{{umbrella|Author}}
Government publications in STCV (unlike in STCN) are not described anonymously but assigned to a corporate author. The bibliographer will search in the text of the '''government publication''' for the 'issuing agency': the government agency that issued the ordinance. The search will focus on the agency that is as close as possible to the level of the actual practice. A placard made by the Geheime Raad [Secret Council] and then ratified and published individually by different cities, will have as corporate author the magistrate of the specific city and not the secret council. People signing the government publications as part of their profession (secretaries of government agencies, ruling monarchs, ...) are not considered authors and are not recorded anywhere in the description. '''Ruling monarchs, kings, governors, popes, bishops, ... are treated as personal authors''' when they are the issuers of the publication at hand.
Corporate authors are systematically recorded in the thesaurus for 'Instellingen & Manifestaties' [Institutions & Manifestations]. Only if the issuing agency is named on the title page, will that specific reference term be recorded in the description. All other wordings found in the work may be added as reference terms to the thesaurus record, without being linked to the description.
Two types of publications are not considered government publications and do not receive a corporate author. They are recorded by the name of the personal author or compiler.
#'''Letters of ambassadors''' to their government and other semi-official pieces
#Commented '''compilation-editions of ordinances''', such as ''Vlaems recht''
It is also possible that government publications are illustrated and that the illustrator is known. In that case, besides the corporate author, a personal author is also added with the function 'ill' (illustrator).