### Chancellery
Originally the cancellarius was the person who stood at the bars (in Latin: cancelli), which separated the parties in a lawsuit at the court. Later the meaning of chancellor was modified (it appeared in authentic sources as an office from 858 in the Carolingian court, from the beginning of the 11th century in the papal court, and from the end of the 12th century in Hungary). It referred to the institute in the medieval rulers' courts (imperial, papal, royal courts), whose duty was to produce official written documents, that is charters. The head of it, the chancellor was also a prelate, who usually stayed at his residence, so actually the vice-chancellor supervised the work of clerks (notarius) and writers (scriptor). Later besides conducting written work, the chancellor had independent legislative power, since he substituted the ruler, and he became a court judge. By that time the institute of chancellery had already been differentiated, written work was done in several offices. In Hungary the chancellery had close relations with literature: almost all of the few Hungarian historiographers were employed in one of the royal chancelleries, but the authors, whose name is unknown, might also have been working in those institutes. Consequently, a special Hungarian phenomena appeared in Europe: the narrative parts of charters often have literary values, they are much longer than those of western charters. SzK