'a keeper, preserver, defender'),[1] was a judge delegated by the pope to defend certain privileged classes of persons – as universities, Catholic religious orders, chapters, the poor – from manifest or notorious injury or violence, without recourse to a judicial process.
[3] The earliest recorded mention of conserators is in a decree by Pope Innocent IV, which presupposes their existence.
[4] Owing to abuses and complaints the Council of Trent limited their jurisdiction,[2] but new controversies, often recurring, caused popes Clement VIII, Gregory XV, and Innocent X to define their privileges more precisely.
Pope Clement XIII decreed that in missionary countries such officials should no longer be chosen, but that all controversies should be referred to the Holy See.
[2] According to law, these officials were to be chosen from among the prelates or dignitaries of cathedral and collegiate churches; later from the synodal judges.