James D'EMILIO (Tampa, Florida) In December, 1177, king Fernando II granted a charter to the city of Lugo. This led to the first appearance of a town notary, Tomas Petrides, who signed a charter that same month as "presbyter et notarius tocius civitatis". Within three months, the new office had passed to Romanus Veremudi who occupied it until his death in 1224. More than one hundred and thirty of his signed charters have survived, including nearly a dozen from the decade before he took office. In addition, twenty-six of his charters are signed by seven different scribes. Some of these men earned prominence themselves. Pelagius Sobrinus, for example, enjoyed a forty-year career in the cathedral chapter, and served successively as episcopal notary and cathedral treasurer. Pelagius Veremudi, a relative of Romanus, wrote nearly all of his charters during the last eight years of his tenure, and succeeded him as notary in 1224. The stability of the notarial office contrasts with the succession of clerics who served as episcopal notary, an office which comes into view in the 1190s. Five canons held this dignity between 1195 and 1239, and their handwriting reveals their diverse training. Although their documents are less homogeneous than those of Romanus and his successors, individual differences were, to some degree, softened as an official style took shape. These two notarial offices provide two contrasting environments in which to examine how individual styles were shaped by different forms of interactions among scribes. In this paper I will first trace the development of Romanus' script against the background of the diverse styles of writing in late twelfth-century Lugo. Secondly, I will assess the impact of Romanus' style on his scribes and successors. Thirdly, I will turn to the parallel history of the episcopal notaries' office, and consider the ways in which successive notaries responded to the writing of their predecessors.