[1] The False Capitularies are for civil legislation what the False
Decretals are for ecclesiastical legislation: three books of
Capitularies of the Frankish kings, more of which are spurious than
authentic. The author gives himself out as a certain Benedict, a
deacon of the church of Mainz; hence the name by which he is usually
known, Benedictus Levita. The two false collections are closely akin,
and are doubtless the fabrication of the same hands.
DECURIO, a Roman official title, used in three connexions. (1) A member
of the senatorial order in the Italian towns under the administration of
Rome, and later in provincial towns organized on the Italian model (see
CURIA 4). The number of _decuriones_ varied in different towns, but was
usually 100. The qualifications for the office were fixed in each town
by a special law for that community (_lex municipalis_). Cicero (_in
Verr._ 2. 49, 120) alludes to an age limit (originally thirty years,
until lowered by Augustus to twenty-five), to a property qualification
(cf. Pliny, _Ep._ i. 19. 2), and to certain conditions of rank. The
method of appointment varied in different towns and at different
periods. In the early municipal constitution ex-magistrates passed
automatically into the senate of their town; but at a later date this
order was reversed, and membership of the senate became a qualification
for the magistracy. Cicero (_l.c._) speaks of the senate in the Sicilian
towns as appointed by a vote of the township. But in most towns it was
the duty of the chief magistrate to draw up a list (_album_) of the
senators every five years. The _decuriones_ held office for life. They
were convened by the magistrate, who presided as in the Roman senate.
Their powers were extensive. In all matters the magistrates were obliged
to act according to their direction, and in some towns they heard cases
of appeal against judicial sentences passed by the magistrate. By the
time of the municipal law of Julius Caesar (45 B.C.) special privileges
were conferred on the _decuriones_, including the right to appeal to
Rome for trial in criminal cases. Under the principate their status
underwent a marked decline. The office was no longer coveted, and
documents of the 3rd and 4th centuries show that means were devised to
compel members of the towns to undertake it. By the time of the jurists
it had become hereditary and compulsory. This change was largely due to
the heavy financial burdens which the Roman government laid on the
municipal senates. (2) The president of a _decuria_, a subdivision of
the _curia_ (q.v.). (3) An officer in the Roman cavalry, commanding a
troop of ten men (_decuria_).
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--C. G. Bruns, _Fontes juris Romani_, c. 3, No. 18, c. 4,
Nos. 27, 29, 30 (_leges municipales_); J. C. Orelli, _Inscr. Latinae_,
No. 3721 (Album of Canusium); Godefroy, _Paratitl. ad cod.
Theodosianam_, xii. 1 (vol. iv. pp. 352 et seq., ed. Ritter); J.
Marquardt, _Romische Staatsverwaltung_, i. pp. 183 et seq. (Leipzig,
1881); P. Willems, _Droit public romain_, pp. 535 et seq. (Paris,
1884); Pauly-Wissowa, _Realencyclopadie_, IV. ii. pp. 2319 foll.
(Stuttgart, 1901); W. Liebenam, _Stadteverwaltung im romischen
Kaiserreiche_ (Leipzig, 1900). (A. M. Cl.)
DEDEAGATCH, a seaport of European Turkey, in the vilayet of Adrianople,
10 m. N.W. of the Maritza estuary, on the Gulf of Enos, an inlet of the
Aegean Sea. Pop. (1905) about 3000, mostly Greeks. Until 1871 Dedeagatch
was a mere cluster of fishermen's huts. A new town then began to spring
up, settlers being attracted by the prospect of opening up a trade in the
products of a vast forest of valonia oaks which grew near. In 1873 it was
made the chief town of a _Kaza_, to which it gave its name, and a
_Kaimakam_ was appointed to it. In 1884 it was raised in administrative
rank from a _Kaza_ to a _Sanjak_, and the governor became a _Mutessarif_.
In 1889 the Greek archbishopric of Enos was transferred to Dedeagatch. On
the opening, early in 1896, of the Constantinople-Salonica railway, which
has a station here, a large proportion of the extensive transit trade
which Enos, situated at the mouth of the Maritza, had acquired, was
immediately diverted to Dedeagatch, and an era of unprecedented
prosperity began; but when the railway connecting Burgas on the Black Sea
with the interior was opened, in 1898, Dedeagatch lost all it had won
from Enos. Owing to the lack of shelter in its open roadstead, the port
has not become the great commercial centre which its position otherwise
qualifies it to be. It is, however, one of the chief outlets for the
grain trade of the Adrianople, Demotica and Xanthi districts. The valonia
trade has also steadily developed, and is supplemented by the export of
timber, tobacco and almonds. In 1871, while digging out the foundations
of their houses, the settlers found many ancient tombs. Probably these
are relics, not of the necropolis of the ancient _Zone_, but of a
monastic community of Dervishes, of the Dede sect, which was established
here in the 15th century, shortly after the Turkish conquest, and gave to
the place its name.
DEDHAM, a township and the county seat of Norfolk county, Massachusetts,
U.S.A., with an area of 23 sq. m. of comparatively level country. Pop.
(1890) 7123; (1900) 7457, of whom 2186 were foreign-born; (1910 U.S.
census) 9284. The township is traversed by the New York, New Haven &
Hartford railway, and by interurban electric lines. It contains three
villages, Dedham, East Dedham and Oakdale. Dedham has a public library
(1854; incorporated 1871). The Dedham historical society was organized
in 1859 and was incorporated in 1862. The Fairbanks house was erected in
part as early as 1654. Carpets, handkerchiefs and woollen goods are
manufactured, and a pottery here is reputed to make the only true
crackleware outside the East. Dedham was "planted" in 1635 and was
incorporated in 1636. It was one of the first two inland settlements of
the colony, being coeval with Concord. The original plantation, about 20
m. long and 10 m. wide, extended from Roxbury and Dorchester to the
present state line of Rhode Island: from this territory several
townships were created, including Westwood (pop. in 1910, 1266), in
1897. A free public school, one of the first in America to be supported
by direct taxation, was established in Dedham in 1645. In the Woodward
tavern, the birthplace of Fisher Ames, a convention met in September
1774 and adjourned to Milton (q.v.), where it passed the Suffolk
Resolves.
DEDICATION (Lat. _dedicatio_, from _dedicare_, to proclaim, to
announce), properly the setting apart of anything by solemn
proclamation. It is thus in Latin the term particularly applied to the
consecration of altars, temples and other sacred buildings, and also to
the inscription prefixed to a book, &c., and addressed to some
particular person. This latter practice, which formerly had the purpose
of gaining the patronage and support of the person so addressed, is now
only a mark of affection or regard. In law, the word is used of the
setting apart by a private owner of a road to public use. (See HIGHWAY.)
_The Feast of Dedication_ ([Hebrew: hanuka]; [Greek: ta egkainia]) was a
Jewish festival observed for eight days from the 25th of Kislev (i.e.
about December 12) in commemoration of the reconsecration (165 B.C.) of
the temple and especially of the altar of burnt offering, after they had
been desecrated in the persecution under Antiochus Epiphanes (168 B.C.).
The distinguishing features of the festival were the illumination of
houses and synagogues, a custom probably taken over from the feast of
tabernacles, and the recitation of Psalm xxx. The biblical references
are 1 Macc. i. 41-64, iv. 36-39; 2 Macc. vi. 1-11; John x. 22. See also
2 Macc. i. 9, 18; ii. 16; and Josephus, _Antiq._ xii. v. 4. J.
Wellhausen suggests that the feast was originally connected with the
winter solstice, and only afterwards with the events narrated in
Maccabees.
_Dedication of Churches._--The custom of solemnly dedicating or
consecrating buildings as churches or chapels set apart for Christian
worship must be almost as old as Christianity itself. If we find no
reference to it in the New Testament or in the very earliest apostolic
or post-apostolic writings, it is merely due to the fact that Christian
churches had not as yet begun to be built. Throughout the ante-Nicene
period, until the reign of Constantine, Christian churches were few in
number, and any public dedication of them would have been attended with
danger in those days of heathen persecution. This is why we are ignorant
as to what liturgical forms and what consecration ritual were employed
in those primitive times. But when we come to the earlier part of the
4th century allusions to and descriptions of the consecration of
churches become plentiful.
Like so much else in the worship and ritual of the Christian church this
service is probably of Jewish origin. The hallowing of the tabernacle
and of its furniture and ornaments (Exodus xl.); the dedication of
Solomon's temple (1 Kings viii.) and of the second temple by Zerubbabel
(Ezra vi.), and its rededication by Judas Maccabaeus (see above), and
the dedication of the temple of Herod the Great (Josephus, _Antiq. of
the Jews_, bk. xv. c. xi. S 6), and our Lord's recognition of the Feast
of Dedication (St John xi. 22, 23)--all these point to the probability
of the Christians deriving their custom from a Jewish origin, quite
apart from the intrinsic appropriateness of such a custom in itself.
Eusebius (_Hist. Eccles._ lib. x. cap. 3) speaks of the dedication of
churches rebuilt after the Diocletian persecution, including the church
at Tyre in A.D. 314. The consecrations of the church of the Holy
Sepulchre at Jerusalem in A.D. 335, which had been built by Constantine,
and of other churches after his time, are described both by Eusebius and
by other ecclesiastical historians. From them we gather that every
consecration was accompanied by a celebration of the Holy Eucharist and
a sermon, and special prayers of a dedicatory character, but there is no
trace of the elaborate ritual, to be described presently, of the
medieval pontificals dating from the 8th century onwards.
The separate consecration of altars is provided for by canon 14 of the
council of Agde in 506, and by canon 26 of the council of Epaone in 517,
the latter containing the first known reference to the usage of
anointing the altar with chrism. The use of both holy water and of
unction is attributed to St Columbanus, who died in 615 (Walafrid
Strabo, _Vita S. Galli_, cap. 6).
There was an annual commemoration of the original dedication of the
church, a feast with its octave extending over eight days, during which
Gregory the Great encouraged the erection of booths and general feasting
on the part of the populace, to compensate them for, and in some way to
take the place of, abolished heathen festivities (Sozomen, _Hist.
Eccles._ lib. ii. cap. 26; Bede, _Hist. Eccles._ lib. i. cap. 30).
At an early date the right to consecrate churches was reserved to
bishops, as by canon 37 of the first council of Bracara in 563, and by
the 23rd of the Irish collections of canons, once attributed to St
Patrick, but hardly to be put earlier than the 8th century (Haddon and
Stubbs, _Councils, &c._, vol. ii. pt. 2, p. 329).
When we come to examine the MS. and printed service-books of the
medieval church, we find a lengthy and elaborate service provided for
the consecration of churches. It is contained in the pontifical. The
earliest pontifical which has come down to us is that of Egbert,
archbishop of York (732-766), which, however, only survives in a
10th-century MS. copy. Later pontificals are numerous; we cannot
describe all their variations. A good idea, however, of the general
character of the service will be obtained from a skeleton of it as
performed in this country before the Reformation according to the use of
Sarum. The service in question is taken from an early 15th-century
pontifical in the Cambridge University Library as printed by W. Makell
in _Monumenta ritualia ecclesiae Anglicanae_, and ed., vol. i. pp.
195-239.
There is a preliminary office for laying a foundation-stone. On the day
of consecration the bishop is to vest in a tent outside the church,
thence to proceed to the door of the church on the outside, a single
deacon being inside the church, and there to bless holy water, twelve
lighted candles being placed outside, and twelve inside the church. He
is then to sprinkle the walls all round outside, and to knock at the
door; then to sprinkle the walls all round outside a second time and to
knock at the door again; then to sprinkle the walls all round outside a
third time, and a third time to knock at the door, by which he will then
enter, all laity being excluded. The bishop is then to fix a cross in
the centre of the church, after which the litany is said, including a
special clause for the consecration of the church and altar. Next the
bishop inscribes the alphabet in Greek letters on one of the limbs of St
Andrew's cross from the left east corner to the right west corner on the
pavement cindered for the purpose, and the alphabet in Latin on the
other limb from the right east corner to the left west corner. Then he
is to genuflect before the altar or cross. Then he blesses water,
mingled with salt, ashes and wine, and sprinkles therewith all the walls
of the church inside thrice, beginning at the altar; then he sprinkles
the centre of the church longwise and crosswise on the pavement, and
then goes round the outside of the church sprinkling it thrice. Next
reentering the church and taking up a central position he sprinkles holy
water to the four points of the compass, and toward the roof. Next he
anoints with chrism the twelve internal and twelve external
wall-crosses, afterwards perambulating the church thrice inside and
outside, censing it.
Then there follows the consecration of the altar. First, holy water is
blessed and mixed with chrism, and with the mixture the bishop makes a
cross in the middle of the altar, then on the right and the left, then
on the four horns of the altar. Then the altar is sprinkled seven times
or three times with water not mixed with chrism, and the altar-table is
washed therewith and censed and wiped with a linen cloth. The centre of
the altar is next anointed with the oil of the catechumens in the form
of a cross; and the altar-stone is next anointed with chrism; and then
the whole altar is rubbed over with oil of the catechumens and with
chrism. Incense is next blessed, and the altar censed, five grains of
incense being placed crosswise in the centre and at the four corners,
and upon the grains five slender candle crosses, which are to be lit.
Afterwards the altar is scraped and cleansed; then the altar-cloths and
ornaments having been sprinkled with holy water are placed upon the
altar, which is then to be censed.
All this is subsidiary to the celebration of mass, with which the whole
service is concluded. The transcription and description of the various
collects, psalms, anthems, benedictions, &c., which make up the order of
dedication have been omitted for the sake of brevity.
The Sarum order of dedication described above is substantially identical
with the Roman order, but it would be superfluous to tabulate and
describe the lesser variations of language or ritual. There is, however,
one very important and significant piece of ritual, not found in the
above-described English church order, but always found in the Roman
service, and not infrequently found in the earlier and later English
uses, in connexion with the presence and use of relics at the
consecration of an altar. According to the Roman ritual, after the
priest has sprinkled the walls of the church inside thrice all round and
then sprinkled the pavement from the altar to the porch, and sideways
from wall to wall, and then to the four quarters of the compass, he
prepares some cement at the altar. He then goes to the place where the
relics are kept, and starts a solemn procession with the relics round
the outside of the church. There a sermon is preached, and two decrees
of the council of Trent are read, and the founder's deed of gift or
endowment. Then the bishop, anointing the door with chrism, enters the
church with the relics and deposits them in the cavity or confession in
the altar. Having been enclosed they are censed and covered in, and the
cover is anointed. Then follows the censing and wiping of the altar as
in the Sarum order.
This use of relics is very ancient and can be traced back to the time
of St Ambrose. There was also a custom, now obsolete, of enclosing a
portion of the consecrated Eucharist if relics were not obtainable. This
was ordered by cap. 2 of the council of Celchyth (Chelsea) in 816. But
though ancient the custom of enclosing relics was not universal, and
where found in English church orders, as it frequently is found from the
pontifical of Egbert onwards, it is called the "Mos Romanus" as
distinguished from the "Mos Anglicanus" (_Archaeologia_, liv. 416). It
is absent from the description of the early Irish form of consecration
preserved in the _Leabhar Breac_, translated and annotated by Rev. T.
Olden in the _Transactions of the St Paul's Ecclesiolog. Soc._ vol. iv.
pt. ii. p. 98.
The curious ritual act, technically known as the _abecedarium_, i.e. the
tracing of the alphabet, sometimes in Latin characters, sometimes in
Latin and Greek, sometimes, according to Menard, in Latin, Greek and
Hebrew, along the limbs of St Andrew's cross on the floor of the church,
can be traced back to the 8th century and may be earlier. Its origin and
meaning are unknown. Of all explanations we like best the recent one
suggested by Rossi and adopted by the bishop of Salisbury. This
interprets the St Andrew's cross as the initial Greek letter of
Christus, and the whole act as significant of taking possession of the
site to be consecrated in the name of Christ, who is the Alpha and
Omega, the word of God, combining in himself all letters that lie
between them, every element of human speech. The three languages may
then have been suggested by the Latin, Greek and Hebrew, in which his
title was written on the cross.
The disentangling the Gallican from the Roman elements in the early
Western forms of service is a delicate and difficult task, undertaken by
Monsignor Louis Duchesne, who shows how the former partook of a funerary
and the latter of a baptismal character (_Christian Worship_ (London,
1904), cap. xii.).
The dedication service of the Greek Church is likewise long and
elaborate. Relics are to be prepared and guarded on the day previous in
some neighbouring sacred building. On the morning following, all
ornaments and requisites having been got ready, the laity being
excluded, the bishop and clergy vested proceed to fix in its place and
consecrate the altar, a long prayer of dedication being said, followed
by a litany. The altar is then sprinkled with warm water, then with
wine, then anointed with chrism in the form of a cross. The altar, the
book of the gospels, and all cloths are then censed, every pillar is
crossed with chrism, while various collects are said and psalms recited.
One lamp is then filled with oil and lit, and placed on the altar, while
clergy bring in other lamps and other ornaments of the church. On the
next day--if the service cannot be concluded in one day--the bishop and
clergy go to the building where the relics have been kept and guarded. A
procession is formed and advances thence with the relics, which are
borne by a priest in a holy vessel (_discus_) on his head; the church
having been entered, the relics are placed by him with much ceremonial
in the "confession," the recess prepared in or about the altar for their
reception, which is then anointed and sealed up. After this the liturgy
is celebrated both on the feast of dedication and on seven days
afterwards.
There is no authorized form for the dedication of a church in the
reformed Church of England. A form was drawn up and approved by both
houses of the convocation of Canterbury under Archbishop Tenison in
1712, and an almost identical form was submitted to convocation in 1715,
but its consideration was not completed by the Lower House, and neither
form ever received royal sanction. The consequence has been that
Anglican bishops have fallen back on their undefined _jus liturgicum_,
and have drawn up and promulgated forms for use in their various
dioceses, some of them being content to borrow from other dioceses for
this purpose. There is a general similarity, with a certain amount of
difference in detail, in these various forms. In the diocese of London
the bishop, attended by clergy and churchwardens, receives at the west
door, outside, a petition for consecration; the procession then moves
round the whole church outside, while certain psalms are chanted. On
again reaching the west door the bishop knocks thrice for admission, and
the door being opened the procession advances to the east end of the
church. He there lays the keys on the table "which is to be hallowed."
The _Veni Creator_ is then sung kneeling, followed by the litany with
special suffrages. The bishop then proceeds to various parts of the
church and blesses the font, the chancel, with special references to
confirmation and holy matrimony, the lectern, the pulpit, the clergy
stalls, the choir seats, the holy table. The deed of consecration is
then read and signed, and the celebration of Holy Communion follows with
special collects, epistle and gospel.
The Church of Ireland and the episcopal Church of Scotland are likewise
without any completely authorized form of dedication, and their
archbishops or bishops have at various times issued forms of service on
their own authority. (F. E. W.)
DE DONIS CONDITIONALIBUS, a chapter of the statute of Westminster the
Second (1285) which originated the law of entail. Strictly speaking, a
form of entail was known before the Norman feudal law had been
domesticated in England. The common form was a grant "to the feoffee and
the heirs of his body," by which limitation it was sought to prevent
alienation from the lineage of the first purchaser. These grants were
also known as _feuda conditionata_, because if the donee had no heirs of
his body the estate reverted to the donor. This right of reversion was
evaded by the interpretation that such a gift was a conditional fee,
which enabled the donee, if he had an heir of the body born alive, to
alienate the land, and consequently disinherit the issue and defeat the
right of the donor. To remedy this the statute _De Donis
Conditionalibus_ was passed, which enacted that, in grants to a man and
the heirs of his body, the will of the donor according to the form in
the deed of gift manifestly expressed, should be from thenceforth
observed; so that they to whom the land was given under such condition,
should have no power to alienate the land so given, but that it should
remain unto the issue of those to whom it was given after their death,
or unto the giver or his heirs, if issue fail. Since the passing of the
statute an estate given to a man and the heirs of his body has been
known as an estate tail, or an estate in fee tail (_feudum talliatum_),
the word tail being derived from the French _tailler_, to cut, the
inheritance being by the statute cut down and confined to the heirs of
the body. The operation of the statute soon produced innumerable evils:
"children, it is said, grew disobedient when they knew they could not be
set aside; farmers were deprived of their leases; creditors were
defrauded of their debts; innumerable latent entails were produced to
deprive purchasers of the land they had fairly bought; treasons also
were encouraged, as estates tail were not liable to forfeiture longer
than for the tenant's life" (Williams, _Real Property_). Accordingly,
the power of alienation was reintroduced by the judges in Taltarum's
case (_Year Book_, 12 Edward IV., 1472) by means of a fictitious suit or
recovery which had originally been devised by the regular clergy for
evading the statutes of mortmain. This was abolished by an act passed in
1833. (See FINE.)
DEDUCTION (from Lat. _deducere_, to take or lead from or out of,
derive), a term used in common parlance for the process of taking away
from, or subtracting (as in mathematics), and specially for the
argumentative process of arriving at a conclusion from evidence, i.e.
for any kind of inference.[1] In this sense it includes both arguments
from particular facts and those from general laws to particular cases.
In logic it is generally used in contradiction to "induction" for a kind
of mediate inference, in which a conclusion (often itself called the
deduction) is regarded as following necessarily under certain fixed laws
from premises. This, the most common, form of deduction is the syllogism
(q.v.; see also LOGIC), which consists in taking a general principle and
deriving from it facts which are necessarily involved in it. This use of
deduction is of comparatively modern origin; it was originally used as
the equivalent of Aristotle's [Greek: apagoge] (see _Prior Analytics_, B
xxv.). The modern use of deduction is practically identical with the
Aristotelian [Greek: syllogismos].