IMPRIMATUR. — “Let it be printed”: this is the formula by which the local Ordinary or the competent dicastery of the Roman Curia grants permission to print a book, a leaflet or other writing subject to prior censorship in accordance with can. 1385, nn. 1–2, and any sacred image, if the ecclesiastical censor charged with the review has given a favourable opinion.
The Ordinary’s licence, the opinion and, ordinarily, the name of the reviewer must be printed at the beginning or end of the book (can. 1393 § 4 and 1394 § 1).
It is not to be confused with “the permission that clerics must obtain from the local Ordinary, and if religious also from their major Superior, before publishing any writing or assuming the direction of newspapers, periodicals or reviews (can. 1386 § 1).
The first ecclesiastical law imposing prior censorship and the consequent imprimatur was promulgated by Innocent VIII in 1487. For the history and current discipline on the matter, V. CENSURA; INDICE DEI LIBRI PROIBITI.
The Albertine Statute (art. 28) established the obligation to submit Bibles, Catechisms and prayer books to prior episcopal censorship before printing them; this provision, never observed, was not reproduced in the Constitution of the Italian Republic.