(O. Ba.)
COLLATERAL (from Med. Lat. collateralis,—cum, with, and latus, lateris, side,—side by side, hence parallel or additional), a term used in law in several senses. Collateral relationship means the relationship between persons who are descended from the same stock or ancestor, but in a different line; as opposed to lineal, which is the relationship between ascendants and descendants in a direct line, as between father and son, grandfather and grandson. A collateral agreement is an agreement made contemporaneously with a written contract as part of the transaction, but without being incorporated with it. Collateral facts, in evidence, are those facts which do not bear directly on the matters in dispute. Collateral security is an additional security for the better safety of the mortgagee, i.e. property or right of action deposited to secure the fulfilment of an obligation.
COLLATIA, an ancient town of Latium, 10 m. E. by N. of Rome by the Via Collatina. It appears in the legendary history of Rome as captured by Tarquinius Priscus. Livy tells us it was taken from the Sabines, while Virgil speaks of it as a Latin colony. In the time of Cicero it had lost all importance; Strabo names it as a mere village, in private hands, while for Pliny it was one of the lost cities of Latium. The site is undoubtedly to be sought on the hill now occupied by the large medieval fortified farmhouse of Lunghezza, immediately to the south of the Anio, which occupies the site of the citadel joined by a narrow neck to the tableland to the south-east on which the city stood: this is protected by wide valleys on each side, and is isolated at the south-east end by a deep narrow valley enlarged by cutting. No remains are to be seen, but the site is admirably adapted for an ancient settlement. The road may be traced leading to the south end of this tableland, being identical with the modern road to Lunghezza for the middle part of its course only. The current indentification with Castellaccio, 2 m. to the south-east, is untenable.
See T. Ashby in Papers of the British School at Rome, i. 138 seq., iii. 201.
(T. As.)
COLLATION (Lat. collatio, from conferre, to bring together or compare), the bringing together of things for the special purpose of comparison, and thus, particularly, the critical examination of the texts of documents or MSS. and the result of such comparison. The word is also a term in printing and bookbinding for the register of the “signatures,” the number of quires and leaves in each quire of a book or MS. In Roman and Scots law “collation” answers to the English law term “hotch-pot” (q.v.). From another meaning of the Latin word, a consultation or conference, and so a treatise or homily, comes the title of a work of Johannes Cassianus (q.v.), the Conferences of the Fathers (Collationes Patrum). Readings from this and similar works were customary in monasteries; by the regula of St Benedict it is ordered that on rising from supper there should be read collationes, passages from the lives of the Fathers and other edifying works; the word is then applied to the discussions arising from such readings. On fast days it was usual in monasteries to have a very light meal after the Collatio, and hence the meal itself came to be called “collation,” a meaning which survives in the modern use of the word for any light or quickly prepared repast.