The Holy See, also called the See of Rome, Petrine See or Apostolic See, is the central governing body of the Catholic Church and the Vatican City State. It encompasses the office of the pope as the bishop of the Apostolic episcopal see of Rome and serves as the spiritual and administrative authority of the worldwide Catholic Church and the city-state. Under international law, the Holy See holds the status of a sovereign juridical entity.
A quaestor was a public official in ancient Rome. There were various types of quaestors, with the title used to describe greatly different offices at different times.
Responsa comprise a body of written decisions and rulings given by legal scholars in response to questions addressed to them. In the modern era, the term is used to describe decisions and rulings made by scholars in historic religious law.
Ulpian was a Roman jurist born in Tyre in Roman Syria. He moved to Rome and rose to become considered one of the great legal authorities of his time. He was one of the five jurists upon whom decisions were to be based according to the Law of Citations of Valentinian III, and supplied the Justinian Digest about a third of its contents.
The title of imperator originally meant the rough equivalent of commander under the Roman Republic. Later, it became a part of the titulature of the Roman Emperors as their praenomen. The Roman emperors generally based their authority on multiple titles and positions, rather than preferring any single title. Nevertheless, imperator was used relatively consistently as an element of a Roman ruler's title throughout the Principate and the later Roman Empire. It was abbreviated to "IMP" in incriptions. The word derives from the stem of the verb imperare, meaning 'to order, to command'. The English word emperor derives from imperator via Old French: Empereür.
Tribonian was a Byzantine jurist and advisor. During the reign of the Emperor Justinian I, he supervised the revision of the legal code of the Byzantine Empire. He has been described as one of the wisest collaborators of Justinian.
A lictor was a Roman civil servant who was an attendant and bodyguard to a magistrate who held imperium. Roman records describe lictors as having existed since the Roman Kingdom, and may have originated with the Etruscans.
Eutropius was a fourth-century Eastern Roman official who rose to prominence during the reign of emperor Arcadius. He was the first eunuch to become a consul in the Roman Empire.
The agentes in rebus were the late Roman imperial and Byzantine courier service and general agents of the central government from the 4th to the 7th centuries.
Comes, often translated as count, was a Roman title or office.
Palatinus, Latin for "palatial", were designations for various ecclesiastical offices in the Catholic Church, primarily of certain high officials in the papal court.
A tribus, or tribe, was a division of the Roman people for military, censorial, and voting purposes. When constituted in the comitia tributa, the tribes were the voting units of a legislative assembly of the Roman Republic.
Ecclesiastical letters are publications or announcements of the organs of Roman Catholic ecclesiastical authority, e.g. the synods, but more particularly of pope and bishops, addressed to the faithful in the form of letters.
Papal rescripts are responses of the pope or a Congregation of the Roman Curia, in writing, to queries or petitions of individuals. Some rescripts concern the granting of favours; others the administration of justice under canon law, e. g. the interpretation of a law, the appointment of a judge.
The magister officiorum was one of the most senior administrative officials in the Later Roman Empire and the early centuries of the Byzantine Empire. In Byzantium, the office was eventually transformed into a senior honorary rank, simply called magistros (μάγιστρος), until it disappeared in the 12th century.
The Codex Gregorianus is the title of a collection of constitutions of Roman emperors over a century and a half from the 130s to 290s AD. It is believed to have been produced around 291–294 but the exact date is unknown.
The Codex Hermogenianus is the title of a collection of constitutions of the Roman emperors of the first tetrarchy, mostly from the years 293–94. Most of the work is now lost. The work became a standard reference in late antiquity, until it was superseded by the Breviary of Alaric and the Codex Justinianeus.
Aurelius Hermogenianus, or Hermogenian, was an eminent Roman jurist and public servant of the age of Diocletian and his fellow tetrarchs.
The quaestor sacri palatii was the senior legal authority in the late Roman Empire and early Byzantium, responsible for drafting laws. In the later Byzantine Empire, the office of the quaestor was altered and it became a senior judicial official for the imperial capital, Constantinople. The post survived until the 14th century, albeit only as an honorary title.
The Code of Justinian is one part of the Corpus Juris Civilis, the codification of Roman law ordered early in the 6th century AD by Justinian I, who was Eastern Roman emperor in Constantinople. Two other units, the Digest and the Institutes, were created during his reign. The fourth part, the Novellae Constitutiones, was compiled unofficially after his death but is now also thought of as part of the Corpus Juris Civilis.
