The name is also used to indicate subsequent publications containing such documents, in chronological order, with summaries of their essential contents, for which the science of diplomatics - when written in English - usually uses the term "calendar".
Rufinum", III, xx), St. Jerome refers to the archives (chartarium) of the Roman Church, where the letter of Pope Anastasius (399-401) on the controversy over the doctrines of Origen was preserved.
Thus Pope Zosimus in his letter of 22 Sept., 417, to the bishops of Africa refers to the fact that all the earlier negotiations with Coelestius had been examined at Rome (Coustant, "Epist.
From this time onwards it remained the fixed custom of the papal chancery to copy the official papers issued by it in registers.
From the centuries previous to the pontificate of Innocent III (1199–1216) there remain only fragments of the registry volumes of the papal chancery and these in large part merely in later copies.
Separate letters, fifty-five in number, belonging to the first four years of the pontificate of this pope, are in a manuscript of the 12th century in the British Museum (Ms. Add.
A fraction of the Regesta of the antipope Anacletus II (1130–38) containing thirty-eight letters has been preserved in a manuscript of Monte Cassino (Ewald in "Neues Archiv", III, 164 sqq.).
From Pope Innocent III onward the manuscript volumes of the papal Regesta still exist in the Vatican Archives.
At a later era, the original Regesta volumes were also brought to the Vatican Archives so that there are two series in existence for the Avignon epoch of the 14th century.
Numerous investigations have been made by various scholars as to the arrangement of the volumes of the Regesta, the rules or customs observed in the entering of the separate pieces, as to the question of whether the draft or the finished letter was copied, and as to many other matters in diplomatics, without reaching very certain results.
For convenience in historical investigation various scholars have published in chronological order all known papal documents of large periods, with brief summaries of the contents of the letters.
The Regesta of the letters of Gregory I were edited again by Ewald and Hartmann, "Gregorii I Registrum epistolarum" in "Mon.
The letters of Gregory VII were edited by Jaffé, "Monumenta Gregoriana" in "Bibliotheca Rerum Germanicarum" (2 vols., Berlin, 1868).
In addition a number of works have been issued or are in course of publication that contain Regesta from the Vatican Regesta of the 14th century, bearing on special questions or on the history of various countries and dioceses, e.g., Werunsky, "Excerpts ex registris Clementis VI et Innocenti VI (Innsbruck, 1885); Ruezler, "Vatikanische Akten zur deutschen Geschichte in der Zeit Ludwigs des Bayern" (Munich, 1890).