Innocent III's Registers and Letters

The  image on the left is taken from the papal registers Codex Reg. Vat. 5 of the Vatican Archives, which is the seventh year of Innocent's pontificate (Click here for larger image).  The letter in the middle of the page with the capital "R" initial is dated 30 November 1204-February 1205 and has next to it in the margin a drawing of  the Hungarian Crown and a young boy.  The letter was from the Regent of Hungary, Andrea, the duke of Dalmatia and Croatia and written to Innocent.  It must have been of special importance to Innocent, since the registers contain few letters that were written to Innocent by other correspondents.
 

Pope Innocent III (1198-1216) reorganized the papal curia. As the result, the production and preservation of papal correspondence became regular and orderly.  Consequently, we have a series of registers containing his letters from the first days of his pontificate until his death, with only a few volumes having been lost over the centuries.  Innocent's registers contain several thousand letters but by no means all of them.  Since not all letters were entered into the papal registers, it is often difficult to know why some very important letters were omitted and other letters of trivial importance were included.
 

I have translated letters that illustrate  the themes of the course:
 

Letters on the Issues of Church and State
 

Letters on Marriage and Women
 

A Consilium sent to the Crusaders at Zara