve later or medieval regions, the origin of
which has long been a subject of controversy.
The first question to answer is, which of these three series
is denoted by the numbers assigned to particular regions in
^ Duchesne, ii. pp. xxiv.— xxxvii. ^ Ihid., p. xxxvii.
^ Monsignor Duchesne prints them down to the pontificate
of Martin V: ihid., pp. 449-523. * See above, p. 8.

Tlie Regions of Rome 171
historical works and documents. H. Jordan, a most learned
investigator of the topographj' of ancient Rome, laid down
that all numbered regions which we find mentioned down
to the twelfth century are civU regions. They correspond
roughly, it we disregard textual mistakes and inaccuracies, to
the districts mapped out by Augustus, with the single exception
that from the seventh century onwards the Xlllth region is
caUed the Ist, whUe no evidence exists concerning the ancient
Ist, Xth, and Xlth^. There is, Jordan maintained, no
foundation for the view that the Liber Pontificalis or even
perhaps the letters of Gregory the Great refer to any other
regions than these: 'the seven ecclesiastical regions served
for titles for the clergy but were not applied as designations
of localities^.' In other words the Deacons and Notaries
were arranged in regions, but these regions were not used with
a precise topographical denotation.
Jordan's opinion, it wUl be seen, requires the emendation
of inconvenient statements, which are treated as scriptural
errors. But, what is more important, it ignores the plain
fact that, if the city was divided among certain officials for
ecclesiastical purposes, this involved the formation of local
districts. It is true that no unequivocal example has been
found of an ecclesiastical region cited by number with a
definite local attribution. An inscription of the year 338
commemorating a Lector of the second region*, though it
may raise a presumption, does not prove that that region was
the second ecclesiastical one* ; and the references in the Liber
1 Topographie der Stadt Rom im Alterthum, ii. (1871), 317-
321. 2 Ihid., pp. 326 f. Camillo Re, who agrees with Jordan as to
the continued use of the civil numbers down to the eleventh
century, does not accept his opinion concerning the ecclesiastical
regions: see his paper on Le Regioni di Roma nel Medio Evo, in
Studi e Dooumenti di Storia e Diritto, x. (1889) 349-363.
3 J. B. de Rossi, Inscriptiones sacrae Urbis Romae, i. (1857-
1861) 42, n. XLViii.
* As Monsignor Duchesne contends: Notes sur la Topo
graphie de Rome au Moyen Age, in Melanges d' Archeologie et
d'Histoire, vii. (1887), 397 f.

172 Appendix II
Pontificahs to St Clement's church as m the third region^
would be equaUy apphcable to either system of numeration.
On the other hand, when the Liber Pontificalis states, as it
usuaUy does, that a Pope was bom in such or such a region,
it can only mean that the regions denoted definite locaUties,
and the fact that no region bearing a higher number than
seven is mentioned leaves no doubt that the regions are
those of the ecclesiastical series".
Monsignor Duchesne asserts in opposition to Jordan that
the civU regions passed into desuetude, at least in ordinary
use, after the Gothic wars of the sixth century, and that
the ecclesiastical regions took their place* : if ever after
that time a civU region is mentioned, it is merely a piece of
antiquarian pedantry*. Except in such cases, any reference
to a region with a number higher than seven indicates not
a civU region, but a region of the later, medieval system.
I venture to think that Jordan was right in maintaining the
persistence of the ancient numbers for certain purposes, but
clearly wrong in denjdng the employment of numbers to
indicate the localities of the ecclesiastical regions; and that,
whUe Monsignor Duchesne was right in insisting on this
latter point, he adopted an unnatural uiterpretation of the
evidence in order to prove the disappearance of the civil
regions. Now it is beyond doubt that the ancient regions ceased
to be applicable to the conditions to which Rome was reduced
1 Lib. Pontif., i. 443, 505.
^ There is, indeed, one instance of a reference to the eighth
region printed in the edition of the Liber Pontificalis in the
notice of Benedict VT (972, ihid., ii. 255), but it is found only in
a variant text of the Papal Catalogue preserved in one manuscript
written at the end of^the eleventh century (the Codex Bstensis:
see Liber Pontif., i. p. cxcix.): the explanation added that it
was suh Capitolio shows that the region belongs to the civil series ;
Monsignor Duchesne's attempt, in his paper on Les Regions de
Rome au Moyen Age, in Melanges d' Archeologie et d'Histoire,
X. (1890) p. 141, to connect it with the region Campitelh of the
medieval system appears unsuccessful.
3 Ihid., p. 128. * Ibid., p. 135.

The Regions of Rome 173
after the sack by TotUa in 547; post quam devastationem, in
the fearful words of the Continuator of MarceUinus^, quadra-
ginta aut amplius dies Roma ita fuit desolata ut nemo ibi
hominum nisi bestiae morarentur. When the city was re-
peopled it was inhabited in new parts and whole districts
were left derehct. The extent of the change is indicated by
the facts that of the first thirteen regions of the ancient
system ten, extending from the south to the centre, the east,
and the north-east, correspond roughly to three of the later
medieval regions, and that the fourteenth seems to have
almost passed away out of mind^ The ancient regions now
meant nothing for the administration of the city, but they
continued to be used as a means for identifying property;
and thus we find them frequently mentioned in charters of
the tenth and eleventh centuries*. Possibly they were
mechanicaUy repeated from older title-deeds, just as in
English leases of the seventeenth century we may read of a
tenement bounded by another 'in the occupation of John
Stokes,' though John Stokes had been dead for a hundred
years. But as Rome slowly recovered from the disasters of the
Gothic wars it became necessary to organize the city for the
purpose of defence, and to this we may with probabUity
attribute the origin of the twelve medieval regions. Mon
signor Duchesne suggests that this system was imported from
the East; it was connected wdth the Byzantine mUitary
system and was introduced into Rome in the seventh century :
1 Chron. min. u. 108, ed. Mommsen (Monum. Germ. Hist.)
1893. ^ I have already noticed (pp. 11 f.) that not one of the diaconiae
was fixed in this region, the district beyond the Tiber. When
this region emerged once more, it was known by its ancient
number, xrv: see Gregorovius, iv. 456, note 2. The fourteenth
region trans Tiherim is mentioned in a bull of John XVIII of
29 March 1005: Pfiugk-Harttimg, Acta u. 57, n. 93.
^ I need not cite the instances which I had collected, as
abundant specimens are given by M. Halphen, !fitudes sur
r Administration de Rome au Moyen Age (1907), in the notes to
pp. 8 f. Cf. Gregorovius, iii. 530, note 2.

174 Appendix II
and thus the establishment of the scholar, militiae, here as at
Ravenna^, led to the creation of a new series of regions based
upon a different principle from either of the older ones. But
there is a link between the ecclesiastical and the medieval
systems. In the Roman Ordines preserved in texts which go
back to the eighth and ninth centuries the clergy and the
oivU population are found grouped by ecclesiastical regions^.
There were seven Crosses carried in processions and these
Crosses were connected with the regions. For mUitary
purposes standards were needed, and in 1143 there is record
of twelve standards. This account of the object for which
the medieval regions were constituted, though the defective
nature of our materials forbids us to assert it as proved*,
furnishes an adequate and reasonable explanation of their
distribution. If the system was first constructed in the seventh
century, it is hkely that the violence of later times led to the
modification of its arrangement. Above aU, the plunder of
Rome by Robert Guiscard in 1084 caused a displacement of
^ Ravenna was divided into twelve regions: one for the
church and eleven handi arranged for military purposes : Agnellus,
Liber Pontif. Eccl. Ravennat., cxx. p. 370 (Script. Rer. Lango-
bard., ed. Waitz, 1878). These handi were known by their
numbers: ihid., xxxix. p. 303, t.xxvti. p. 330. Cf. Charles Diehl,
ifitudes sur I'Administration Byzantine dans I'Exarchat de
Ravenne (1888), pp. 308 ff.
2 Monsignor Duchesne thinks (Les Regions de Rome, pp. I42ff.)
that the ecclesiastical regions were parcelled out at a date subse
quent to the ninth century to suit the shifting of the population,
and that their place was taken by the eighteen diaconiae. See too
his note to the Liber Pontificalis, ii. 253.
^ The argument which has been drawn from the Life of
John XIII, to show that the 'mean folk' in 965 was organized
under twelve decarcones, does not seem to be warranted by the
text: 'De viUgo populo qui vocantur decarcones duodecim
suspendit in patibulo,' Liber Pontif., ii. 252, and Duchesne's
note on pp. 253 f. Cf. Giesebrecht, Geschichte der Deutschen
Kaiserzeit, i. (5th ed., 1881) 874 note 3. The document on which
Re relies for the existence of fifteen regions in 964 (pp. 365 f.)
is a well-known forgery : see Monum. Germ. Hist., Leg. li. ii.
168 ff., Jaffe, Reg. 3705.

The Regions of Rome 175
population which probably made a re-grouping of the regions
necessary. The district from the Lateran Palace to the
Colosseum was consumed by fire, and the Coelian and Aventine
hUls were graduaUy abandoned^. The number of regions
required for the south and south-east became smaUer, whUe
there became a greater need for organization of the rapidly
growing districts to the north-west and along the Tiber.
But the twelve regions of the city are positively attested in
1118, when on the occasion of the election of Gelasius II we
read of regiones duodecim Romanae civitatis, Tiberini, et Insu-
lani^. The regions included only the parts within the waUs:
the Transtiberine district with the Island lay outside* ; it was
not comprised among the regions until the thirteenth century.
The discussion of the relation of the three systems of
regions has been greatly confused by the assumption, which
has been taken for granted by many writers, that the medieval
regions bore numbers, hke the ancient and the ecclesiastical
systems. There was no more reason why they should bear
numbers than, for instance, the wards of the city of London.
As a fact they were mentioned simply by name, exactly as
we speak of the Ward of ComhiU. If ever a number is added,
it is an ancient number supphed for the purpose of topo
graphical identification*. It appears from an addition to
the MirabUia Urbis Romae contained in a manuscript
written between 1220 and 1226^, that even then the
arrangement of the regions was not completely settled.
We there find mention first of the fourteen civU regions;
then of the system of seven cohorts guarding the regions in
pairs*; and finaUy, postquam Romana est virtus attenuata et
1 Cf. Gregorovius, iv. 251 ff. ^ Liber. Pontif., ii. 313.
^ This fact is an evidence of the early date at which the
medieval regions were formed: cf. above, pp. 11 f., and Halphen,
p. 15, note 2.
* Halphen, p. 13 and note 5 ; Duchesne, Les Regions de-Rome,
p. 146. ° Cod. 1180 of the Imperial Library at Vienna.
" Referring to the title De officio Praefecti Vigilum, in the
Digest, I. XV. 3 : ' Septem cohortes opportunis locis constituit,
ut binas regiones Urbis unaquaeque cohors tueatur.'

176 Appendix II
loca mutata et nomina transformata, et sic duodecim principales
regiones in urbe sunt ordinate, qui divise sunt in viginti sex^.
It is of these twenty-six not of the twelve that he gives the
names and numbers; and his hst includes not only the
Transtiberine district but also the Leonine City. The first
clear evidence that the regional system crossed the Tiber is
quoted from the fourteenth century^, but the regions were
not reckoned in an official numerical order untU the time of
Martin V*. At length in 1586 the Borgo or Leonine City
was admitted as the fourteenth region.
The foUowing table gives the names of the regions as
arranged by authority under Martin V, with their numbers (a)*,
foUowed by the slightly different order of numeration found
in a Turin catalogue of the fifteenth century (b)^. In the
last column (c) I print an entirely different series of numbers
foimd in Spruner's Atlas*, of which I have not explored the
origin; it is stated to represent the distribution of the
regions after the piUage of Robert Guiscard. On the left
hand I have set down the numbers of the civU and
ecclesiastical regions, not in the least in order to suggest
even a rough approximation to a comparison, — ^for the
different systems did not, and were not intended to, corre
spond, — but simply in order to indicate in the most general
way the immense disparity of area included in each'.
1 Re, p. 372.
" Ibid., p. 375.
3 Ihid., p. 376; Duchesne, pp. 146 f.
* Re, p. 377 ; also in Kehr, Regesta Pontificum Romanorum,
i. pp. vii.-ix.
' Cod. Lat. 749, printed by F. Papencordt, Geschichte der
Stadt Rom im Mittelalter (1857), p. 53; cf. Re, p. 371. This
numbering is given by Gregorovius, iv. 620, and Halphen, p. 10.
* Hand -Atlas zur Geschichte des Mittelalters und der neueren
Zeit (3rd ed. by F. Menke, 1880), plate xxu. From this the
numbers are repeated in my Historical Atlas of Modern Europe
(1902), plate Ixix.
' I must add that, partly through repeated tracing of maps
and copying out of hsts of figures, and partly through defective
eyesight, I fear that these two columns are not free from error.

Appendix III

177

Civil
11, in, IV,
VI

ECOLES.

Ill, IV

V, VI

II, IV, vm, X, :
IX
I, xn, xm
XIV

1
vii

Regio
(Montium et Biberatioae
I Trivii et Viae Latae
/Columnae et S. Mariae in Aquiro
Campl Martis et S. Laurentii in
Lucina
J Pontis et Soorticlariorum
> Pariouis et S. Laurentii in Damaso
Arenulae et Caocabareorum
S. Eustaohii et Vineae Tedemarii
iPineae et S. Marci
Campitolli et S. Adrian!
S. Angeli in Foro Pisoium
Ripae et Marmoratae
Transtiberim [Burgi]

A

B

0

I

1

2

2

2

3

3

3

4

4

4

5

5

5

6

6

8

12

7

7

11

8

6

13

9

9

14

10

12

1

11

10

10

12

11

9

13

13

8

14

14

7

III. Salutem et Apostolicam Benedictionem ^
It has often been asserted that the Greeting in the form
Salutem et Apostolicam Benedictionem is found as early as
the time of John V and Sergius I at the end of the seventh
century. For this MabUlon adduced evidence from the
documents of the abbey of St Benignus at Dijon^, and gave
facsimUes of parts of the two Bulls*. He did not however
take these from the originals. The papyrus, he says, had so
much perished that it became necessary for the documents
to be restored, recognosci, approbari, ac in integrum restitui ;
and this was done by official authority in 1663*. MabUlon
duly noted that one of the BuUs contained an error in the
Indiction, but he expressed no further suspicion of their
genuineness^. The authors of the Nouveau Traite de
^ See above, p. 23.
2 De Re Diplomatica (ed. 1709), p. 622. ' Tab. xlvi.
* P. 36. This record was acquired by the Bibhotheque
Imperiale at Paris in 1867. It is printed in full by Delisle,
Melanges de Paieographie et de BibUographie (1880), pp. 37-43.
* Mabillon, p. 436. Delisle notes (p. 45) that, a little before
Mabillon, Le Cointe had condemned the Bull of Sergius as a
forgery.
P. P. c. 12

178 Appendix III
Diplomatique^ foUowed him in defending the documents, and
drew attention to their importance not merely as containing the
formula in question, but also as proving that a Bibliothecarius
was employed in the Papal Chancery at that early date and
that it was not necessary to insert the Imperial year in the
Datum: that a Datum should appear at aU or that a Pope
of the seventh century should have inserted his Pontifical
year does not seem to have caused surprise. It was not
untU Jaffe published his Regesta Pontificum Romanorum in
1851 that the Bulls were definitely set down as spurious^.
After him Dehsle discovered evidence which proved that
they were forged some time after 995* Previously the docu
ments had been known only from facsinules. Delisle examined
three fragments of the actual BuUs, two at Dijon and one
which had been stolen by Libri*. He discovered that the
papyrus leaves on which these letters, professing to emanate
from the Chancery of two different Popes, were written con
tained on their backs portions of a single Privilege of John XV
dated on 26 May 995. The forger could not procure new
sheets of papyrus and had to make use of a sheet already
written on. No proof could be more complete.
If these forgeries misled scholars for many ages, an
invention of a different sort not only carried back the use of
the formula to the earliest days of Christianity, but succeeded
in embodying the statement of its authorship in the Roman
Breviary. In the eleventh century a fashion arose of adding
a special interest to the lives of different Popes by attributing
to them an individual share in the composition of the Liturgy
1 V. 148 ff.
^ Doubts had indeed been expressed by Brequigny and
Gaetano Marini: see Dehsle, p. 46.
' Melanges, pp. 47-52. He had already given reasons for
regarding the documents with extreme suspicion in his Notice
sur un Papyrus de la Bibhotheque de Lord Ashburnham, in
Bibhotheque de I'ficole des Chartes, 6th series, iu. (1867), 455-
466. * This last is now restored not to Dijon, but to Paris, Nouv.
Acquis. Lat. 1609: see Dehsle's Catalogue des Manuscrits des
Fonds Libri et Barroia (1888), p. 57.

Salutem et Apostolicam Benedictionem 179
and in the establishment of particular ordinances. Bonizo of
iSutri in the fourth book of his Decretum assigns to a number
of early Bishops of Rome successive stages in this work.
Thus St Clement instituit canonem super Eucharistiam ante
quam frangatur decantari ; St Alexander inserted the passage
beginning Qui pridie. Other Popes appointed regulations of
other sorts : Evaristus constituit ut septem diacones essent in
urbe Roma qui custodirent papam ne infestaretur a malivolis^.
Martin of Troppau, better known as Martinus Polonus, who
repeated these statements, finding that no special claim was
made for St Cletus — a Bishop whose existence is more than
doubtful — supplied the defect thus : ' Hie pontif ex invenitur
primus posuisse in litteris suis Salutem et apostolicam bene
dictionem^.' The lesson for St Cletus on 26 AprU may be found in an
xmdated Breviarium secundum consuetudinem Romane Curig,
said to have been printed at Venice in 1505. It is taken
verbally from the Liber Pontificalis, except that the length
assigned to his episcopate* does not agree with any known
text. In Cardinal Quignon's first revision of the Breviary
published m 1535*, and in his second edition of 1536^, the
lesson is different ; it is abridged from Platina's work De Vitis
Summorum Pontificum*, but the mention of the epistolary
formula is not yet found. It appears however in Johannes
Stella's Vite ducentorum et triginta summorum Pontificum,
1507, in a narrative which is compUed from Martin of
Troppau as weU as from Platina: 'Primus litteris apostohcis
Salutem et apostolicam benedictionem scripsit.' The reformed
Breviary of Pius V foUows closely the text of the Liber
Pontificahs, but inserts in the middle of it a sentence and
1 A. Mai, Nova Patrum Bibhotheca, vii. hi. 32, 1854.
2 Monum. Germ, hist.. Script, xxii. 410.
' ' Annos .vii. mensem unum dies .xi.' Cf. H. Kellner, in
Historisches Jahrbuch, xxxiii. (1912), 109.
^ Breviarium Romanum a Francisco Cardinal! Quignonio
editum, ed. J. Wickham Legg (1888), p. 125.
5 The Second Recension of the Quignon Breviary, ed.
J. Wickham Legg, i. (1908), 276.
» Pp. 9 f., ed. 1626.
12—2

180 Appendix III, IV
a half apparently derived from SteUa, m which we read,
according to a copy printed at Venice in 1623, 'Pnmus m
litteris verbis iUis usus est, Salutem ei Apostolicam benedic
tionem^.' The source of the statement was behoved both by
Monsignor Pierre BatiffoP and by Suitbert Baumer* to be
unknown, but it is manifestly derived either from Martin of
Troppau or from SteUa. Since I ascertained this fact I have
found that it was aheady pointed out by the BoUandists so
long ago as 1675*.

IV. The Judices Palatini ^
Two descriptions of the Roman Judices have come down
to us in somewhat blundered forms. One has been caUed
the Notitia of c. 1000 and the other the Fragment of c. 1000 ;
but both of them are apparently incomplete, and as they are
generaUy accepted as belonging to the time of Otto III, and
as the shorter fragment is of a glossarial character, they may
be conveniently distinguished as the Ottoman Notitia and
the Ottonian Gloss. Of these the Gloss has by far the earlier
manuscript attestation*- It is found in a volume in the
^ It may be noted that this sentence is not contained in
Breviaries published at Avranches (1733), Evreux (1737), Amiens
(1746), Chalon (1765), Paris (1778), Chartres (1783), Vienne (1783),
Rennes (1787), Langres (1830), Besan^on (1834), or Laon (1839).
But it appears in that published at Cologne in 1718, and I am
informed that it held its position in the authorized editions until
recent years. I find it, for instance, in a Breviary printed at
Lyons in 1846. I have not undertaken a systematic examination
of the matter ; I merely cite the editions which I have inspected.
2 In Bulletin Critique, 1892, p. 15.
' Geschichte des Breviers, 1895, p. 432.
* Acta Sanctorum Aprilis, iii. 411. ^ gge above, p. 51.
' See the accounts of the manuscripts given by Dr S. KeUer,
Untersuchtmgen iiber die Judices sacri Palatii Lateranensis, ii.,
in the Deutsche Zeitsehrift fiir Kirchenrecht, x. (1901), 187-203
and by M. Louis Halphen, Le Cour d'Otton III & Rome, in.
Melanges d' Archeologie et d'Histoire, xxv. (1905), 354 note 4.

The Judices Palatini 181
Laurentian hbrary at Florence, Cod. Aedil. cxxu., which was
written about the year 1000 and formerly belonged to the
Cathedral Church. This contains a Gregorian Sacramentary,
foUowed, according to Bandini^, by a group of ritus et orationes
ad ccnsecrandum Episcopum, ad coronandum et benedicendum
Imperatorem, then our Gloss, Missa in ordinatione Pontiflcis,
and other masses, ordines, and prayers. The Gloss next
appears in a series of compUations of the last quarter of the
twelfth century: (1) the Liber pohticus (polyptychus) of
Benedict Presbyter, Cambray MS 554 ; (2) the Gesta pauperis
seholaris Albini, Cod. Ottobon. 3057 ; (3) the Liber Censuum
of Cencius the Chamberlain, afterwards Honorius III, Cod.
Vatic. Lat. 8486 2. It is also inserted in the Graphia aureae
Urbis Romae and in the Liber de MirabUibus Urbis Romae,
two surveys of the City which assumed their present shape
about the middle of the twehth century; but of these the
Graphia is preserved only in a manuscript of the thirteenth
or fourteenth century*, and the MirabUia has no earlier text
than that given by Cencius*. StUl, though their manuscript
transmission is unsatisfactory, it is probable that one or the
other of them in its original form was the source from which
Benedict, Albinus, and Cencius derived their copies of the
Gloss. Now, although the MirabUia can in fact be traced back
nearly to 1143, whUe the Graphia, as we have it, is not
older than about 1154, the Graphia is in fact of a considerably

1 Biblioth. Leopold. Laurent., i. (1791), 214 &, 215.
^ Dr Keller, p. 192, thinks that, though Cencius made use of
Albinus, he did not derive his text of the Gloss from him, but
either from the Graphia or the MirabUia.
* Florence, Biblioth. Laurent. ^ Ixxxix. infra, cod. 41, whence
it was published by A. F. Ozanam, Documents inedits pour
servir k I'Histoire htteraire de I'ltahe (1850), pp. 155-183.
* Le Liber Censuum de I'lfiglise Romaine, ed. by P. Fabre and
L. Duchesne, i. (1901), 262-273. Montfaucon first printed the
work from a manuscript of the thirteenth century: Diarium
Italicum, u. 28.3-298 (1702). It gives a text of the Gloss
(pp. 289 f.) similar to that of Albinus.

182 Appendix IV
earher origin^. It consists of three parts. The first is a
short historical introduction, beginning with the Tower of
BabeP ; this is pecuhar to the Graphia. Secondly, it describes
the classical topography of Rome and its Christian monuments
in a treatise* which in form and content shows a considerable
general affinity and often verbal agreement with the paraUel
description in the MirabUia, but the order of the sections in
the two works differs a good deal. It is only in this part of
the Graphia that we meet with statements written in the
twelfth century*, and these few notices are plainly interpo
lations. The third part introduces a new subject with the
words. His itaque prelibatis, nomina et dignitates illorum qui
in excubiis imperialibus perseverant describamus. It sets forth
the manner in which the Imperial Court was organized at
Rome, according to the author's accoimt, in his time, and
it enumerates the Judices not as Papal but as Imperial
officers. This section of the Graphia^ is independent of the
MirabUia. It is in part derived from the Origines of Isidore
of SeviUe, and shows a connexion, though not perhaps a
close connexion, with the work of the Emperor Constantine
Porphyrogenitus De Ceremoniis Aulae Byzantini*; but it
also includes not only the Gloss but three formulae which are
found also in the Vatican MS 4917 of the eleventh century.
These features lead to the conclusion that the Graphia in its
original shape was composed in the time of Otto III, who was
the only Emperor of the German line who kept a fixed court
at Rome and who is knowm to have surrounded himself with
1 We may see this from a comparison of the local descriptions :
for instance, 'Theatrum Neronis iiixta monumentum Adrian!
imperatoris' in the Graphia, p. 159, becomes 'Theatrum Neronis
iuxta oastellum Crescent!!' in the Mirabilia, ap. Lib. Censuum, !.
263 6.
2 Pp. 155 f.,ed. Ozanam. a Pp. 156-171.
* Thus p. 163, 'In monumento vero porfiretico beate Helene
sepultus est Anastasius iii! papa,' gives the latest date, 1153.
» Pp. 171-183.
' This connexion, if accepted, excludes Ozanam's attribution
of the Graphia to the period between the sixth and the eighth
centuries, probably about 663: p. 91. Cf. Keller, p. 195.

The Judices Palatini 183
that Byzantine ceremonial which the Graphia describes'-.
This is the view taken by WUhelm von Giesebrecht^, who
accounts for the absence of the later sections of the work from
the MirabUia on the ground that, since the Western Emperors
no longer had their residence at Rome, these descriptions
ceased to have more than an antiquarian interest and were
therefore omitted. The earher, topographical part however
continued to be transcribed, and came to form the nucleus
of the MirabUia. Giesebrecht admits the paradox that the
part of the Graphia which relates the establishment of the
Christian court of Otto III should bear a purely pagan
aspect. He thinks the author may have been a gram
marian, more occupied with antiquities and etymologies than
with the actual condition of things*- WhUe however the
third part of the Graphia was thus omitted in the MirabUia,
the httle fragmentary Gloss about the Judices was inserted,
without regard to arrangement, between the legend about the
Marble Horses and the mention of the Column of Antoninus*.
An examination of the text of the Notitia leads to a
simUar conclusion as to the date of its composition; but the
manuscripts in which it is preserved are not so early^. It is
found (1) in the historical compUation which Bonizo of Sutri
prefixed to his Decretum, printed by Cardinal Mai, Nova
Patrum Bibliotheea, vn. hi. 59 f. (1854*), by F. Bluhme,
^ In addition to the often quoted passages describing Otto's
attempt to revive the old Empire, reference may be made to a
lawsuit of 999 set out in the Farfa chartulary, iii. 149 ff., in
which we read of the praefectus navalis, the vestararius sacri
palatii, and the imperialis palatii magister.
2 Gesch. der Deutschen Kaiserzeit, i. 5th ed. (1881), 879 f . ;
cf. Gregorovius, iii. 517 ff. * Cf. KeUer, p. 200.
* Liber Censuum, i. 272. It is not however included in the late
twelfth-century text of the Mirabiha prefixed to the Chronicle of
Romuald of Salerno in the Vatican MS 3973, and printed by C. L.
Urhchs, Codex Urbis Romae topographicus (1871), pp. 92-112.
' A careful account of the manuscripts is given by Keller,
pp. 161-164.
« The discovery of this work is an interesting piece of literary
liistory, which does credit to the critical acuteness of Pertz. See

184 Appendix IV
m the Monumenta Germaniae, Leges, iv. (1868) 663 f., and
by Giesebrecht, i. 893 f .^ ; (2) in John the Deacon's Liber de
Ecclesia Lateranensi, dedicated to Alexander III and printed
by MabUlon, Museum Itahcum, u. 570 (1689) 2; (3) in Godfrey
of Viterbo's Pantheon, printed in Waltz's edition in the
Monumenta Germaniae, Scriptores, xxii. (1872) 304.
In all three texts the Notitia is inserted in a context with
which it has no organic connexion. Bonizo gives it in a
coUection of misceUanies. In John the Deacon it foUows an
interpolated inscription of 1297. Godfrey inserted it in his
second edition (MSS of the class D) which was dedicated to
Gregory VIII (1187), and omitted it in his third. Bonizo
and Godfrey give a longer text than John the Deacon, but
we need not hesitate to foUow Giesebrecht* and Dr KeUer*
in regarding the concluding part of the longer recensions
as an addition, probably made by Sonizo. John must there
fore have had access to an earher and to this extent an
imcontaminated text.
But the earlier part also presents difficulties. If we
accept the enumeration of the judices as a Roman document,
the question at once arises whether the interpretations of the
terms scriniarii — tabelliones, and defensores = advocati, do
not point to a redaction by a writer familiar with the officials
of Ravenna. Dr KeUer goes further and by an acute analysis
of the grammar and structure of the whole arrives at the
conclusion that the Roman Notitia is imbedded in a Ravennate
account of the judices of that city; so that the latter is in
terrupted between 'Ahi pedanei a consuhbus creati' and ' Alii
vero qui dicuntur consules' by the insertion of this older
Keller, 1. c. Some confusion has arisen from the fact that
G. B. de Rossi, who first transcribed the text, omitted to copy
the sentences after 'et ideo fallitur.'
1 Giesebrecht originally published it in his first edition of 1855.
^ The pagination of the edition of 1724 agrees with this.
The Notitia is given in chapter viii, but the next chapter is
numbered xii. It does not appear from what manuscript
MabiUon published his edition; it caimot have been of a date
earlier than the fourteenth century.
' i. 881. " Pp. 166 f.

The Judices Palatini

185

matter. 1 have indicated this by printmg what appears to
be the original Notitia in italics ; but I am not sure that the
insertion of the Notitia has not produced a further disturbance
in the statement about the judices at Ravenna which cannot
now be amended. Nor is it clear whether the text of the
Notitia begins, as I have printed it, with ' Septem sunt indices '
or with the clause preceding, but I incline to think that this
clause is due to the redactor. Dr KeUer is of opinion that
the existing form in which the Notitia appears, as redacted
at Ravenna, may be dated between 1010 and 1090'-
I reprint side by side the Gloss from the Laurentian
manuscript as given by Bluhme in the Monumenta Germaniae,
Leges, iv. 663, with selected variants from KeUer, pp. 202 f . ;
and the Notitia from Giesebrecht's copy of Bonizo with various
readings from Godfrey of Viterbo. These I take from the
editions, as I have not had the opportunity of collating the
manuscripts myself. I have rearranged the order of the
officers in the Gloss so as to agree with that in the Notitia,
but have numbered them as they stand in the manuscripts.

1 P. 179.

The Ottonian Gloss.

Inoipit de vn grad[ibus] quomodo
nominantur apud Grecos et Latinos^.
Primicerius' id est prima manus.
Chera' Greoe Latine manus dicitur.

The Notitia.
Quot sunt genera iudicum.
ludicum alii sunt palati^ quos
ordinarios vocamus; alii consules,
distributi per iudioatus ; alii pedanei,
a cousulibus creati'. In Romano
vero imperio et in Romana usque
hodie aecolesia' septem sunt indices
palatini, qui ordinarii nominantur.

^ Instead of this inclpit Albinus
and Cencius give a title, De nominibus
iudicum et earum infractioniJms. I
take the variants of A (and C where
it differs) from Dr Keller, pp. 202 f.
' Primicerus C.
' A ins. enim.

1 Palatini Godfrey, Bonizo (ed.
Mai). ^ G adds id est nostri indices.
3 Some MSS of G have in
Romana vero ecclesia omitting In
Romano vero imperio et.

186

Appendix IV

The Ottonian Glass.
Primicerius apud Grecos papia^ vo
catur. Ipse debet habere clavi de
toto palatio* et esse ibi honorabilis
apud imperatorem, die noctuque in
palatio debet esse'.
II. Secundicerius id est secunda
manus. C[hera] G[rece] L[atine]
m[anus] dpcitur]. Et* apud Grecos
secundicerius^ vocatur depterus. In
palatio honorabilis est, et ibi [debet]
esse die noctuque*, et' ooronae et
omn[ium] vestiment[orum] imperi-
ali[um]' qu[ae] per festas" indu-
[untur], ipse debet habere curam.
V. Arcarius^" debet" oolUgere
censum. VI. SacceUarius" debet habere
curam monasterionim ancillarum
Dei, et iu festis'^ debet introduoere
omnem honorem" ante impera
torem. VIII. Protosoriti, protoscrini-

The Notitia.
qui^ ordinant imperatorem et cum
Romanis clericis eligunt papam.
Quorum nomina haec sunt: Primus
primicerius. Secundus qui dicitur
secundicerius. Qui ab ipsis officiis
nomen accipiunt. Hi dextra levaque
vallantes imperatorem, quodammodo
cum illo videntur regnare ; sine
quibus aliquid magni non potest con-
siituere imperator'. Set et' in Romana
aecclesia in omnibus processionibus
mannatim ducunt papam, cedentibus
episcopis et ceteris magnatibus, et in
maioribus festivitatihus octavam super
omnes episcopos legunt lectionem.
Tertius est archarius^, qui praeest
tributis. Quartus saccellarius^, qui
stipendia erogat militibns, et Rome
sabbato scrutiniorum^ dat elemosinam,
et Romanis episcopis et clericis et
ordinatis viris largitur presbiteria''.
Quintus est protus^, qui praeest
scriniariis, quos nos tabelliones vo-

^ The TraTrUs had the keys of the
Palace : see J. J. Relske's note to
Constantine Porphyrogen. de Ceri-
moniis, ii. 39 f. (ed. 1830).
^ curam de clavibus totius pala
tii A. ' Existere debet A.
' O G LmdEt om. A.
' Om. A.
° Et node A, et noctu C.
' Om. A.
" Om. A. Compare Reiske's
note on the aaKeWdpios, ubi supra,
ii. 156. ' festivitates A.
^° qui ab archano dicitur ins. A.
" scire secreta consilia impera
toris et ins. A.
" SaceUanus A.
^' festivitatibus A.
'* omnem honorem om. A.
" Protoscriti protoscriniarius om.
A, who inserts Protoscriniarius id
est primus scriniariorum before
Bibliothecarius.

Keller suggests quia.
0 papa.
etiam v.l. in G.
arcadius G.
ceUerarius G.
infirmorum v.l. in G.
id est a prebendo add. G.
id est primus add. G.

The Judices Palatini

187

The Ottonian Gloss.
IV. Primus defensor^ apud
Grecos protohecdieo^ vocatur.
Ipse' debet habere homines sub
se, qui defenda[n]t sedem imperii,
ubi residet in ecclesia*.
III. [Nome]nculator Latine, a-
pud Grecos questor dicitur. Ipse
debet habere curam de viduis et
orphanis et omnibus xenodochiis, et
apud ipsum* debet disputari de
testamentis. VII. Bibliothecarius apud
Grecos logothetis*, referendarius
interpretatur, quia' ipse debet re-
nuntiare omnem scriptionem ad
imperatorem*.

The Notitia.
camus. Sextus primus defensor, qui
praeest defensoribus, quos nos ad
vocates^ nominamus. Septimus am
miniculator, intercedens pro pupillis
et viduis, pro afflictis et captivis. Hi
pro criminalibus non indicant', nee
in quemquam mortiferam dictant sen-
tentiam, et Rome clerici' snnt*, ad
nullos umquam alios ordines promo-
vendi. Ahi vero, qui dicuntur con
sules, iudicatus regnnt et reos
legibus puniunt et pro qualitate
oriminum in noxios dictant sen-
tentiam. * Ceterum postquam peccatis
nostris exigentibus Romanum im-
perium barbarorum patuit gladiis
feriendum, Romanas leges penitus
ignorautes inliterati ac barbari
indices, legis peritos in legem co-
gentes iurare, indices creaverunt,
quorum iudioio' lis' ventilata ter-
minaretur. Hi accepta hac' abusiva
potestate, dum stipendia a republioa
non accipiunt, avariciae face suc-
censi ius omne confunduut. Comes
enim iuliteratus ac barbarus nesoit
vera a falsis discernere et ideo
fallitur. Qui si mente pertractarent
illud prophetioum, luste iudica proximo tuo, et non accipies in iudicio
personam pauperis nee bonores vultura potentis, maUent ab omni munere
manus excutere, quam per cecam animi cupiditatem inlecti Dei se facere
reos esse iudicio, dicentis. Qua mensura mensi fueritis, remetietur vobis.
Set et Romanis legibus rei habentur ao notabUes, qui abusive ad libitum
leges infleotentes non iudicant ex equitate, sed propria voluntate. Hi dati
sunt aeoclesie in adiutorium, ut qui non reverentur episcopos pro aecclesi-
astica disciplina, saltim per horum terrorem et gladios ad pacis, licet inviti,
redeant unitatem.

* A ins. latine.
" prohecdicos A.
3 Om. A.
* A om. the last four words.
' eum A.
" logothenus A.
' interpretatur quia om. A.
" In the Graphia (Ozanam,
pp. 172 f.) the text after ad impe
ratorem proceeds with sentences on
the Kymiliarchus, Consules, Pro
consul, Dictator, and Patricii, which
have nothing corresponding to them
in A.

^ advocatum v.l. in G. ' nondum dicant G.
' domini v.l. in G. * G prefixes qui.
' What follows is found only in Bonizo and Godfrey.

* iudiciorum G.

' lex B G.

8 Om. B.

188 Appendix V

V. A FOEMULABY OF THE THIETEENTH CeNTUEY^
The foUowmg short hst of rules for the drawing up of
Letters of Grace and Mandates has been several times
published. It was first printed by Delisle m 1858 m his
Memoire sur les Aetes d'Innocent III^ from the Paris IMS
Lat. 4163, written towards the end of the thirteenth century.
Then in 1890 Simonsfeld, who was ignorant of Dehsle's
edition*, pubhshed another text from a very bad manuscript
of about 1400 at St Mark's, Venice, CI. iv. Lat. n. 30*.
Six years later he discovered a third manuscript, written
between 1363 and 1371, at Munich, Cod. Lat. 17788, and
produced another edition which took account of aU three
manuscripts^. Simonsfeld used the Munich manuscript as
his basis, and gave a coUation of the Paris and Venice texts.
I have preferred to adopt the earher text of the Paris manu
script (P), printed by Dehsle, and to distinguish the additions
of the Munich manuscript (M) by square brackets. I therefore
retain Dehsle's numeration of the paragraphs, which have
been used for reference by other scholars. Though in a text
like this no exact reproduction of the forms of the documents
can be attempted, I have introduced a heavy type as
a rough representation of the ornamental forms given in
Simonsfeld's facsimUe of the Munich manuscript. I have
^ See above, pp. 117 f.
' Bibhotheque de I'^ficole des Chartes, 4th series, iv. 23.
' This ignorance and the slovenliness of Simonsfeld's edition
provoked a severe and just reproof from Dr Tangl, in Mitthei
lungen, xii. (1891) 189 f.
* Beitrage zum papstlichen Kanzleiwesen im Mittelalter, in
Sitzungsberichte der philos. -philol. und hist. Classe der k. B.
Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Miinchen, 1890, ii. 255 f. ;
cf. pp. 228-231.
* Neue Beitrage zum papstlichen Urkundenwesen im Mittel
alter, in Abhandlungen der historischen Classe der k. B. Akademie
der Wissenschaften, xxi. ii. (1896) 365 f. Other manuscripts are
mentioned by Dr Tangl, uhi supra, and in Deutsche Zeitsehrift fiir
Geschichtswissenschaft, viii. (1897), Monatsblatter 5-6, pp. 158 f.

A Formulary 189
not noted variations of speUing or transpositions of words,
nor have I inserted any readings from the Venice MS (V).
The Formulary comes from the Audientia Litterarum
Contradictarum, a department of the Chancery in which, at
least as early as the time of Innocent III-*^, Letters were
examined before they were registered and passed on to the
parties interested 2. Though the oldest manuscript is as late
as the pontificate of Boniface VIII, the practice which it
records goes back in most points nearly a century earlier*.
It would appear that the strict regulation of the minutiae of
the writing of Letters was brought in under Alexander III and
thenceforward gradually developed. It was part of the
process by which Letters of Grace took over decorative
features from the PrivUege. Under Alexander III we note
that the Pope's name is written in fuU, without abbreviation
(art. 2), and that distinctive capitals introduce the clauses
Nulli ergo and Si quis (art. 7)*. It was also in his time that
the Datum came to be spaced out so as to fill up nearly the
whole of the last line of the document''. The elegant tittle
(titulus) to mark contractions in Letters of Grace (art. 5)
seems to have been introduced into them under Celestine III.
By his time also the emplojrment of capitals for the initials
of proper names had become uniform*. M. '&. Berger, the
editor of the Registers of Innocent IV,- asserts that the
1 See the references to it in the Chronicon Abbatiae de
Evesham, pp. 145, 199. ^ gee Bresslau, i. 281 f.
^ The details for the time before Innocent III have been
explored by Kaltenbrunner, in Mittheilungen, i. 405-409 ; those
for Innocent III by Delisle, in his M^mohe ; and for Innocent IV
by M. :iS. Berger, Les Registres d'Innocent IV, i. (1884) pp. 1., h. ;
and those from the middle of the thirteenth century by Diekamp,
in Mittheilungen, iv. 502-505.
* From his time also apostolicam in the Greeting is far more
commonly written with -cam than with -ca ; but 7 for et may
still be foimd in it beyond the middle of the thirteenth century.
' This feature is not mentioned in our rules.
* This rule was probably estabhshed earlier, but it was not
always observed, e.g., by the Antipope Cahxtus III. See an
example of its neglect in 1 1 69, in Spec. Ill n. 28.

190 Appendix V
rules printed below are exactly foUowed in the originals of
that Pope. But the prohibition of certain marks of con
traction (art. 8) was only strictly observed in Letters of
Grace, and the rule about the arrangement of the elements
in the Datum (art. 11) was at no time uniformly adhered
to. The general inference to which an examination of the
Formulary leads us is that it is founded on a set of rules
compUed at the beginning of the thirteenth century and
partially revised to suit modifications of detaUs which were
made during its course. It was the elaboration of the first
line and the gradual emphasizing of the initials of the main
sections of the document which came, as time went on, to
mark the Letter of Grace from the Mandate in a manner
which cannot be mistaken. The large ornamented initials of
such words as Dilecto, lustis, Sane, Nulli, Siquis, at once
strike the eye; but the calhgraphy was so obvious that it
formed a poor protection against forgery. Hence it was
thought expedient to devise more intricate technicalities
which could not be so easUy learned.
Letters with silk and 1. Est notaudum quod littere domini pape
Letters with string. aUe buUautur cum serico, aUe cum filo canapis.
In Letters with silk 2. Que autem cum serico bullantur debent
the Pope's name is written habere nomen domini pape [per omnes litteras]
tall, with an ornamental elevatum, prima semper apice^ existente et
initial, the remaining facta cum aliquibus spaciis infra se, reliquis
letters being of full height litteris eiusdem nominis de Unea ad Hneam
with or without floriation. attingentibus, et cum floribus vel sine eis, boo
The initial of the Ad- modo Bonifacius eps^ etc. Et ubi dicitur
dress has a tall initial. Dilecto filio, D debet elevari hoc modo :
Dilecto etc.
The Greeting. 3. Sai et apUcam' ben in omnibus sic
scribitur.
In all Letters the 4. Littera autem prime dictionis que im-
initial of the following mediate sequitur ap.* ben. debet semper magna
word is written large, esse in omnibus litteris, puta sic, Ad audien-
but in Simple Letters it is tiam etc., nisi in simplicibus' ubi debet esse
an ordinary majuscule. mediocris, isto modo, Conquestus [est] etc.
1 Delisle (p. 24) explains this as meaning prima littera semper cum apice.
' Delisle prints episcopus.
» So M : SaVt et ap'"' P. See above, p. 189 note 4. * PM ad.
» That is. in Letters in forma communi ; of. Delisle, p. 22.

A Formulary

191

In Letters with silk
abbreviations in proper
names are usually indi
cated by a tittle;
in Letters with string,
always by a. plain stroke.
In Letters with silk
there are ligatures between
s and t and c and t.

Nulli ergo and Siquis
each begin with a large
tall initial.

Not all signs of con
traction are permitted.
[Letters must not be
ruled.] The parchment must
be without a hole or ob
vious mend.
\Nulli ergo must not be
inserted in Indults.]

[The word preceding
the Date must not be
divided between two
lines.]

5. Item notandum quod in istis litteris
cum serico titulus debet esse super nominibus,
ut supra factus est in eps^, hoc modo 8^ vel
alias" ut plaoebit scriptori, non tamen in
omnibus*. In iUis autem cum filo canapis
semper planus hoc modo [-].
6. Item notandum quod in Htteris cum
serico quando s attingit t [ex parte ante in
eadem dictione t] debet aliquantulum pro-
longari ab s, hoc modo, tetiimonium, etc'
lUud idem fit de t cum coniungitur ad c in
eadem dictione, hoc modo, dile6lo, etc'
7. Item notandum quod N de Nulli ergo,
etc, et S de Siquis autem, etc., semper in
omnibus litteris, ubi soribuutur, debent' esse
magne et elevate, ut hie, et maiores, ut forme
competed. 8. Item nota quod in litteris papalibus
non recipiuntur omnes breviature, ut iste
Bj [13'] P°> 6t liiis similes, neo tale 2^°.
[Item nota quod littere pape non debent
lineari cum plumbo vel cum inoausto: quod
si fieret essent suspecte.]
9. Item [nota] quod in nulla parte sui'^
debent oontinere foramen vel suturam^^ appa-
rentem^'. [Item nota quod iu litteris indulgentiarum
non debet esse Nulli ergo etc., et si ponatur
littere sunt resoribende, tamen sunt cum filo
serico. Notandum quod diotio que est ante datam
littere non debet dividi, sed poni tota iu uno
latere : verb! gratia, per in uno latere et hibere
in alio.

1 Delisle prints epistolis. ' F S. ' M aliter.
* Diekamp observes (p. 503) that the use of the tittle S is here prescribed
only over proper names, and that the plain stroke may be found over other
words; in the Avignon period the latter was used with proper names too.
' etc. om. M.
' It is not here denied that these ligatures may also be found on Letters
with hemp, but according to M. Berger they do not appear under Innocent IV.
Diekamp observes (pp. 503 f.) that in such Letters the form of ligature,
where it occurs in the second half of the thirteenth century, is of a plainer
type than that on Letters with sUk.
' debeant M. ' competit M.
9 plro], p[cr] P. Diekamp (p. 504) emends pre for per.
^'' The sign for ur : M and V have 7, the sign for et.
11 sui : dicte littere M. ^' scisuram M.
" apparenter M. This paragraph is omitted in V.

192

Appendix V, VI

[In Letters directed ad
instar, the Pope's name
must be written in tall
compressed characters.]
[In Litterae Simplices,
if the Text fills two parts
of the line, the whole Date
must be ia the same line ;
if it fills three parts, that
of the pontificate may be
in a second line.]
[In a, recital of an an
cient Privilege which has
decayed the name of the
Pope must not be in large
letters.]

In Letters sealed on
string the initial only of
the Pope's name must be
tall; Dilecto filio must begin
with a capital.
In all Letters the Date
must be complete in one
or two lines,

but the date of the month
must not be divided be
tween two lines.

Proper names and
names of ofiices and dig
nities must have capital
initials.

Item est sciendum quod, quando in littera
dicitur ad instar, littere debent^ esse levate
vel inherentes in nomine pape, hoc modo,
Clemens, et sic in aliis.
Item in simplioibus litteris tenendum est
quod in ultima Unea, [si] sunt duo partes
tantum, data tota debet esse ibidem; et si
sunt ibidem tres partes, tunc pontificatus esse
poterit in secunda linea.

Item nota quod quando aliquod privi
legium propter vetustatem petitur renovari
et dicatur propter nimiam vetustatem con-
sumptam, et inseratur iu Utteris alterius
pontificia, littere in nomine pontiflcis debent
ease parve, sic : Innocentius etc.*]
10. Item nota quod Ule littere que bul
lantur eum filo canapis debent habere primam
Utteram nominis domini pape elevatam et
reliquas communes, hoc modo Bonifacius, etc.
Ubi dicitur' Dilecto filio* d debet esse tale
D vel tale D seu huius ^ forme, et sic de
similibus. 11. Item nota quod in omnibus litteris
apostoUcis data tota debet esse in eadem" Unea
vel' in duabus, ita quod [Datum Laterani sit
semper in una linea, vel] Datum Laterani Kal.
lannarii sit in una Unea, et Pontificatus nostri
anno septimo sit in aUa. Quod si secus fieret,
Uttere essent corrigende; scilicet, si Dat.
Laterani kalendis essent in una^ et quod
sequitur in alia', vel e coutrario: vel forte
suspecte essent.
12. Item nota quod in Utteris apostoliois
omnia propria nomina personarum, locomm,
nomina officiorum et dignitatum debent habere
primam Utteram elevatam, sic, Pelrus, Canoni-
cus, Episcopus, et simiUa.

1 MS debet.
' These five paragraphs are absent both from P and V.
» dicit M. « dilectis filiis M.
" talis M. « una M.
' For vel the Paper Register of Oement VI reads non, representing the
older rule : see Tangl, in Deutsche Zeitsehrift, ubi supra, p. 159.
' una linea M.
' alia linea M.

The Roman Provinciale 193
[Nowadays the word [Item nota quod data tenetur modo in una
Data may end a Une and Unea et Avinionis in capite alterius, sed hoc
the name of the place sustinetur in iUis in quibus fnon^ est'.]
may begin a new one.]
Dates are given by 13. Et quia hie de data est mentio, de
nones, ides, and kalends. ilia dicatur. Notandum quod data* scribitur
secundum nonas, secundum idus, et secundum
kalendas mensium*.
' no MS. Simonsfeld extends nomen, but the text is probablv defective
Cf. Tangl, l.c. pp. 160 f. *• J
" This paragraph is also omitted in V. » datum M.
* In M and V there foUows an explanation of the Roman Kalendar.

VI. The Roman Peovincialbi
A Provinciale or catalogue of sees arranged under provinces
was inserted by Albinus, Cardinal Bishop of Albano, in the
tenth book of his Gesta 2. This part of his work was finished
after 29 October 1188 and in aU probabUity before May 1189
when he was made bishop*. The original manuscript is not
known to exist, but we possess a copy which is of very nearly
the same date*. Albinus however was not the author of the
Provinciale. It is true that it includes Monreale (1182), but
this is apparently an addition to the list. The omission of
Hebron and Petra (1167) indicates an earher date, whUe the
inclusion of Trondhjem (1154) and Upsala (1164) suggests that
it was compUed between 1 164 and 1 167^. Monsignor Duchesne
inclines to the opinion that it was drawn up by Cardinal Boso,
who was Chamberlain under Hadrian IV and Alexander III*.
1 See above, pp. 150 f.
^ On this book see E. Stevenson, in Archivio della R. Society
Romana di Storia Patria, viii. (1 885) 357 ff.
3 Paul Pabre, ifitude sur le Liber Censuum de I'lSglise
Romaine, pp. 10 f., 1892.
* Codex Ottobonianus Lat. 3057, in the Vatican Library.
Either this or the original was formerly in the Papal Archives.
° The omission of Carlisle may point to a time thirty years
earher: in this ease the list must have been added to as years
went on.
' Introduction to Liber Censuum (1910), p. 56.
P. P. c. 13

194

Appendix VI

In 1192 the Chamberlain Cencius, afterwards Pope
Honorius III, undertook the composition of a tax-book, the
Liber Censuum, in which he gave a list of sees after the
manner of a Provinciale, inserting under the different bishoprics
the monasteries from which the Roman Church claimed
revenue. The skeleton of this hst was derived not directly
from Albinus but from Albinus' source, presumably Boso.
The book is preserved, as it was drawn up under Cencius'
direction, in the Vatican MS 8486^.
The question arises, to what Provinciale Giraldus Cam-
1 Ihid., pp. 1-7.

(^raWius
Et cum verteretur
ad regnum Anglorum,
scriptum in hunc mo-
dum ibidem et lectum
fuit: Oantuariensis metropolis
suffraganeas habet ecde-
sias istas, Roffensem,
Londoniensem et cae-
teras per ordinem.

Enumeratis autem
singulis sufEraganeis ec-
clesiasticis AngUae, in-
terposita rubrica taU,
De Wallia,
prosequitur in hunc
modum. In Wallia
Menevensis ecclesia,
Landavensis, Bangori-
ensis, et de Sancto
Asaph.

Albinus
Im EBONO Anglie.
MetropoUs civitas Cantuaria has
habet civitates sub se:
Lundoniam,RoheoestriamCicestriam, Cestriam,Excestriam,Guintoniam,Salesberiam.
Herefordiam,
GuiUoestriam, Bahadam,
Nioholam, Norguicium,Helyam,
In GuaUa vero Menevia, Pangoria.
Landaph, et Sanctus Asaph.
Sunt autem numero xvm.
MetropoUs oivitas Emboracus habet
sub se Dunelmum.

The Roman Provinciale

195

brensis refers when he speaks of Innocent III having ordered
out such a book in order to verify the statements made about
the independence of the W^elsh sees^. In order to assist us
in forming a judgement on this point, I print below side by
side, first, the account given by Giraldus, secondly, the hst
of Albinus*, thirdly, that of Cencius* (omitting the names of
monasteries), and, fourthly, a hst written not long after
1 De lure Menevensis Eeclesiae, ii., in Opera, iii. 165.
^ Printed by Gaetano Cenni, Monumenta Dominationis
Pontificiae (1761), ii. pp. xxv!., xxvii., and at the end of Monsignor
Duchesne's edition of the Liber Censuum, ii. 100.
' Liber Censuum, i. 223-226.

Cencius
Anglia.
In archiepiscopatu Cantuariensi.
In epiacopatu Lundoniensi.
In episcopatu Rofensi vel Rovecestrensi,
In episeopatu Cicestrensi.
In episcopatu Exoniensi.
In episcopatu Wintoniensi.
In episcopatu Batonienai et WeUenai.
In episcopatu Salesberienai.
In epiacopatu Wigomienai.
In episcopatu Herfordensi.
In episcopatu Conventrensi.
In episcopatu Lincolniensi.
In episcopatu Norwicensi.
In epiacopatu HeUensi. Wallia.
In episcopatu Menevensi.
In episcopatu Landavensi.
In episcopatu Bangomensi.
In episcopatu sancti Asaht.
In archiepiscopatu Eboracensi.
In episcopatu Duuelmensi.
In episcopatu Cardocensi.

Bologna MS.
In Anolia.
Archiepiscopatus Cantuariensis hos
habet suSraganeos :
Lundonienaem
Roffensem sive Rovecestrensem
Cioestrensem
Exoniensem Wintoniensem
Bathonienaem Saresburiensem
Wigoriensem HerefordensemConventrensem sive Cestrensem vel
Lichifeldensem
Lincolniensem [Norwioensem"-]HeUensem
MenevensemLandevensemBangorensemSancti Assaph
Archiepiscopatus Eboracensis hoa
habet suffraganeos :
Dunelmensem
Cardocensem vel Carleolensem.
^ Omitted by an evident oversight ; the name is found in two later copies
of the same Ust.
13—2

196 Appendix VI
1278 and preserved in Cod. 275 of the Spanish CoUege at
Bologna^. Now Giraldus no doubt was writing from memory, and
a verbal agreement with his original is not to be expected.
But the main features on which he dwelt were the separation
of the Welsh from the English sees by a rubric and the
difference of the grammatical construction in the two series.
It is at the outset plain that the book consulted was not the
Liber Censuum of Cencius, because, although the rubric
Wallia is retained there, the whole form of the list has been
changed: the bishoprics have been turned into the ablative
in order to admit of the insertion of monasteries where
required; moreover, the province of York is appended care
lessly to Wales. In the later (Bologna) hst the distinction of
the Welsh sees is obhterated, and aU are placed uniformly in the
same construction as the English ; but there are some features
in it which suggest that it was derived not from Cencius but
from the older Provinciale which was the source of Albinus.
If this was the work of Boso, a man weU acquainted with
England and possibly by birth an Enghshman, this would
explain the correctness with which the Enghsh names are
vmtten, as compared with the corrupt forms given by Albinus.
And it seems permissible to infer that this older Provinciale
was the Register inspected by Innocent III and Giraldus*.
1 Tangl, Die papsthchen Kanzleiordnungen von 1200-1500
(1894), pp. 18 f. ; cf. introd. pp. Ixii.-lxv.
^ Dr Tangl's supposition (p. xvh.) that it was a book compUed
later than the Liber Censuum, that is, between 1 192 and 1199,
lacks probability. He seems to imply that Albinus' work was
superseded by that of Cencius (p. xvi. ) ; but the two were compiled
for different purposes.

Appendix VII 197

VII. Miscellanies
1. Bulls on Papyrus^. — ^Dr Bresslau, in the MittheUungen,
ix. (1888) 1-8, enumerates twenty-nine Bulls on papyrus
recorded to be in existence in modem times, and M. Henri
Omont, in the Bibhotheque de r]6cole des Chartes, Ixv. (1904)
575-582, gives a hst of twenty-three actually preserved from
the ninth to the eleventh century. Three of the BuUs
mentioned by Dr Bresslau have now perished: two at the
burning of the abbey of RipoU in 1835*, and one at the
Louvre in 1871* Thus his total is reduced to twenty-six.
But M. Omont adds a Bull of Benedict VIII, making twenty-
seven*. The difference in the total is accounted for by
M. Omont's omission first of the fragment of Hadrian I's
BuU, as belonging to a date earher than the ninth century,
and secondly of three smaU fragments, at Paris, Amiens, and
Le Puy. Two of these are unidentified, the third, coming
from a Privilege of Leo IX, is remarkable because of its late
date^- It confirms the fact already known from transcripts
made under Gregory IX that papyrus was occasionaUy used
in the Papal Chancery not only under this Pope but even
imder Victor II*.
The papyrus was sometimes of enormous length. A
PrivUege granted by Benedict III to the abbey of Corbie on
7 October 855' measures 22 feet 6 inches. It has been often
1 See above, p. 37.
2 Omont, p. 575 note 1.
' Bresslau, p. 6.
* Cf. Bresslau, Handbuch der Urkundenlehre, i. 73 note 2.
A shorter hst was given with valuable critical remarks by Paul
Ewald, Zur Diplomatik Silvesters II, in Neues Archiv, ix. (1883)
327-353. * A facsimile of this last is given by M. Prou, in the Bibl. de
I'ficole des Chartes, Ixiv. (1903) 578.
• See Mariru, I Papiri diplomatic!, n. XLIX., l., pp. 84, 86. The
terms in which Gregory on 29 July 1236 ordered the Bulls to be
exemplified {exenvplari) will be found in the Registres de Gr^goire
IX, n. 3544, h. 587, ed. L. Auvray, 1907.
' Jaff6, Reg. 2663.

198 Appendix VII
published from the time of Gaetano Marini^ onwards, and a
reduced facsimUe of the entire document was edited by
M. C. Brunei for the Sooiete des Antiquaires de Picardie in
1912. Another PrivUege of unusual dimensions was granted
also to the abbey of Corbie by Nicholas I*.
2. The Datary^.— The use of the term Datary to designate
the official who completed the ratification of a BuU by adding
the Dating Clause, though admitted by usage, is open to
objection because in the later middle ages it came to indicate
an official who dealt with an earher stage in the production
of the document. The Petitions on which Letters of Grace
were founded passed first into an office known as the Data
Communis, and towards the end of the thirteenth or the
beginning of the fourteenth century the Notaries who had
previously received them were excluded from any share in their
examination* A little later the office was caUed the Dataria,
and it was placed under the charge of a Datarius with Referen
daries to assist him*. When the Petition was approved, the
Pope wrote his initials* and the official added the Date'. In
the course of time the functions of the Dataria were amphfied,
and a greater antiquity was claimed for it*. The importance
of the Date was recognized also in England in the fourteenth
1 n. xrv., pp. 17-22.
' Mabillon gives its length variously as of nine or seven feet :
De Re Diplomatica, pp. 40, 442.
' See p. 55.
* Bresslau, i. 292 f. (2nd ed.), p. 231 (1st ed.).
' Ibid., pp. 683 f. (1st ed.).
0 Ihid., pp. 738 f. (1st ed.).
' A short account of the procedure vrill be found in Mr Charles
Johnson's preface to W. H. BUss's Calendar of Entries in the
Papal Registers relating to Great Britain and Ireland, Petitions
to the Pope, i. ( 1896). Particulars about the work and machinery
of the developed office are given by Hinschius, Kirchenrecht,
i- § 49(3.
' In a seventeenth century manuscript Delia Dataria in the
Bodleian Library (Mendham MS 35) it is said to go back to the
time of Honorius III.

Miscellanies 199
century, when the King's Warrant for the issue of Letters
Patent came to be annotated with a memorandum naming
the Date at which it was received in the Chancery^. This
'Livery Clause' gave the Date to be inserted in the Letters,
and was required by Act of Parliament under Henry VI*.
But no separate office was estabhshed, as at Rome, for the
purpose. 3. The Pope's Name on the Seal. — It has been said above*
that the Seal untU Leo IX bears the Pope's name without
his number, and that untU Urban II the name is in the
genitive. A detached Seal found in the Forum seems to
anticipate by some months the insertion of the number and
by fifty years the use of the nominative. The legend on the
two sides of this bulla is damasus | papa ii. See De Rossi's
remarks in Atti deUa R. Accademia dei Lincei, 3rd ser., x.
(1882) 385. The Seal is figured m Dr von Pflugk-Harttung's
Specimina, in. plate vi. n. 10.
4. The Points on the Seal*'. — As the number of points or
beads round the circumference of the bulla and on certain
parts of the design on the counterseal served as one of the
criteria of genuineness*, some detaUs may be given ; but the
outer edge of the lead is so often worn or damaged that it is
not always possible to count the number of points round the
circumference with certainty. The obverse, or Seal, of
Innocent II seems to have been surrounded by as many as
ninety-two points ; but that of Celestine III had only forty-
nine and Innocent III one less. In the second half of the
thirteenth century Martin of Troppau in his Summa Decreti
1 E. D6prez, !fitudes de Diplomatique Anglaise, 1908, p. 47.
2 18 Henry VI, c. 1.
' Pp. 119 L
* See above, p. 120.
° Conrad of Mure says, ' Circumf erentia utrobique certis
punctulis est expressa, ut eo difiScilius possit falsificari et eo
faciUus falsitas valeat deprehendi': Summa de Arte Prosandl
(written in 1275), in Rockinger, Briefsteller, i. 475.

200 Appendix VII
et Decretahum^ prescribes seventy-five. But it may be
doubted whether much regard was paid to the number of
points surrounding this face of the seal, as a new die had to
be cut for every pope and many pontificates were not long
enough to make the number famUiar. With the reverse, or
Counterseal, it was otherwise, for the same die might continue
in use for a great many years. When the heads of the Apostles
were introduced into it by Paschal II in a type the main
features of which were preserved untU at least the Avignon
period, several varying designs were produced, and an old die
was not deemed to be superseded by a new one; more
than one of Paschal's dies were in fact used by Cahxtus II*.
But when near the end of the pontificate of Innocent II a
fresh die was cut, the uniform use of one standard pattern
was settled; and thenceforward for a century and a hah,
with the exception of a short time in 1252 during which an
unsatisfactory die was used*, only six dies are found*. The
points on these which were coimted were as foUows* :
1 MS. Lat. 4133 in the Bibhotheque Nationale, cited by
Delisle, M6mohe sur les Actes d'Innocent III, p. 48 note 1.
2 See Pflugk-Harttung, Die Bullen der Papste, pp. 53, 57,
and the facsimUes given in Spec. !!!., where the mode of their
reproduction is not in all respects satisfactory: some are taken
from plaster or wax casts, and some from drawings.
' Shortly after 8 June 1252 Innocent IV's counterseal was
broken while the Pope was at Perugia, and a new die (typarium)
was made. But it was not successful ; according to the Mandate
which oanceUed it, the heads of the apostles were too coarsely
drawn {corpulentiores solito). See Dehsle, p. 49, and the two
Mandates printed on pp. 70 f. The earher Mandate, of 5 July,
authenticating the new seal is calendared in Berger's Registres
d'Innocent IV, n. 6771; the second one, cancelling it, bears no
date and is not included in the Register.
* Dr von Pflugk-Harttung makes the number larger, but for
the reasons stated in the preceding note his facsimiles do not
enable us to determine the facts.
" I take the statistics mainly from Diekamp, in Mittheilungen,
iu. 613-626 (with three plates), iv. 530.

MisceUanies

201

1

2

3

4

5

6

12 Mar.

15 July

2 Nov.

30 Mar.

3 June

15 Mar.

Points on

1143—

1155—

1181—

1186—

1253—

1260

17 May

14 Dec.

29 April

8 June

7 Mar.

1155
1179
1185
1252
1259
'Circumference
75!
68 or 691
73
73
73
73»
Aureole roimd the
27
23
25
25
252
243
head of St Paul
Aureole round the
29
26
26
26
252
25'
head of St Peter
Points composing
—
25
25
25
25
25»
the hair of St
Peter's head
Points composing
—
16
28
28
28
28'
his beard
1 The specimen is perhaps worn.
' Dr L. Sohmitz-Rheidt, in Mittheilungen, xvii. (1896) 65, makes the
points on the aureoles respectively twenty-aix or twenty-aeven and twenty-
six; but the facsimile he gives ia not clear. The numbers however were
certainly those given in the table above, as may be seen from the fine
reproductions in C. Serafini'a Monete e Bolle plumbee pontifioie, i. (1910)
plate I.
' Theae numbers are thoao recorded alao by Martin of Troppau, cited
by DeUale, p. 48 note I.
5. Demi-Bulls. — ^A Pope elect did not at once adopt the
style which was appropriate after his consecration. Gregory
VII entitled himself not episcopus servus servorum Dei but
Gregorius in Romanum pontificem electus, and his Greeting
was salutem in Christo lesu^ or salutem in domino lesu Christo^.
Iimocent Ill's ordination was deferred for more than a month,
and during the interval he used only the counterseal of his
bulla. It is probable that this practice was not new, for the
face of the die with the Pope's name required some time to
engrave and the business of the Chancery could not be
neglected. But Innocent no doubt made a larger use of his
power than was customary, for the age and infirmity of his
predecessor had left him heavy arrears to overtake. Hence
on 3 AprU 1198 he issued a general rescript confirming them
in the foUowing terms :
Reg. I. 1*-11.
2 I. 12.
13—5
202 Appendix VII
Quoniam insolitum fuit hactenus ut sub dimidia bulla ad tot
et tam remotas provincias litterae apostohcae mitterentur, et ex
hoc litterae ipsae diutius quam vellemus possent ex ahcmus
dubitatione suspend!, ut quorum interest parcamus laboribus
et expensis, quae ab electionis nostrae die usque ad solemnitatem
consecrationis sub bulla dimidia emanarunt parem cum ilhs
firmitatem obtinere decernimus quae in bulla Integra diriguntur^.
6. The Closing of Bulls. — Whether Letters other than
Litterae clausae were usuaUy tied up before they were dis
patched is uncertain, because in most cases the strings
protruding from the lower side of the seal have been in part
or altogether cut off. But there is evidence to show that
the protruding strings were often long enough to pass round
the document when folded and then to be tied together*.
But the supposition that after the middle of the twelfth
century the long ends were fastened in the lead at the time
of sealing* lacks all probabUity. We know in fact that
in the thirteenth century registration took place after the
affixing of the seal and that even at a later stage the
document might be examined and then canceUed or
ordered to be redraughted*. It has even been maintained
that, besides the double string on which the seal hung, an
additional string was used, so that four ends might be en
closed in the lead. This theory seems to be based upon a
derehct seal of Innocent IV, preserved at Munster in West-
phaha with no document belonging to it, which showed signs
of these four ends. Such a mode of seahng looks hke an
example of the manner of forgery condemned by Innocent Ill's
1 Reg. I. 83; cf. Nouveau Trait6 de Diplomatique, iv.
311. ^ Thus in a Mandate of Innocent IV in the British Museum
(Addit. Charter 20373) the strings are long enough to go round
the folded document. In a Letter of Alexander III (Addit.
Charter 52148) there are about nine inches of silk protruding,
and the same is the case with an Indult of Gregory X (Haxleian
Charter HI, a. 24).
* Diekamp, in Mittheilungen, hi. 610 f., iv. 528 f. ; Bresslau
i. 960 (Isted.); R. F. Kaindl, in Romische Quartalschrift, vii.
(1893) 492-496.
* Tangl, in Mittheilungen, xvi. (1895) 180.

Miscellanies 203
Fourth Rule^: it was apparently the case of a genuine seal
being attached to a forged document. The same objection
seems to apply to the seals which have been noticed* where
the protruding ends are not those of the original string but
two new strings which were tied roimd the document.
In any case we cannot maintain the theory that the long
strings were at both ends imbedded in the seal*.
7. The Disappearance of the Registers before that of
Innocent III. — ^With the exception of the Register of
Gregory VII, if its character be finaUy decided, no original
Register earher than that of Innocent III is now preserved,
and no reference to any Register of the Popes down to his
time is contained after the pontfficate of Honorius III*.
Many of them, from Alexander II onwards, are known to
have existed at various dates between the latter years of the
eleventh century and the early part of the thirteenth*. After
that time they disappear and leave no trace. The question
therefore has been raised, to what cause we are to attribute
the practicaUy total loss of all this great series of volumes.
G. B. de Rossi, who gave a valuable history of the places of
deposit of the Papal Archives in a Commentatio prefixed to
Henry Stevenson's Catalogue of the Palatine Library®, main
tained that some at least of the Registers were stored for
safety in the Cartularium iuxta Palladium. This he understood
to be situate within the hmits of the Castle held by the
Frangipani, and he urged the constant loyalty of this famUy
to the Popes as a reason for the choice of the Turris Cartularia:
when Frederick II granted it to the Annibaldi in 1244 aU the
documents were destroyed. A closer study of the topography
in the light of recent excavation made the first part of this
1 See above, pp. 154, 155, 156 note I.
* See L. Schmitz-Kallenberg, Urkundenlehre (2nd ed. 1913),
p. 96. * See Baumgarten, Aus Kanzlei und Kammer, pp. 191-194.
* See Bresslau, i. 109 note 2.
* See above, pp. 123 f. and notes.
' Codices Palatini Latini Bibhothecae Vaticanae, i. (1886)
pp. Ixxix.-xcix.

204 Appendix VII
argument more than doubtful^, and the facts of the relations
of the Frangipani to the Papacy in the thirteenth century
were fatal to the second*.
It is however certam that about 1081 Cardmal Deusdedit
foimd some records in this Tower*. The important section
of his Liber Canonum, in. 191-207, in which these excerpts
are contained includes seventeen pieces, of which fourteen
were in the Lateran, and only three in the Cartularium;
and these three are definitely stated to have been written
on papyrus {fomi carticii) and therefore were not Registers
of modem date. Apparently they had been taken to the
Tower in some time of disturbance, just as when Urban II
took refuge there in 1094 he brought some documents
with him for reference*. In any case there can be no
question of the Tower having become the general depository
of the Papal Registers. When Giraldus Cambrensis in 1200
consulted the Register of Eugenius III* he seems to have
found it at the Lateran. Innocent III buUt a new archive
room at St Peter's, but only for volumes and documents
required for current business'; and he did not continue this
arrangement. It may therefore be concluded that the Lateran
remained the seat of the Archives down to the time of Honorius
III, after which, in circumstances unrecorded, they either were
plimdered or perished from fire'.
^ The Tower, which survived until 1829, stood hard by the
Arch of Titus; it was no part of the Palace of John VII, which
was on the north of the Palatine Hill near the Temple of Augustus.
^ See F. Bhrle, Die Frangipani und der Untergang des Archivs
xmd der Bibliothek der Papste am Anfang des 13. Jahrhunderts,
in Melanges offerts k M. ifimile Chatelain (1910), pp. 448-485.
' Kanonessammlung, iii. 191, 193, 194, pp. 353, 357, ed.
V. Wolf von GlanveU.
* Ehrle, pp. 478 ft.
^ De lure Menevensis Eeclesiae, in Opera, iii. 180.
' De Rossi, p. xcix.
' Ehrle, pp. 481 f.

INDEX

The words Rome and Papal have usually been omitted far the sake of
they must be supplied according to the sense.

Abbreviatores, 163
Address (Inscriptio) of Letters, 22,
41, 157 f., 190, 192
Adeodatus, Pope, 23
Agatho, Pope, 17, 19
Agnes, St, Church of, 10
Alberic of Monte Cassino, 77, 85, 93
AlBEBT of Morra, 79-82. See Gbe-
COBY VIII
Albinus, Cardinal, 151, 181, 193-
196
Albxandbe I, 179
Albxandeb II, 6, 36, 43, 69-71,
102, 103, 105, 107, 114; his
autograph, 108
Register of, 123
Alexander III, i2\ 104, 110«,
111, 1212, 138, 139, 151, 1698,
1601, 170, 189, 193, 202^; his
autograph, 109"^. See also
Roland
Register of, 124
Alexandria, Primicerius of, 13'
Amen, how written, 47, 109
Amminiculator. See Nomenculator
Anacletus II, Antipope. See
Peteb Leonis
Anastasius IV, 104, III, 182*
Anastasius the Librarian, 166
Anglo-Saxon Charters, 35^, 46',
481, 147'
Annibaldi, The, 203
Antivari, Archbishop of, 157^
A pari. Documents registered, 125',
132»
Arcaria or Arcariva, 18
Arcarius, 17 f., 51, 186
Archives, where kept, 14 f., 203 f . ;
by whom, 14, 16, 56, 138
Abibo, Deacon, 67''
Audientia Litterarum contradic
tarum, 189

Auditor Litterarum contradictarum,
164
Augustine, St, 13
Augustus, Regions of, 8, 170
Aubelian, Walls of, 8
AveUana, Collectio, 30
Band! at Ravenna, 174*
Bannister, H. M., IP
Basle, St, near Rheims, 103*
Batiffol, p., 180
Baumer, S., 180
Beds, 31, 111, 146
Bellarmin, Cardinal, 166
Benedict III, 197
Benedict VI, 172^
Benedict VII, 54
Benedict VIH, 37, 59, 60 f., 106,
197
Benedict IX, 61 f., 64
Benedict X, 68, 102, 103, 104
Benedict Presbyter, 181
Bene Valete, 23 f., 39, 47, 100, 105,
106. See also Subscription
Berengar of Tours, 85
Beeobb, !fi., 189
Bibhothecarius. See Librarian
Bollandists, The, 180
Boniface VIII, 43, 141
Bonizo of Sutri, 179, 183-185
Boso, Cardinal, 170, 193, 196
Beackmann, a., 28, 167«
Bresslau, H., 372, 502, sgi, 59a,
622, 1382, 197
Breviary, The, 178-180
Briefs, 23, 40, 41 1
Britannica, Collectio (Addit. MS
8873), 29 f., 33, 34i, 123»
Bbunel, C, 198
Bulla. See Seal
Bullator, 152=, 156i, 165
Bulls, Different names for, 40 f.;

206

Index

their forms and structure, 21-
25, 40-48, 99-122 ; intermediate
type of, 1221. ggg Letters and
Privileges •
Their transmission, 25-28. See
Register
Buoncompagno, 77
Byzantine conquest of Rome, II,
173
Cadalus (Antipope Honobius II),
69
Calixtus II, 39, 53, 74. 104, 108*,
109, 110^ 1126, 113, 121, 138,
144, 200
Calixtus III, Antipope. See John
of Struma
Canonical CoUections, 21, 24, 25-27,
29-31, 33
Canterbury, Archbishops of, 143-
146, 150
St AuousTiNB, 145, 146
Laneeano, 143, 147'
Ralph, 144
William, 144
Cardinals in charge of the Chancery,
56, 60-62, 71, 74, 108^, 138-
141. See Subscriptions
Carthage, Registers of, 30
Caspab, E., 342, 35», 1262, 127, 128'
Cecilia, St, Church of, 10
Celestine II, 104, 138
Celestine III, 104, IO52, 140, 147,
153, 189, 199
Cencius, Chamberlain, 139, 140,
170, 181, 194-196. See Ho
norius III
ChanceUor, The, 2, 59-69, 73-75,
108, 109 f., 136-141
Chancery, The, 1 f . ; its early
organization, 14-19, 51-57;
placed under the librarian, 56 ;
modified by foreign influences,
59-75, 136-138; its adminis
tration from the twelfth century
138-142 : description of, under
Urban IV, 162-165. See also
Scrinium
Charles the Great, 20, 38, 98
Charles III, Emperor, 48
Chrism,. The, 25, 41
Christian Era, Dating from the,
48, 50, 110 f.
CiCBBO, 21, 90, 92
Cistercian Order, 78*
Clark, A. C, 76i, 90, 92, 96i
Clement, St, 7, 12, 179; Church
of, 171 f.
Clement II, 63, 64, 106 •

Clement III, Antipope. See Gui
bert
Clement III, 104, 114, 140, 147
Clement IV, 105i
Clement V, 163^
Clement VI, 142, 192'
Clement VII, 141
Cletus, St, 179
Cologne, Archbishops of
Pebborinb, 60 f.
Heeman, 61, 66
The Chancellorship held by, 66 f.,
137; cf. 71 and note 1
Comma, The, 39, 702, 105 f.
Commentarii, Imperial, 29
Commissions. See Litterae de Jus
titia
Cononianus, Catalogus, 5, 169 2
CoNBAD II, Emperor, 49, 61
CoNBAD III, Emperor, 159'
Conrad of Mure, 199=
Constantine, Emperor, 10; Dona
tion of, 26
Constantine Porphyrogenitus, Em
peror, 182
Constantine, Pope, 19, 147-149,
167«, 169
Constantinople, Council of (536), 13
Consular Year, Dating by, 24, 38
Corbie, Abbey of, 197 f.
Cornelius, Pope, 12, 23*
Corrector Litterarum ApostoUca-
rum, 163
Cosmas and Damian, SS., Church
of, 11
Councils, Acts of, 21, 402; Canons
of, 26 f.
Coustant, P., 26 f.
Cross, St, in Jerusalem, Church of, 10
Curial handwriting, 58, 64, 70-74,
1361
Cursus Curiae Romanae, 3, 76-87,
93-97, 156
Cyprian, St, 23*, 92
Damasus I, 14, 23, 166, 167
Damasus II, 198
Data or Datum, 20, 38 f., 47 f., 49,
55, 66, 112 f., 1251, 136, 139,
142, 178, 189, 190; hand
writing of, 672, 682, 70*, 721, 75
Data Communis, 198
Datary, The, 55, 198
Date, The, 24, 113, 192 f., 198 ; how
reckoned, 20, 24, 38, 110 f.,
193 : the double date, 20, 38 f.,
53, 69, 68», 751, 109
Deacons, The, and the Regions, 7,
12, 131

Index

207

Decarcones, 174*
Decreta, Decretales, 24, 25, 30, 40 f.
Defensores, 13, 19*, 184, 187;
Primus Defensorum or Primus
Defensor, 18, 51, 187
Delisle, L., 100, 114, 116*, 133,
1772, 1773, 188
Demi-BuUs, 201
Dbniele, H., 133
De Rossi, G. B., 10', 199, 203
Dbsideeius, Abbot of Monte Cas
sino, 72*, 85 f. See ViCtoe III
Deusdedit, Cardinal, 33, 126, 204
Device, The, 74', 102-105, 108, 112
Diaconiae, II, 174
Dictamen, or Ars Dictandi, Study
of, 77 f.; Treatises on, 78-80,
822; Rules for, 79-85, 96;
cf. 156 f.
DiBKAMP, W., 991, 1091, 1892, 191*,
191 =, 200'
Dijon, 20=, 177-f.
Dionysius Exiguus, 25
Diplomatique, Nouveau Traits de,
502, 1592, 177 f.
Duchesne, L., 12, 83, 167 f., 170',
170*, 171, 1722, 173 f., 193
Ehblb, E., 2042
EuoENTOS in, 104, 105, 110 f., 114,
139, 150, 1592, 204
Eugenius IV, 1052
EvAEiSTUS, Pope, 179
Evesham, Abbey of, 147-149
Ewald, P., 28, 372, 197*
Exemplification, 160, 197«
Fabian, Pope, 7, 12
Pelicianus, Catalogus, 5, 167
Felix IV, 5, 167, 169
Fereata, Cardinal, 68'
FiLOCALUS, Catalogue of, 167
Firmatio, The, 108
Florence, 69; Calculus Florentinus,
llOf.
Forgery, 151 f. ; Measures for the
detection of, 152-160; cf.
202 f.: at Canterbury, 143;
at Evesham, 147-149
Formularies, 152, 188-193; cf. 78*,
1581
Frangipani, The, 203 f.
Frankish. See Imperial
Feedbbick I, Emperor, 159'
Frederick II, Emperor, 203
Frederick of Lorraine, Abbot of
Monte Cassino, 66-68, 85. See
Stephen IX
Feontinus, 92

Galletti, P. L., 51
Gelasius I, 29 f.
Gelasius II, 75, 84, 104, 112, 138,
175. See John of Gaeti
Geoffrey de Vino Salvo, 1622
Giesbbbbcht, W. von, 124, 126,
183-185
GiEALDUS Cambrensis, 129, 1352,
149-151, 194-196, 204
GoDFEBY of Viterbo, 184, 185
Grado, Scriniarii at, 17
Graphia aureae Urbis Romae, 181-
183
Geauert, H., 1622
Greeting (Salutatio) in Letters, 23,
42, 113, 177-180, 189'; in
Simple Privileges, 112 f.
Gebgoey, St, the Great, 13, 16, 18,
45, 55, 144-146, 168=
Register of, 29, SI', 32 f., 144
Gregory II, 18, 26, 33
Geegoby III, 33
Geegoby IV, 512
Geeqoey vii, 5, 6, 70-73, 74, 102,
103, 106, 110, 114, 1192, 120,
169 f., 201 ; his autograph, 108.
See also Hlldebband
Register of, 124-131, 133, 134',
1352, 203
Geegoby VIII, 79, 104, 114, 138,
140, 184. See Albert of Morra
Gregory IX, IO52, 1552, 161', 197
Gregory X, IO52, 2022
Grotefend, H., IIP
Guibert of Ravenna (Antipope
Clement III), 49, 72', 102, 103
Guy of Crema (Antipope Paschal
III), 104, 1052
Hadrian I, 4, 19 f., 37 f., 48, 50',
53, 55, 56, 160, 169, 197
Hadrian II, 169
Hadrian IV, 104, IO52, IO91, 111,
193
Halphen, L., 173'
Havet, L., 87 f., 91
Heckel, R. von, 135*, I632
Heney II, Emperor, 61
Henby III, Emperor, 49, 63, 67
Hbney V, Emperor, 49
Heney the Poet, of Wiirzburg, 1622
Hildbbband, 672; hia autograph,
722, 108; ct. 672. See Gee
goby VII
HrusGHius, P., 51
Honorius I, 33, 146, 168»
Honobius II, Antipope. See Cada
lus
Honorius IL 104, 114, 169

208

Index

Honobius III, IO52, 140, 141, 158i,
198», 203, 204. See Cencius
Hobmisdas, Pope, 167
Hugh the Chantor, 145
Hugh of Trimberg, 1622
HuMBEET, Cardinal, 662; j^jg auto
graph, 682, 107 f.
Imperial influence on the Papal
Chancery, 2, 4, 20, 50, 59, 63,
66 f., 136 f.
Imperial Year, Dating by, 20, 24,
48; Western, 49, 712; cf. 178
Incarnation, Year of the. See
Christian Era
Indiction, The, 38, 48, 49', 113, 124,
1251 ; modesof reckoning, 49 f.,
llOf.
Indults. See Litterae de Gratia
Innocent II, 40, 104, 105, 110,
112, 114, 115, 116, 120*
Register of, 132, 199, 200
Innocent III, 25i, 39 f., 94,-97,
104, 105, 113, 114, 121, 139,
147 f., 150 f., 152-162, 189,
195, 199, 201, 202, 2031
Register of, 132-134, 135'
• Innocent IV, 114, 122, 1351, 189,
200', 202
Innocent V, IO52
Innocent VI, IO52
Innocent VIII, 40
IsiDOEE of SeviUe, 182; Pseudo-
Isidorian Decretals, 25 f.
jAFFi), P., 27 f., 126
Jerome, St, 166
John, St, Church of, in the Lateran,
10
John V, 20=, 177
John VII, 204i
John VIII, 48, 169
Register of, 33-35, 86, I34»
John IX, 160
John XII, 54, 169
John XIII, 48, 50, 174'
John XV, 178
John XVIU, 37', 59 f., I732
John XIX, 61
John XXII, 141
John Crescentius, 60
John the Deacon, 184
John of Gaetk, Prosignator and
ChanceUor, 73-75, 83-86,93, 108,
112, 144. See also Gelasius II
John of Struma (Antipope Calixtus
III), 104, 138, 140, 189«
Johnson, C, 198'
Jordan, H., 171 f.

Judices Palatini, 51, 53, 56, 180-187
Julius I, 23*
Justel or Justbau, H., 25
Justinian, Emperor, 16, 38
Kaltenbeunnbe, F., 28, 189'
Kehr, P., 28
Keller, S., I8I2, 184 f.
Lapotbe, a., 35, 1262
Lateran Palace, 54, 59, 62, 64£.,
74, 137; Archives kept at the,
14 f., 204
Lawrence, St, Church of, without
the Walls, 10; in Prasina (or in
Damaso), 14, 142
Laweenoe, Master, 82'
Lector, 165, 171
Leo the Great, 23, 27
Lbo III, 561
Leo IV, 33
Leo VIII, 54
Leo IX, 39, 432, 47, 49, 50, 63,
65-68, 98-100, 101, 105-107,
119, 137, 197, 199
Leo Marsicanus, 862
Leo of Monte Cassino, 86
Leonine Catalogue, 167
Letters, 41, 50, 71, 95, 100 f., 113-
116;- how registered, 31 f., 35,
128, 133-135. See BuUs, Lit
terae
Lewis II, Emperor, 48
Liber Censuum, 170, 181, 194-196
Liber Diurnus, 6, 84
Liber PontificaUs, 4 f., 36, 83, 166-
170, 171 f., 179 f.
Liberianus, Catalogus, 5, 12, 167
LiBBEius, Pope, 23, 30 ; Basilica of,
11
Librarian, The, 56 f., 59-63, 66, 68-
70, 72, 136-138; cf. 178: his
deputies, 72i
Librarv, Custody of the, 14, 18, 56,
138
Licences. See Litterae de Gratia
Lightfoot, Bishop J. B., 167
Litterae clausae, 121, 202
Litterae de Curia, 117, 134 f., 135i
Litterae de Gratia, 44, 115-117,
122, 134, 188-193
Litterae de Justitia, 44, 115, 117 f.,
188-193
Litterae in forma communi, 118
Litterae legendae, 118, 164
Litterae patentes, 121'
Litterae secretae, 117
Litterae simplices. See Litterae in
forma communi.

Index

209

Litterae tonsae, 161
Lowenfeld, S., 28
Lucca, 69-71
Lucius II, 104, 116, 138, 150
Lucius III, 104, 105
Mabillon, J., 177
Magister Census, 52
Mainz, Archbishop of, 60 ; Scriniarii
at, 17
Mandates (Mandamenta). See Lit
terae de Justitia
MarceUinus and Peter, SS., Church
of, 10
Mabcellinus, Continuator of, 173
Maria, S., Antiqua, Church of,
II'
Maria, S., Liberatria, Church of,
11'
Mabini, G., 1782, 198
Maeinus I, 160
Mark, St, Church of, 11
Martin V, 40, 170', 176
Martin of Troppau (Martinus Polo
nus), 1662, 179 f., 199 f.
Mary, St, Church of, beyond the
Tiber, 10
Mary, St, The Greater Church of,
11. See also Maria, S.
Meybe, p., 77
Meyee, W., of Spires, 88 f.
Milan, Scriniarii at, 17
Minuscule handwriting, 58 f., 64 f.,
66, 69, 72-74, 136-138
Mirabilibus Urbis Romae, Liber de,
175, 181-183
Missi et Apocrisiarii, 56
Mommsen, T., 167 f.
Monogram, The, 39, 47, 70, 95, 105-
107, 109, 112, 113
Monte Cassino, 33 f., 72', 74, 77,
85 f., 124'
Montfaucon, B. de, 181*
Motu Proprio, 40
MUEATORI, L. A., 51'
Nicholas I, 16', 33, 198
Nicholas II, 68 f., 102, 103, 106,
107, 110, 119; his autograph,
108
Nomenculator, 19, 51, 57, 187
Gregory, 19
Nonantula, 160
Notae (Minutae), 133
Notaries of the City. See Tabel-
Uones
Notaries PubUo, 138*
Notaries of the Regions, 7, 12-19.
See Scriniarii

Notaries of the Sacred Palace,
62 f., 64 f., 70, 137 f., 139, 140
160
Grisogonus, 74i
Lanfraso, 73
Lietbuin, 66, 68»
Rainbrius, 71, 741, 128
Nothelm, 31
Notitia Dignitatum, 16
Notitia, The Ottonian, 19*, 50, 180,
183-187
Octavian (Antipope Victor IV),
104
Odeeisius, Abbot of Monte Cassino,
85*
Omont, H., 197
Ordines, Roman, 174
Ottenthal, E. von, 127*
Otto the Great, 49, 54
Otto III, 51, 180, 182 f.
Ozanam, A. F., 181', 182"
Palentia, Peter, Bishop Elect of,
141
Pandulf, Subdeacon, 169
Palestrina, Bebnabd, Bishop of, 69
Panvinio, 0., 166
Papyrus, 29, 37, 452, 47, 59, 147,
1491, 160 f., 178, 197 f., 204
Parchment, 37, 59, 114, 145, 147.
148 f., 191
Paschal I, 37, 56
Paschal II, 25i, 49, 712, 73 f., 104,
108 f., 120, 200
Paschal III, Antipope. See Guy
of Crema
Paul, St, Church of, 10, 17
Paul L 452
Peitz, W. M., 127-129, 133', 135'
Pelagius II, 168=
Peetz, G. H., 183«
Peter, St, Church of, 10; Archives
kept at, 15
Petee, Abbot and ChanceUor, 59
Pbtee the Deacon, Librarian and
Chancellor, 62 f., 65, 66'
Peter the Acolyte (afterwards
Cardinal), Librarian and Chan
ceUor, 70, 721, 74
Petee Leonis (Antipope Anacle
tus II), 104, 124
Petee of Blois, LibeUus de Arte
Dictandi attributed to, 80'
Petbb William, 170
Petitions, 163, 166, 198
Pbteonius, 92
Pflugk-Habttung, J. von, 27, 99i,
2002, 200*

210

Index

Pippin, King, 20
Pisa, Reckoning of Year at, 110
Pitea, Cardinal. lOSS 133*
Pius V, 179
Platina, B., 179
Plural number. Use of the, 22',
159
Pontifical Year, Dating by, 20, 48 ;
in Letters, 114
Pontius of Provence, 78 1, 80 1
Popes, The Lives of, 5 f., 166-170
Porto, Bishop of, 56, 60
Potthast, A., 27
Praxedis, St, Church of, 11
Prefecture, the Roman, Registers of,
30
Primicerius, 13-15, 17, 51, 55-57,
185
Laueentius, 13
Primiscriniarius. See Protoscrini
arius
Prisca, St, Church of, 10
Privileges, 41, 50, 71, 95, 116 f.;
marks of, 39^8, 100-111; how
registered, 130-132 : Simple
Privileges, 111-113, 122
Prosignator, 73, 74, 86
Protonotaries, 14 2
Protoscriniarius or Protus, 19, 51-
53, 55, 136, 186
Provinciale, 150 f., 193-196
QuesneUiana, CoUectio, 30
Quignon, Cardinal, 179
Quintilian, 891
Ravenna, 54, 184 f. ; Primicerius at,
13'; Scriniarii at, 17, 184, 186;
Registers of, 30; Regions of,
174
Re, C, 1712
Referendarii, I632, I651, 198
Regions of the City, 7-11, 170-177
Registers, 29-36, 86, 123-135, 203 f.
Rheims, Archbishop of, 153
RiOHTEB, J. P., 112
Robbet Guiscaed, 174, 176
RoBEET of CUpstone, 147
Roland, ChanceUor, 139'. See
Alexander III
Rome, The Regions of, 7-11, 170-
177 ; early churches in, 10-12 ;
synods at (499), 13i; (649), 14;
(963). 172. See also Lateran
Palace
Romuald of Salerno, 183*
Rota, The, 39, 70, 71, 74', 95, 101-
105, 109, 112, 113
RoziiiRE, E. SE, 62

SacceUarius, 18, 51, 56, 186
St David's, See of, 149-151
St Denis, Suger, Abbot of, 159
Salutatio. See Greeting
Sanctio, 45 f.
Schelestrate, E. de, 166
Sohmitz-Rheidt, L., 2012
Schola, 13, 16, 17, 174
Scriniarii sacri IPalatii. See Notaries
Scriniarii Regionarii, 15-17, 47, 51-
58, 62, 64, 651, 68, 70, 73, 136-138
Bonushomo, 74i
Geeaed, 73
Gervase, 74i
Geegoby, 73
Guinizo, 70
Octavian, 68'
Peter, 73', 74i
Rainbbius, 70
Scriniarii = TabeUiones, 52, 184, 186
Scrinium, 15 f., 53, 60, 61, 64, 68.
70, 73 f., 136, 138
Scriptores, 65, 73, 139, 163
Scriptum, 20, 38 f., 47, 53, 59, 64,
65, 73, 74, 109, 137 f.
Seal, Leaden (or BuUa), 24, 50, 102,
119, 199, 201; the points on
the, 199-201; as a test of
genuineness, 145-150, 153-155,
156; how attached, 50, 115 f.,
119, 1201, 2021
Golden, II92
Secundicerius, 13, 17, 51, 55, 186
Mennas, 13*
Sebok, 0., 49'
Selva Candida, Bishops of:
HUMBBET, 66, 1071
Mainaed, 69
The Chancellorship held by, 61,
62', 71, 137
Sbbgius I, 20=, 177
Sickel, T. von, 62
Sidonius Apollinaeis, 92
Simonsfeld, H., 188
Singular number. Use of the, 22',
1581
SiBioius, Pope, 24
Sixtus IV, 40
Spaethen, M., 147'
Stella, J., 1791
Stephen II, 169
Stephen III, 169
Stephen V, 33, 36, 123, 169
Stephen IX, 66, 68, 101, 103, 106.
See also Fbbdebiok of Lorraine
Subdeacons, 12, I32
Subscription of Pope, 23, 47, 106,
1081,112,113,147'. See also
Monogram

Index

211

Subscription of Cardinals, 107 f.,
109, 112, 113
Sylvesteb I, 26
Sylvesteb II, 452
Symmachus, 87, 92
TabeUiones, 52, 54, 184, 186
Tangl, M., I272, 188', 1962
Tayloe, Miss A. C, II2
Terracina, Scriniaru at, 17
Thiel, A., 27
Thomas of Marlborough, 147 f.
Thurot, C, 77
Title (Intitulatio or Supersoriptio)
of the Pope, 221, 41
TituU. See Litterae de Gratia
Titulus (a tittle), 189, 191
TOTILA, 173
Toul, Bruno, Bishop of. See Leo IX
Udo, Primicerius of, 66'
Tournay, Stephen, Bishop of, 135*
Trasimund or Teansmund, 781, 80'
Troyes, 128'
Turris Cartularia, 203 f.
Tusculum, 57,62,68; Bishop of, 138

Ueban II, 72-74, 83, S
105, 1101, 113,
199, 204
Register of, 123, 124

6, 102, 103,
1191, 146,

Ueban III, 104, 140
Urban IV, IO52, 162

Valois, N., 77, 831
Veeoil, Polydore, 50'
Vice-Chanoellor, The, 139-141,
164
MOYSBS, 140
Victor II, 251, 59i, 67 f., 101, 103,
105, 107, 119, 197
Victor III, 49, 72, 86, 103
Victor IV, Antipope. See Octa
vian
Vitruvius, 92
Waitz, G., 1671
Wattenbach, W., 28, 77
Worcester, See of, 147-149
Xystus III, 11 2
York, Archbishops of, 143
Thurstan, 144, 146
Zachaby, Pope, 22'
Zielinski, T., 76i, 90
Zosimus, Pope, 30

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