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DOMINIUM,

minium), nor was it the same as in bonis. The two things are distinguished by Ulpian (Frag. xix. '20, 21). A bonae fidei possessor had a capa­city for acquiring by usucapion the ownership of the thing which he possessed. He had a kind of action, actio publiciana in rera, by which, if he lost the possession before he had acquired the owner­ship by usucapion, he could recover it against all except the owner, or such person as had a better right than himself, in which latter respect he dif­fered from him who had a thing in bonis, for his claim was good against the person who had the bare ownership. (Dig. 6. tit. 2.)

As to fundi provinciales, it was an old priri-c'ple of Roman law that there could be no domi-nium in them, that is, no quiritarian ownership; nor were they said to be in bonis, but the occupier had possessio and ususfructus. In fact the terms dominium and in bonis were not applicable to pro­vincial lands, nor were the fictions that were ap­plicable to things in bonis applicable to provincial lands ; but it is an ingenious conjecture of Unter-holzner, that the formula actionis was adapted to the case of provincial lands by a fiction of their being Italic lands, combined with a fiction of their being acquired by usucapion. In the case of the ager publicus in Italy, the dominium was in the Roman people, and the terms possessio and pos­sessor were appropriate to the enjoyment and the person by whom the land was enjt>yed. Still the property in provincial land was like the pro­perty in bonis in Rome and Italy, and it conse­quently became dominium after the distinction between quiritarian and bonitarian ownership was destroyed.

Ownership was also acquired in the case of oc-cupatio, accessio, &c. [accessio ; alluvio ; confusio.]

A man, who had a legal capacity, could acquire property either himself or by those who were " in potestate.manu,mancipiove." He could even acquire thus per universitatem, as in the case of an here-ditas ; and he could also thus acquire a legacy. If a slave was a man's in bonis, every thing that the slave acquired belonged to the owner in bonis, and not to him who had the bare quiritarian ownership. If a man was the " bona fide possessor " of another per­son, whether that person happened to be a freeman supposed to be and possessed as a slave, or was the property of another, the possessor only acquired the ownership of that which the person so possessed ac­quired " ex re possid; ntis " and " ex operis suis." The same rule applied to a slave in which a man had only the ususfructus ; and the rule was con­sistent with the rule just laid down, for ususfructus was not property. Sons who were in the power of a father, and slaves, of course, could not acquire property for themselves. [PfiCULiUM.]

Ownership was lost either with the consent of the owner or against it. With the consent, when he transferred it to another, which was the general mode of acquiring and losing property ; without the consent, when the thing perished, when it be­came the property of another by accession or usu­capion, when it was judicially declared to be the property of another, or forfeited by being pledged. Ownership was not lost by death, for the heres was considered to be the same person as the de­funct.

As certain persons had not a capacity to acquire, bo some persons had not the same liability to lose

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DOMUS,

that others had. Thus the property of a pupil his who was in tutela legitima, could not become the property of another by usucapion ; a fundamental principle of law which Cicero was surprised that his friend Atticus did not know (Ad Att.\. 5).

Ownership might be lost by the Maxima capitis diminutio ; when it was the consequence of a con­ viction for a capital crime, the property was for­ feited to the state. [sectio bonohum.] The media capitis diminutio only effected an incapacity for quiritarian ownership: the person could still retain or acquire property by the jus gentium ; still if the media capitis diminutio was the conse­ quence of conviction for a capital crime, it had the same consequences as the Maxima. (Mackeldey, Lehrluch, &c. 12th ed. ; Ueber die Verschiedenett Arten des Eigenthums, &c. von Unterholzner, Rhcin. Mus. Erster Jalvrg. ; Gaius, ii. 1, &c. ; UJp. frag. tit. xix. ; Thibaut, System, &c. § 146. &c., § 242, &c., 9th ed.) [G. L.]

DOMINUS means master^ owner [dominium]. Dominus is opposed to Servus. as master to slave. Plinius, in his letters, always addresses Trajanus as Dominus ; but this must be viewed rather as a mode of showing his respect than any acknowledg­ ment of a title. (C. Plinii Caecilii Secundi Ep. ed. G. H. Schaefer, p. 500, note.) Domitianus claimed the titles of Dominus and Deus. (Dion Cass. Ixvii. 13, and the note of Reimarus ; also Martialis, Ep. v. 8, and x. 72, when Domitianus was dead.) It is said, that Aurelianus first adopted the title Dominus on his medals. (Eckhel, Ddct. Num. Vet. vol. vii. p. 482.) [G. L.]

DOMUS (olwos, oiKia, and in old Greek S^uos), a house. 1. greek. — The arrangement of the several parts of the dwellings of the Greeks forms one of the most difficult subjects in their antiquities. The only regular description of the Greek house, that of Vitruvius, is in many respects inconsistent with the allusions found in the Greek writers ; while those allusions themselves are far too scanty and obscure, to be woven into a clear description. It is manifest, also, that the arrangement of tho parts differed much at different periods. To say nothing of the early period when, according to tra­dition, rude huts of clay, or wood, or stone, began to be used instead of the hollow trees, and caves, and clefts in the rocks, in which the savage aborigines found shelter (Diod. v. 68, Pans. x. 17), we have to distinguish between the houses, or rather palaces, of the heroic age, to which Homer's allusions apply, the houses of the historical period down to the time of Alexander the Great, and those after his time.

There were also considerable differences between the arrangements of a town and a country house. All of these had two principal features in com­mon. Firstly, in Greece, as in all warm climates, the general arrangement of a house of the bett r sort was that of one or more open courts, sur­rounded by the various rooms. Secondly, in a Greek family the women lived in private apart­ments allotted to their exclusive use. Hence the house was always divided into two distinct por­tions, namely, the Andronitis^ or men's apart­ments- (dj/S/wz/ms), and the Gynaeconitis, or wo­men's apartments (yvvaiKow'iTis). In the earliest times, as in the houses referred to by Homer, the women's apartments were in the upper story (u-srep-eooi'). The same arrangement is found at the time of the Peloponnesian war in the house spoken of

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