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 the Augustan and the Claudian arrangements were combined in the provision that two ex-praetors should be appointed as praefects of the treasury, but that these should be named, generally for three years, by the Princeps. The fact that the Princeps appointed the guardians of the public chest was by no means an assertion that he controlled its funds, and, although his indirect influence on the aerarium was unquestionably great, this treasury still remained in principle under the direction of the Senate alone. Even in the second century it voted a loan to Marcus Aurelius for carrying on a war.

The Princeps was rendered financially independent of the Senate through the possession of his own treasury (fiscus or fiscus Caesaris), into which flowed the revenues from his own provinces, certain dues owed by the public provinces, and some extraordinary revenues, such as the confiscated goods of condemned criminals or lapsed inheritances (bona damnatorum, bona vacantia), in the claim to which the fiscus finally replaced the aerarium. The Princeps was the owner of the fiscus, but was regarded as a trustee of the wealth which it contained. To sue the fiscus was to sue the Princeps; but, although he was the sole subject of rights in relation to this treasury, he did not regard the money which it contained as though it were his own private property. Even in the early Principate there is evidence of the existence of crown property (patrimonium or patrimonium privatum), the use of which for private purposes was vested in the Princeps. The patrimonium doubtless commenced by being the strictly personal property of the first family of Caesars, and much of it was acquired by bequest; but, when the Principate had ceased to be hereditary in the Julian line, it seems to have[Greek: tên boulên].]