These privileges have since become defunct, and the society is now an independent, non-regulatory association of solicitors who are mostly based in Edinburgh, Scotland's capital city.

[4] While the Clerk of Rolls and Register was originally responsible for the records of Chancery, Parliament and Exchequer,[5] but as the central civil court developed out of the king's council in the fifteenth century, he became responsible for its records too, and from 1483 he was "Clerk of the Rolls, Register and Council"5.

[7] The Clerk Register remained responsible for the records of Parliament and its committees and commissions, the Exchequer, and the Court of Session (representing the judicial side of the old council).

By the time of the Union with the Kingdom of England in 1707, the office was known as the "Clerk of the Registers and Rolls of the council, Session and Exchequer, and of all Commissions, Parliaments and Conventions of Estates".

The Treaty of Union in 1707 provided for the preservation of public records; and the office was also entrusted the election and management of the sixteen Scottish peers to the House of Lords in the new British parliament, with two Clerks of Session commissioned by him to assist.

In 1818, a Royal Commission entrusted the officers of state, including the Lord Clerk Register for the time being, with the custody of the Honours of Scotland.

Prior to devolution, the Lord Clerk Register was appointed by the Monarch on the advice of a Minister of the Crown.