PRIMICERIUS AND SECUNDICERIUS. — P. (qui primus cerae seu matriculae erat inscriptus), originally denoted one who occupied the highest office in a given order and was therefore written first at the head of a wax tablet. Several persons who bore this title are known; the most famous is the p. of the college of notaries (v.) of the Roman Church, who was the first of the seven regional notaries; the s., the second.
This is to be distinguished from the protocrinarius, who likewise presided over a college of notaries, but not pontifical notaries; rather, over those of the city of Rome. The first reasonably reliable record of the existence of the p. is found under Julius I (341–52), in the Lib. Pont. (I, p. 205). It is certain, however, that the college of regional notaries existed, and that the primicerius notariorum presided over it, in the sixth century (his name is recorded in a Roman inscription of 565; cf. G. B. De Rossi, Inscriptiones christianae urbis Romae, I, Rome 1888, no. 1098). Confirmation is found shortly thereafter, under Gregory I (cf. P. Hinschius, Kirchenrecht, I, Berlin 1869, p. 384, n. 2). S. Agostino dedicated his Enchiridion de fide, spe et caritate to Lorenzo p. (G. B. De Rossi, De origine scrinii, Rome 1886, p. xxxi, n. 2), and the work of the poet Arator (544) was entrusted by Pope Vigilius to Surgenzio p. (PL 68, 55).
Under him was the secundicerius, who is mentioned in 526 (Epistola de ratione Paschae: PL 67, 512). Both dignities also existed in the imperial Chancery (H. Bresslau, Handbuch der Urkundenlehre, I, 2nd ed., Leipzig 1912, pp. 187 ff.) and are found not only in the Roman Church, but also in other Churches, such as Alexandria, Constantinople, and Ravenna (Council of Ephesus, 431, Council of Chalcedon, 451; Mansi, IV, 1127; VI, 983; H. Bresslau, op. cit., pp. 194 ff.).
The p. was also a capitular dignity or a simple capitular office, instituted especially for instructing deacons and clerics (X, I, 25 de officio primicerii). It still survives here and there in Chapters today, more often as a dignity, ordinarily the third after the archdeacon and the archpriest, and sometimes even the first, according to the various Constitutions. In Confraternities or Archconfraternities, p. is often the title of the person who exercises directive functions in them; here too, for specific determinations, it is necessary to consult the individual Constitutions or Regulations.
The p. was a kind of prime minister of the supreme pontiffs (H. Bresslau, op. cit., pp. 194, 209) and, during a vacancy, governed the Church of Rome together with the archdeacon and the archpriest (Liber Diurnus Rom. Pontificum, forms 59, 61, 62, 63, ed. Th. V. Sickel, Vienna 1889, pp. 49, 53–57, 58).
In the Apostolic Chancery he was the prefect of the Chancery itself. From the time of Hadrian I (771–95), many rescripts bear the Datum of the p. or the s. (H. Bresslau, op. cit., pp. 209 ff.). These functions PATARIA (v.); but from the ninth century onward they passed to a specific official, who was called librarian and then chancellor, and subsequently vice-chancellor (v. CANCELLERIA). From that time onward the importance of the two dignities declined; they are mentioned until 1195. The title of p. was also borne by the head of the defenders or advocates (v.) of the papal court (primicerius defensorum). There are also a primicerius domesticorum et protectorum, a primicerius cubiculi, and others catalogued summarily by Du Cange (Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, ed. A. L. Henschel, VI, Paris 1938, p. 4978).