DĔCŬMAE (sc. partes) formed a portion of the vectigalia of the Romans, and were paid by subjects whose territory, either by conquest or deditio, had become the property of the state (ager publicus). They consisted, as the name denotes, of a tithe or tenth of the produce of the soil, levied upon the cultivators (aratores) or occupiers (possessores) of the lands, which, from being subject to this payment, were called agri decumani. The tax of a tenth was, however, generally paid by corn lands: plantations and vineyards, as requiring no seed and less labour, paid a fifth of the produce. A similar system existed in Greece also. Peisistratus, for instance, imposed a tax of a tenth on the lands of the Athenians, which the Peisistratidae lowered to a twentieth. At the time of the Persian war the confederate Greeks made a vow, by which all the states who had surrendered themselves to the enemy were subjected to the payment of tithes for the use of the god at Delphi. The tithes of the public lands belonging to Athens were farmed out as at Rome to contractors, called δεκατώναι: the term δεκατηλόγοι was applied to the collectors; but the callings were, as we might suppose, often united in the same person. The title δεκατευταί is applied to both. A δεκάτη, or tenth of a different kind, was the arbitrary exaction imposed by the Athenians (B.C. 410) on the cargoes of all ships sailing into or out of the Pontus. They lost it by the battle of Aegospotami (B.C. 405); but it was re-established by Thrasybulus about B.C. 391. The tithe was let out to farm.
DĔCUNCIS, another name for the Dextans. [[As].]
DĔCŬRĬA. [[Exercitus].]
DĔCŬRĬŌNES. [[Colonia]: [Exercitus].]
DĔCUSSIS. [[As].]
DĒDĬCĀTĬO. [[Inauguratio].]
DĒDĬTĬCĬI, were those who had taken up arms against the Roman people, and being conquered, had surrendered themselves. Such people did not individually lose their freedom, but as a community all political existence, and of course had no other relation to Rome than that of subjects.
DĒDUCTŌRES. [[Ambitus].]
DEIGMA (δεῖγμα), a particular place in the Peiraeeus, as well as in the harbours of other states, where merchants exposed samples of their goods for sale. The samples themselves were also called deigmata.
DEIPNON. [[Coena].]