Tela, Loom. (From the Vatican MS. of Virgil.)
TĔLAMŌNES. [[Atlantes].]
TĔLŌNES (τελώνης), a farmer of the public taxes at Athens. The taxes were let by auction to the highest bidder. Companies often took them in the name of one person, who was called ἀρχώνης or τελωνάρχης, and was their representative to the state. Sureties were required of the farmer for the payment of his dues. The office was frequently undertaken by resident aliens, citizens not liking it, on account of the vexatious proceedings to which it often led. The farmer was armed with considerable powers: he carried with him his books, searched for contraband or uncustomed goods, watched the harbour, markets, and other places, to prevent smuggling, or unlawful and clandestine sales; brought a phasis (φάσις) or other legal process against those whom he suspected of defrauding the revenue; or even seized their persons on some occasions, and took them before the magistrate. To enable him to perform these duties, he was exempted from military service. Collectors (ἐκλογεῖς) were sometimes employed by the farmers; but frequently the farmer and the collector were the same person. The taxes were let by the commissioners (πωλῆται), acting under the authority of the senate. The payments were made by the farmer on stated prytaneias in the senate-house. There was usually one payment made in advance, προκαταβολή, and one or more afterwards, called προσκατάβλημα. Upon any default of payment, the farmer became atimus, if a citizen, and he was liable to be imprisoned at the discretion of the court, upon an information laid against him. If the debt was not paid by the expiration of the ninth prytaneia, it was doubled; and if not then paid, his property became forfeited to the state, and proceedings to confiscation might be taken forthwith. Upon this subject, see the speech of Demosthenes against Timocrates.
TĔLOS (τέλος), a tax. The taxes imposed by the Athenians, and collected at home, were either ordinary or extraordinary. The former constituted a regular or permanent source of income; the latter were only raised in time of war or other emergency. The ordinary taxes were laid mostly upon property, and upon citizens indirectly, in the shape of toll or customs; though the resident aliens paid a poll-tax (called μετοίκιον), for the liberty of residing at Athens under protection of the state. There was a duty of two per cent. (πεντηκοστή), levied upon all exports and imports. An excise was paid on all sales in the market (called ἐπωνία), though we know not what the amount was. Slave-owners paid a duty of three obols for every slave they kept; and slaves who had been emancipated paid the same. This was a very productive tax before the fortification of Deceleia by the Lacedaemonians. The justice fees (πρυτανεῖα, παραστασις, &c.) were a lucrative tax in time of peace. The extraordinary taxes were the property-tax, and the compulsory services called liturgies (λειτουργίαι). Some of these last were regular, and recurred annually; the most important, the trierarchia, was a war-service, and performed as occasion required. As these services were all performed, wholly or partly, at the expense of the individual, they may be regarded as a species of tax. [[Eisphora]; [Leitourgia]; [Trierarchia].] The tribute (φόρος) paid by the allied states to the Athenians formed, in the flourishing period of the republic, a regular and most important source of revenue. In Olymp. 91 2, the Athenians substituted for the tribute a duty of five per cent. (εἰκοστή) on all commodities exported or imported by the subject states, thinking to raise by this means a larger income than by direct taxation. This was terminated by the issue of the Peloponnesian war, though the tribute was afterwards revived, on more equitable principles, under the name of σύνταξις. Other sources of revenue were derived by the Athenians from their mines and public lands, fines, and confiscations. The public demesne lands, whether pasture or arable, houses or other buildings, were usually let by auction to private persons. The conditions of the lease were engraven on stone. The rent was payable by prytaneias. These various sources of revenue produced, according to Aristophanes, an annual income of two thousand talents in the most flourishing period of Athenian empire. Τελεῖν signifies “to settle, complete, or perfect,” and hence “to settle an account,” and generally “to pay.” Thus Τέλος comes to mean any payment in the nature of a tax or duty. The words are connected with zahlen in German, and the old sense of tale in English, and the modern word toll. Though τέλος may signify any payment in the nature of a tax or duty, it is more commonly used of the ordinary taxes, as customs, &c. Ἰσοτέλεια signifies the right of being taxed on the same footing, and having other privileges, the same as the citizens; a right sometimes granted to resident aliens. Ἀτέλεια signifies an exemption from taxes, or other duties and services; an honour very rarely granted by the Athenians. As to the farming of the taxes, see [Telones].
TEMPLUM is the same word as the Greek Temenos (τέμενος, from τέμνω, to cut off); for templum was any place which was circumscribed and separated by the augurs from the rest of the land by a certain solemn formula. The technical terms for this act of the augurs are liberare and effari, and hence a templum itself is a locus liberatus et effatus. A place thus set apart and hallowed by the augurs was always intended to serve religious purposes, but chiefly for taking the auguries. The place in the heavens within which the observations were to be made was likewise called templum, as it was marked out and separated from the rest by the staff of the augur. When the augur had defined the templum within which he intended to make his observations, he fixed his tent in it (tabernaculum capere), and this tent was likewise called templum, or, more accurately, templum minus. The place chosen for a templum was generally an eminence, and in the city it was the arx, where the fixing of a tent does not appear to have been necessary, because here a place called auguraculum was once for all consecrated for this purpose. Besides this meaning of the word templum in the language of the augurs, it also had that of a temple in the common acceptation. In this case, however, the sacred precinct within which a temple was built, was always a locus liberatus et effatus by the augurs, that is, a templum or a fanum; the consecration was completed by the pontiffs, and not until inauguration and consecration had taken place, could sacra be performed or meetings of the senate be held in it. It was necessary then for a temple to be sanctioned by the gods, whose will was ascertained by the augurs, and to be consecrated or dedicated by the will of man (pontiffs). Where the sanction of the gods had not been obtained, and where the mere act of man had consecrated a place to the gods, such a place was only a sacrum, sacrarium, or sacellum. The ceremony performed by the augurs was essential to a temple, as the consecration by the pontiffs took place also in other sanctuaries which were not templa, but mere sacra or aedes sacrae. Thus the sanctuary of Vesta was not a templum, but an aedes sacra, and the various curiae (Hostilia, Pompeia, Julia) required to be made templa by the augurs before senatusconsulta could be made in them. It is impossible to determine with certainty in what respects a templum differed from a delubrum.—Temples appear to have existed in Greece from the earliest times. They were separated from the profane land around them (τόπος βέβηλος or τὰ βέβηλα), because every one was allowed to walk in the latter. This separation was in early times indicated by very simple means, such as a string or a rope. Subsequently, however, they were surrounded by more efficient fences, or even by a wall (ἕρκος, περίβολος). The whole space enclosed in such a περίβολος was called τέμενος, or sometimes ἱερόν; and contained, besides the temple itself, other sacred buildings, and sacred ground planted with groves, &c. Within the precincts of the sacred enclosure no dead were generally allowed to be buried, though there were some exceptions to this rule, and we have instances of persons being buried in or at least near certain temples. The religious laws of the island of Delos did not allow any corpses to be buried within the whole extent of the island, and when this law had been violated, a part of the island was first purified by Pisistratus, and subsequently the whole island by the Athenian people. The temple itself was called ναός or νεώς, and at its entrance fonts (περιῤῥαντήρια) were generally placed, that those who entered the sanctuary to pray or to offer sacrifices might first purify themselves. The act of consecration, by which a temple was dedicated to a god, was called ἵδρυσις. The character of the early Greek temples was dark and mysterious, for they had no windows, and they received light only through the door, which was very large, or from lamps burning in them. Architecture in the construction of magnificent temples, however, made great progress even at an earlier time than either painting or statuary, and long before the Persian wars we hear of temples of extraordinary grandeur and beauty. All temples were built either in an oblong or round form, and were mostly adorned with columns. Those of an oblong form had columns either in the front alone, in the fore and back fronts, or on all the four sides. Respecting the original use of these porticoes see [Porticus]. The friezes and metopes were adorned with various sculptures, and no expense was spared in embellishing the abodes of the gods. The light, which was formerly let in at the door, was now frequently let in from above through an opening in the middle. Most of the great temples consisted of three parts: 1. the πρόναος or πρόδομος, the vestibule; 2. the cella (ναός, σηκός); and 3. the ὀπισθόδομος. The cella was the most important part, as it was, properly speaking, the temple or the habitation of the deity whose statue it contained. In one and the same cella there were sometimes the statues of two or more divinities, as in the Erechtheum at Athens, the statues of Poseidon, Hephaestus, and Butas. The statues always faced the entrance, which was in the centre of the prostylus. The place where the statue stood was called ἕδος, and was surrounded by a balustrade or railings. Some temples also had more than one cella, in which case the one was generally behind the other, as in the temple of Athena Polias at Athens. In temples where oracles were given, or where the worship was connected with mysteries, the cella was called ἄδυτον, μέγαρον, or ἀνάκτορον, and to it only the priests and the initiated had access. The ὀπισθόδομος was a building which was sometimes attached to the back front of a temple, and served as a place in which the treasures of the temple were kept, and thus supplied the place of θησαυροί, which were attached to some temples.—Quadrangular Temples were described by the following terms, according to the number and arrangement of the columns on the fronts and sides. 1. Ἄστυλος, astyle, without any columns. 2. Ἐν παραστάσι, in antis, with two columns in front between the antae. 3. Πρόστυλος, prostyle, with four columns in front. 4. Ἀμφιπρόστυλος, amphiprostyle, with four columns at each end. 5. Περίπτερος or ἀμφικίων, peripteral, with columns at each end and along each side. 6. Δίπτερος, dipteral, with two ranges of columns (πτερά) all round, the one within the other. 7. Ψευδοδίπτερος, pseudodipteral, with one range only, but at the same distance from the walls of the cella as the outer range of a δίπτερος. To these must be added a sort of sham invented by the Roman architects, namely: 8. Ψευδοπερίπτερος, pseudoperipteral, where the sides had only half-columns (at the angles three-quarter columns), attached to the walls of the cella, the object being to have the cella large without enlarging the whole building, and yet to keep up something of the splendour of a peripteral temple. Names were also applied to the temples, as well as to the porticoes themselves, according to the number of columns in the portico at either end of the temple: namely, τετράστυλος, tetrastyle, when there were four columns in front, ἑξάστυλος, hexastyle, when there were six, ὀκτάστυλος, octastyle, when there were eight, δεκάστυλος, decastyle, when there were ten. There were never more than ten columns in the end portico of a temple; and when there were only two, they were always arranged in that peculiar form called in antis (ἐν παραστάσι). The number of columns in the end porticoes was never uneven, but the number along the sides of a temple was generally uneven. The number of the side columns varied: where the end portico was tetrastyle, there were never any columns at the sides, except false ones, attached to the walls: where it was hexastyle or octastyle, there were generally 13 or 17 columns at the sides, counting in the corner columns: sometimes a hexastyle temple had only eleven columns on the sides. The last arrangement resulted from the rule adopted by the Roman architects, who counted by intercolumniations (the spaces between the columns), and whose rule was to have twice as many intercolumniations along the sides of the building as in front. The Greek architects on the contrary, counted by columns, and their rule was to have twice as many columns along the sides as in front, and one more, counting the corner columns in each case. Another set of terms, applied to temples and other buildings having porticoes, as well as to the porticoes themselves, was derived from the distances between the columns as compared with the lower diameters of the columns. They were the following:—1. Πυκνόστυλος, pycnostyle, the distance between the columns a diameter of a column and half a diameter. 2. Σύστυλος, systyle, the distance between the columns two diameters of a column. 3. Εὔστυλος, eustyle, the distance between the columns two diameters and a quarter, except in the centre of the front and back of the building, where each intercolumniation (intercolumnium) was three diameters; called eustyle, because it was best adapted both for beauty and convenience. 4. Διάστυλος, diastyle, the intercolumniation, or distance between the columns, three diameters. 5. Ἀραιόστυλος, araeostyle, the distances excessive, so that it was necessary to make the epistyle (ἐπιστύλιον), or architrave, not of stone, but of timber. These five kinds of intercolumniation are illustrated by the following diagram.
| ⬤ | 1½ | ⬤ |
| ⬤ | 2 | ⬤ |
| ⬤ | 2¼ | ⬤ |
| ⬤ | 3 | ⬤ |
| ⬤ | { 4 } {or more} | ⬤ |
Independently of the immense treasures contained in many of the Greek temples, which were either utensils or ornaments, and of the tithes of spoils, &c., the property of temples, from which they derived a regular income, consisted of lands (τεμένη), either fields, pastures, or forests. These lands were generally let out to farm, unless they were, by some curse which lay on them, prevented from being taken into cultivation. Respecting the persons entrusted with the superintendence, keeping, cleaning, &c., see [Aeditui]. In the earliest times there appear to have been very few temples at Rome, and on many spots the worship of a certain divinity had been established from time immemorial, while we hear of the building of a temple for the same divinity at a comparatively late period. Thus the foundation of a temple to the old Italian divinity Saturnus, on the Capitoline, did not take place till B.C. 498. In the same manner, Quirinus and Mars had temples built to them at a late period. Jupiter also had no temple till the time of Ancus Martius, and the one then built was certainly very insignificant. We may therefore suppose that the places of worship among the earliest Romans were in most cases simple altars or sacella. The Roman temples of later times were constructed in the Greek style. As regards the property of temples, it is stated that in early times lands were assigned to each temple, but these lands were probably intended for the maintenance of the priests alone. [[Sacerdos].] The supreme superintendence of the temples of Rome, and of all things connected with them, belonged to the college of pontiffs. Those persons who had the immediate care of the temples were the [Aeditui].
TĔPĬDĀRĬUM. [[Balneum], [p. 56].]
TERMĬNĀLĬA, a festival in honour of the god Terminus, who presided over boundaries. His statue was merely a stone or post stuck in the ground to distinguish between properties. On the festival the two owners of adjacent property crowned the statue with garlands, and raised a rude altar, on which they offered up some corn, honeycombs, and wine, and sacrificed a lamb or a sucking-pig. They concluded with singing the praises of the god. The public festival in honour of this god was celebrated at the sixth mile-stone on the road towards Laurentum, doubtless because this was originally the extent of the Roman territory in that direction. The festival of the Terminalia was celebrated on the 23rd of February, on the day before the Regifugium. The Terminalia was celebrated on the last day of the old Roman year, whence some derive its name. We know that February was the last month of the Roman year, and that when the intercalary month Mercedonius was added, the last five days of February were added to the intercalary month, making the 23rd of February the last day of the year.