Involved in the post-translational conjugation of arginine to the N-terminal aspartate or glutamate of a protein. This arginylation is required for degradation of the protein via the ubiquitin pathway. Does not arginylate cysteine residues (By similarity). an N-terminal L-alpha-aminoacyl-[protein] + L-arginyl-tRNA(Arg) = H(+) + N-terminal L-arginyl-L-amino acid-[protein] + tRNA(Arg) Belongs to the R-transferase family. Deletion of many residues.