ARCHIVIST OF THE HOLY ROMAN CHURCH. - The high direction of the Vatican Secret Archives, of which the Supreme Pontiff "retains, together with ownership, the governance and supreme administration," is exercised through a cardinal, who bears the title of Archivist of the Holy Roman Church. He is appointed by pontifical brief and is answerable to the Pope for all that concerns the preservation of the archival material and the good order of the office; subordinate to him is the prefect of the Vatican Secret Archives, to whom is entrusted the custody of the archive together with the ordinary direction of the scholarly work, of the personnel and of the services for the admission and assistance of scholars who wish to carry out historical research (Regolamento dell'Archivio Vaticano, 1927).
The title is recent. In the more ancient centuries the preservation of the pontifical archive, and in particular of the registers of letters, belonged to the primicerius notariorum, who was head of the chancery; from the beginning of the 8th century it belonged to the bibliothecarius, who perhaps still depended on the primicerius, but must have been an important personage because he was usually a bishop. Subsequently the office passed to the chancellor or the vice-chancellor, until the archive was detached from the chancery and, considered in its historical value, was united with the library; there then came about, under Sixtus IV (1471-84), the constitution of the bibliotheca secreta alongside the bibliotheca publica, under the single direction of the cardinal librarian. Even after the erection of the Secret Archive as an autonomous body (1612), entrusted to custodians or prefects, the dependence on the cardinal librarian continued, and only in 1879 was there the appointment of Card. Giuseppe Hergenröther as Praeses Vaticani tabularii sive archivista Apostolicae Sedis. At his death (1890) there were still prefects, cardinals or prelates; in 1917 Card. Aidan Gasquet received the title of Archivist of the Holy See, which he kept together with that of Librarian of the Holy Roman Church, received two years later; from 1920 the present title of Archivist of the Holy Roman Church has remained fixed, joined to that of Librarian.
Giulio Battelli