The Chancellery of the Transylvanian Principality and the Career
of the Advocates in the 16th Century Cluj

Abstract:

The study is focusing on the question whether being a notary in the Higher or Lower Chancellery of the Principality had influenced, and if so, in which way, a possible later successful career of an advocate in the early modern Transylvania. Whereas, due to the scarceness of the formal researches, a comprehensive analyze of the topic concerning al the advocates of this category throughout the period of the Principality cannot be fulfilled yet, we will limit our research on the case of the town of Cluj (Kolozsvár/Klausenburg) in the last decades of the 16th century. As in our formal researches we had already identified most of the advocates that were present in the judicial activity of the town in the mentioned period, in the present study we will focus on the personal carriers of them, trying to reveal if there are, and which would be those elements, that distinguish a carrier of an advocate formed in the Chancellery against one that didn’t, if this office offered them more and different perspectives towards a higher professional, political, material or social status.

Keywords:

Transylvania, chancery, 16th century