THE NUMBER OF THE LETTERS

The estimated output of the papal Chancery is a topic that has received much attention. Annual averages of letters for which there is evidence before about 1130 (the accession of Innocent II), based on jaffé, do not climb beyond the thirties. With Innocent II (1130–43) the annual average rises to seventy-two, with Adrian IV (1154–9) to 130, and with Alexander III (1159–81) to 179. This pronounced curve upwards in the twelfth century appears to reflect both more active government and improved survival of the sources: the two are not unconnected. It has been argued by Alexander Murray that many of Gregory VII's communications were oral. If that be so, a hundred years later there had been a radical transformation from a society that depended on word of mouth and visible ceremony for authentication to one that favoured written testimony. Innocent III's average yearly issue, based on Potthast, amounts to 303.7 letters (total number of letters 5316 in a pontificate of 17½ years), and for Honorius III the average annual issue is 238.7 letters (total issue 2545 in a pontificate of 10⅔ years). The upward curve in the number of papal letters continues throughout the thirteenth century, being particularly noticeable under Innocent IV and Alexander IV and again under Boniface VIII.

The development of registration and the survival of a continuous series of registers from the early thirteenth century is a marked feature of contemporary Europe in which the papacy led the way.