PONTIFICAL YEARBOOK. – Official directory of the Catholic ecclesiastical hierarchy, the Roman Curia, and the Papal Court, compiled annually at the Secretariat of State. Its origins date back to 1716, when the Chracas printers began publishing the Notizie per l’anno..., containing the principal data and lists of persons relating to the hierarchy of the Church, the Curia, and the Court. This publication, which grew increasingly comprehensive in subsequent years, experienced interruptions between 1798 and 1817 (in some years of the French occupation, it was replaced by an Almanacco per i dipartimenti del Tevere e del Trasimeno), but resumed in 1818. From 1850, the Pontifical Yearbook began to be issued by the printing house of the Apostolic Camera, containing information on the hierarchy and the administration of the Papal States, compiled under the direction of the Giornale di Roma. Suspended in 1870, two years later the Mondali printing house initiated the Gerarchia cattolica e la Famiglia pontificia per l’anno..., which included in an appendix additional information concerning the Holy See. In 1885, printing was taken over by the Vatican Press and, from 1890 to 1904, bore the indication of “official edition.” In 1912, the title Pontifical Yearbook was restored (“official publication” until 1924). During the years 1912–24, it also included brief explanatory notes on the dicasteries of the Curia and certain court dignities, resumed with revised criteria from 1940.
The Yearbook opens with a series of the Roman Supreme Pontiffs “according to the chronology of the Liber Pontificalis and its sources, continued to the present day,” in recent years corrected and annotated, in accordance with the results of historical scholarship, by Msgr. A. Mercati. This is followed by the hierarchy proper (Supreme Pontiff, Sacred College of Cardinals, patriarchates, residential and titular archbishoprics and bishoprics, abbacies and prelatures *nullius diocesis*, apostolic administrations *ad nutum Sanctae Sedis*, prelates of the Eastern rite with ordinary jurisdiction, vicariates and apostolic prefectures, missions *sui iuris*, Custody of the Holy Land); the Orders, Congregations, and religious Institutes; the Roman Curia (Sacred Congregations, tribunals, offices); the representations of the Holy See and the diplomatic corps accredited to it;
the permanent commissions; the Papal Chapel; the household of His Holiness; the palatine offices and administrations; the chivalric Orders; and the State of the Vatican City. It concludes with a substantial appendix of useful lists, a list of dignitaries deceased up to the end of December, and indices (alphabetical, of subjects, and schematic). The publication constitutes a comprehensive overview of the ecclesiastical organization of the Catholic world, supplemented by statistical information, and is contained in a compact volume in-16°, printed by the Vatican Polyglot Press, illustrated with the portrait and coat of arms of the reigning Pontiff, the annual medal of the pontificate, and the coats of arms of the cardinals.