A notarius is a public secretary who is appointed by competent authority to draw up official or authentic documents (compare English "notary").
[2] From the usage in the Emperor's representative in the West, the Exarch of Ravenna, the post and title was applied in the increasingly complicated bureaucracy of the Papal curia in Rome.
During a vacancy of the papal chair, he formed part of the interim government, and a letter in 640 is signed (the pope being elected but not yet consecrated) by one "Johannes, primicerius and serving in the place of the holy apostolic see".
The title no longer exists; the only ecclesiastical notaries at present are the officials of the Roman and episcopal curiae.
[citation needed] Liber Pontificalis attributes the seven regional notaries of the Church in Rome, one for each ecclesiastical district of the Holy City, to an institution of Pope Clement I (traditionally 88–98), to record the acts of the martyrs;[4] though this is unattested in any early document, the notice of Pope Julius I (337-352) in the Liber Pontificalis relates that this pope ordered an account of the property of the Church, intended as an authentic document, to be drawn up before the primicerius of the notaries.