Rotulus

Roman portraiture frescos from Pompeii, 1st century AD, depicting two different men wearing laurel wreaths, one holding the rotulus, the other a volumen

Roman portraiture fresco of a young man with a papyrus scroll, from Herculaneum, 1st century AD

A rotulus (plural: rotuli) is a kind of roll consisting of a long and narrow strip of writing material, historically papyrus or parchment, that is wound around a wooden axil or rod and is written on its interior face or side^[1] such that it is unwound vertically so that the writing runs parallel to the rod,^[2] unlike the other kind of roll, namely the "scroll", whose writing runs perpendicular to the rod in multiple columns.

Rotuli were historically used for:

• Specific legal records in Europe, from which is still derived the title of the judicial functionary denominated the "Master of the Rolls", and the Byzantine Empire;^[3]
• Liturgical manuscripts, e. g. those used for chanting the Exultet; and
• Especially mortuary rolls, i. e., documents memorializing the names of all the deceased members of a monastery or other institution, which were banded together and circulated so that they could mutually pray for the repose of each other's decedents.^[3]

References

Attribution

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Rotuli". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton.  The entry cites:
  • Léopold Victor Delisle, Rouleaux des morts du IX au XV siecle (Paris, 1866);
  • ____, in Bibl. de l'ecole des Chartes, series II, vol. III; Sur l'usage de prier pour les morts;
  • Thurston, A Mediaeval Mortuary-card in The Month (London, Dec., 1896);
  • Nichols in Mem. Archaeolog. Institute (Norwich, 1847);
  • Molinier, Obituaires français au moyen-âge (Paris, 1886);
  • Ebner, Gebetsverbruderungen (Freiburg, 1891);
  • Wattenbach, Schriftwesen im Mittelalter (3rd ed., Leipzig), 150-74.