Album (Ancient Rome)

An album (Latin: albus, lit. 'white'), in ancient Rome, was a board plastered with chalk or gypsum, or painted white (tabula dealbata), on which decrees, edicts and other ephemeral public notices were inscribed in ink using a calamus (reed pen). Album was an early predecessor of bulletin boards. In medieval and modern times the meaning of the word album had changed to refer to a book of blank pages in which verses, autographs, sketches, photographs and the like are collected. An ancient Greek equivalent was called leukomata (Ancient Greek: λεύκωμα pl. λευκώματα).^{[1][2][3][4][5]}

The Annales maximi of the Pontifex maximus, the annual edicts of the praetor, the lists of Roman and municipal senators (decuriones) and jurors (album indicum) were exhibited in this manner.^[1] The Acta Diurna, a sort of daily government gazette, containing an officially authorized narrative of noteworthy events in Rome was also published this way.^[6] Some researchers disagree with this description of the process that belongs to Servius the Grammarian (cf. Brennan 1990).^[7]

The medieval and modern meaning of album, as a book of blank pages in which verses, autographs, sketches, photographs and the like are collected, derives from the Roman use.^[1] This in turn led to the modern meaning of an album as a collection of audio recordings issued as a single item on CD, record, audio tape or another medium.

Another deviation is also applied to the official list of matriculated students in a university, and to the roll in which a bishop inscribes the names of the diocese's clergy. In law, the word is the equivalent of mailles blanches, for rent paid in silver ("white") money.^[1]

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Album". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 513.

• Brennan, T. Corey (1990). "Review of A. Momigliano, The Classical foundations of modern Historiography". Bryn Mawr Classical Review. 1 (2): 74–78. doi:10.7282/T3VT1VJ1. Retrieved 2025-08-08. the tabula dealbata is a late, monstrous invention
• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Album" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 513.
• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Acta Diurna" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 159.
• Forsythe, Gary (1994-11-08). The Historian L. Calpurnius Piso Frugi and the Roman Annalistic Tradition. Lanham, MD: University Press of America. ISBN 0-8191-9742-4.
• Gottesman, Alex (2014). "A tour of the Agora". Politics and the Street in Democratic Athens. Cambridge University Press. pp. 26–43.
• Rhodes, P. J. (2001). "Public Documents in the Greek States: Archives and Inscriptions, Part I". Greece & Rome. 48 (1). Cambridge University Press: 33–44. ISSN 0017-3835. JSTOR 826868. Retrieved 2025-07-28.
• Zavaroni, Adolfo (2024-03-25). Etymological Dictionary of Etruscan Words: Updated Version (in Italian). Youcanprint. ISBN 979-12-227-2465-2. Retrieved 2025-08-08.