Scriveners', Scribes', and Clerks' Guild

Scriveners', Scribes', and Clerks' Guild

This guild of Waterdeep is a highly educated, professional group of men and women who letter signs, draw pictures (sometimes in front of a party audience, upon a noble's hiring), compose and write letters, take dictation, design ornamental scripts, draw up legal tallies, and set down records, contracts, and accounts. Many guild members will even forge or counterfeit documents. These, however, cost very stiff fees – hundreds of gold pieces per document – since the penalties are so severe: Expulsion from Guild and city for very serious cases, with amputation of fingers and thumbs added if the forgery is treasonous or inflammatory, in a manner that threatens the peace of the area.
The Palace retains a dozen guild members at all times to transcribe a record of all said before it, and retains one scribe for each Magister (for the same task). The City Watch also employs guild members to draw likenesses of fugitives described by witnesses, so that watch officers can carry these sketches when on patrol.
In the mid-1400s, the Scriveners' Guild fought the formation of a Printers' Guild for several years, finally successfully gaining recognition as having dominion over that particular vocation by absorbing all of the members of the would-be new guild. To this day, the Scriveners' Guild's portfolio includes the work of printing presses, as well as hand-wrought written and visual works.

Notable Members

Lady Master Stationer Imilantra Cassalanter: When Imilantra Cassalanter entered the guild, most assumed she was simply going to lean into her noble connections to snatch work from more deserving artists. She did not do so, however. Instead, she often offered to find an artist for her noble friends, seeking out those in the guild without noble contacts. In exchange, she only ever asked that they share some of their skill with her, taking some time to teach her their techniques. Fostering not only skill but good-will, it is no surprise that Imilantra Cassalanter has risen to become lady master of the guild, by an unheard-of unanimous vote.

Type

Guild, Professional