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Silentiarii

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a name given, to some monks in early times. This was not a name of any particular order, but given to some few for their professing a more than Pythagorean silence; such as Johannes Silentiarius, who was first, bishop of Colonia in Armenia, but renounced his bishopric to become a monk in Palestine, where he got the name of Silentiarius from his extraordinary silence (Cyril, Acta Sanctorum, Maii 13, vol. [3, p. 234).

2. More commonly to certain men who were civil officers in the emperor's palace, and served both as apparitors to execute public business, and as guards to keep the peace about him, when they had the name of Silentiarii, under which title they are spoken of in the Theodosian Code (lib. 6, tit. 23). See Bingham, Christ. Antiq. bk. 7, ch. 2, 14.