Cancelli in the church of Kreuzlingen, Switzerland.

Cancelli are lattice-work, placed before a window, a door-way, the tribunal of a judge, the chancel of a church, or any other similar place.[1][2]

This led to the occupation of cancellarius, which originally signified a porter who stood at the latticed or grated door of the emperor's palace. According to the Historia Augusta, the emperor Carinus (reigned 283-285) gave great dissatisfaction by promoting one of these cancellarii to city prefect, although the veracity of this account is disputed.[a]

Other cancellarii were legal scribes or secretaries who sat within the lattice-work which protected the tribunals of the judges from the crowd. The chief scribe in Constantinople was eventually invested with judicial power, and from this office came the modern "chancellor".[1]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ A large amount of the Historia Augusta is recognised by historians to be inaccurate or false (see Historia Augusta § Historical value). The lack of any recorded mention of a cancellarius prior to the fifth century led the historian Otto Seeck to believe that the Historia Augusta was a fifth-century forgery.[3]

References

  1. ^ a b Smith, William, ed. (1875). "Cancelli". A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities. London: John Murray. p. 236. Retrieved 2020-02-18.
  2. ^ Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Cancelli" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 5 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 175.
  3. ^ Ballou, Susan H., ed. (1932). Historia Augusta. Loeb Classical Library. Heinemann. p. 441. Retrieved 2020-02-18.


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