incorrect, was retained for the last or twelfth month of the year as now divided. In the Romulian calendar December had thirty days; Numa reduced the number to twenty-nine; Julius Caesar added two days to this, giving the month its present length. The Saturnalia occurred in December, which is therefore styled “acceptus geniis” by Ovid (Fasti, iii. 58); and this also explains the phrase of Horace “libertate Decembri utere” (Sat. ii. 7). Martial applies to the month the epithet canus (hoary), and Ovid styles it gelidus (frosty) and fumosus (smoky). In the reign of Commodus it was temporarily styled Amazonius, in honour of the emperor’s mistress, whom he had had painted as an Amazon. The Saxons called it winter-monath, winter month, and heligh-monath, holy month, from the fact that Christmas fell within it. Thus the modern Germans call it Christmonat. The 22nd of December is the date of the winter solstice, when the sun reaches the tropic of Capricorn.
DECEMVIRI (“the ten men”), the name applied by the
Romans to any official commission of ten. The title was often
followed by a statement of the purpose for which the commission
was appointed, e.g. Xviri legibus scribundis, stlitibus judicandis,
sacris faciundis.
I. Apart from such qualification, it signified chiefly the temporary commission which superseded all the ordinary magistrates of the Republic from 451 to 449 B.C., for the purpose of drawing up a code of laws. In 462 B.C. a tribune proposed that the appointment of a commission to draw up a code expressing the legal principles of the administration was necessary to secure for the plebs a hold over magisterial caprice. Continued agitation to this effect resulted in an agreement in 452 B.C. between patricians and plebeians that decemvirs should be appointed to draw up a code, that during their tenure of office all other magistracies should be in abeyance, that they should not be subject to appeal, but that they should be bound to maintain the laws which guaranteed by religious sanctions the rights of the plebs. The first board of decemvirs (apparently consisting wholly of patricians) was appointed to hold office during 451 B.C.; and the chief man among them was Appius Claudius. Livy (iii. 32) says that only patricians were eligible. Mommsen, however, held that plebeians were legally eligible, though none were actually appointed for 451. The decemvirs ruled with singular moderation, and submitted to the Comitia Centuriata a code of laws in ten headings, which was passed. So popular were the decemvirs that another board of ten was appointed for the following year, some of whom, if the extant list of names is correct, were certainly plebeians. These added two more to the ten laws of their predecessors, thus completing the Laws of the Twelve Tables (see Roman Law). But their rule then became violent and tyrannical, and they fell before the fury of the plebs, though for some reason, not easily understood, they continued to have the support of the patricians. They were forced to abdicate (449 B.C.), and the ordinary magistrates were restored.
II. The judicial board of decemvirs (stlitibus judicandis) formed a civil court of ancient origin concerned mainly with questions bearing on the status of individuals. They were originally a body of jurors which gave a verdict under the presidency of the praetor (q.v.), but eventually became annual minor magistrates of the Republic, elected by the Comitia Tributa.
III. The priestly board of decemvirs (sacris faciundis) was an outcome of the claim of the plebs to a share in the administration of the state religion. Five of the decemvirs were patricians, and five plebeians. They were first appointed in 367 B.C. instead of the patrician duumviri who had hitherto performed these duties. The board was increased to fifteen in the last century of the Republic. Its chief function was the care of the Sibylline books, and the celebration of the games of Apollo (Livy x. 8) and the Secular Games (Tac. Ann. xi. 11).
IV. Decemvirs were also appointed from time to time to control the distribution of the public land (agris dandis adsignandis; see Agrarian Laws).
Bibliography.—B. G. Niebuhr, History of Rome (Eng. trans.), ii. 309 et seq. (Cambridge, 1832); Th. Mommsen, History of Rome, bk. ii. c. 2, vol. i. pp. 361 et seq. (Eng. trans., new ed., 1894); Römisches Staatsrecht, ii. 605 et seq., 714 (Leipzig, 1887); A. H. J. Greenidge, Legal Procedure of Cicero’s Time, p. 40 et seq., 263 (Oxford, 1901); J. Muirhead, Private Law of Rome, p. 73 et seq. (London, 1899); Pauly-Wissowa, Realencyclopädie, iv. 2256 et seq. (Kübler).
DECHEN, ERNST HEINRICH KARL VON (1800–1889), German
geologist, was born in Berlin on the 25th of March 1800, and was
educated in the university in that city. He subsequently studied
mining in Bochum and Essen, and was in 1820 placed in the
mining department of the Prussian state, serving on the staff
until 1864, and becoming director in 1841 when he was stationed
at Bonn. In early years he made journeys to study the mining
systems of other countries, and with this object he visited England
and Scotland in company with Karl von Oeynhausen (1797–1865).
In the course of his work he paid special attention to the
coal-formation of Westphalia and northern Europe generally,
and he greatly furthered the progress made in mining and
metallurgical works in Rhenish Prussia. He made numerous
contributions to geological literature; notably the following:—Geognostische
Umrisse der Rheinländer zwischen Basel und Mainz
mit besonderer Rücksicht auf das Vorkommen des Steinsalzes
(with von Oeynhausen and La Roche), 2 vols. (Berlin, 1825);
Geognostische Führer in das Siebengebirge am Rhein (Bonn, 1861);
Die nutzbaren Mineralien und Gebirgsarten im deutschen Reiche
(1873). But his main work was a geological map of Rhenish
Prussia and Westphalia in 35 sheets on the scale of 1 : 80,000,
issued with two volumes of explanatory text (1855–1882). He
published also a small geological map of Germany (1869). He
died at Bonn on the 15th of February 1889. (H. B. W.)
DECIDUOUS (from Lat. decidere, to fall down), a botanical
and zoological term for “falling in season,” as of petals after
flowering, leaves in autumn, the teeth or horns of animals, or the
wings of insects.
DECIMAL COINAGE.[1] Any currency in which the various
denominations of coin are arranged in multiples or submultiples
of ten (Lat. decem), with reference to a standard unit, is a decimal
system. Thus if the standard unit be 1 the higher coins will be
10, 100, 1000, &c., the lower .1, .01, .001, &c. In a perfect
system there would be no breaks or interpolations, but the actual
currencies described as “decimal” do not show this rigid
symmetry. In France the standard unit—the franc—has the
10 franc and the 100 franc pieces above it; the 10 centime below
it; there are also, however, 50 franc, 20 franc, 5 franc, 2 franc
pieces as well as 50 and 20 centime ones. Similar irregularities
occur in the German and United States coinages, and indeed
in all countries in which a decimal system has been established.
Popular convenience has compelled this departure from the
strict decimal form.
Subject to these practical modifications the leading countries of the world (Great Britain and India are the chief exceptions) have adopted decimal coinage. The United States led the way (1786 and 1792) with the dollar as the unit, and France soon followed (1799 and 1803), her system being extended to the countries of the Latin Union (1865). The German empire (1873), the Scandinavian States (1875), Austria-Hungary (1870, developed in 1892) and Russia (1839 and 1897) are further adherents to the decimal system. The Latin-American countries and Japan (1871) have also adopted it.
In England proposals for decimalizing the coinage have long been under discussion at intervals. Besides the inconvenience of altering the established currency, the difficulty of choosing between the different schemes propounded has been a considerable obstacle. One plan took the farthing as a base: then 10 farthings = 1 doit (212d.), 10 doits = 1 florin (2s. 1d.), 10 florins = 1 pound (20s. 10d.). The advantages claimed for this scheme were (1) the preservation of the smaller coins (the penny = 4 farthings); and (2) the avoidance of interference with the smaller retail prices. Its great disadvantage was the destruction of the existing unit of value—the pound—and the consequent disturbance of all accounts. A second proposal would retain the pound as unit and the florin, but would subdivide the latter into
- ↑ For “decimal” in general see Arithmetic.
