Chancery Practices in England and at the Papal Curia During the Fourteenth Century

Abstract

This chapter argues that throughout the fourteenth century bureaucratic developments across Europe went hand in glove with the practice of diplomacy. The ultimate outcomes of such growth of administrative and diplomatic practices were the implementation of shared administrative procedures, which could effectively support diplomatic activities, and the creation of a ‘shared language of diplomacy’. In order to assess how shared administrative practices and a ‘language of diplomacy’ came into existence, this chapter first addresses the formation of chancery practices at the papal curia and in England between the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries with a special focus on the management of diplomatic activities and correspondence. It further questions the extent to which administrative practices of writing and record-keeping of diplomatic correspondence in those two polities were comparable and focuses on the modalities of communication amongst them.