New Delhi, March 24 -- In Ancient Rome, parties who wanted to record the terms of an agreement had to present themselves before a tabellio-a particular type of clerk whose job was to write down the terms of a contract on a wax tablet, have them witnessed, and make the document official by pressing his seal into the wax. By certifying the document as valid, the tabellio ensured that parties who had no other way to attest to the document's integrity each had a legally enforceable copy.

In a world without trust infrastructure, institutional intermediaries such as these were essential for commerce. This was eventually formalized as the Notarius of Imperial Rome-the precursor to today's notaries.

This arrangement has not changed much in 2,00...