Scrivener - Definition - Law Dictionary Home Dictionary Definition scrivener

Definition :

Scrivener [fr. scrivano, Ital.; escrivain, Fr.], or Money Scrivener, a professional man whose business of receiving men's money and investing it for them when he should find a proper opportunity, being trusted as a banker in the meantime, died out about the middle of the eighteenth century. He was subjected to the law of bankruptcy by 21 Jac. 1, c. 19 (repealed by 6 Geo. 4, c. 16), where, and also in Sch. I of the repealed Bankruptcy Act, 1869, he is defined as 'using the trade or profession of a scrivener, receiving other men's monies or estates into his trust or custody.' See Adams v. Malkin, (1814) 3 Camp 539, where the question whether an attorney could be made bankrupt as a scrivener was decided in the negative, and Boswell's Life of Johnson, where it is related that one Jack Ellis, a contemporary of Dr. Johnson, and mentioned by him with great respect, was the last of the scriveners. By s. 13 of the Public Notaries Act, 1801, no person can become a notary within the limits of the jurisdiction of the Incorporated Company of Scriveners of London, unless a freeman. See NOTARY.