Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume V.djvu/746

 742 DEAN DEANE various etymologies of this word, as given in Du Cange's Glossarium, show that the decani were at the introduction of Christianity minor officers of the civil, military, and ecclesiastical administrations of the Roman empire. In the army a decanus had charge of ten men, while the centurion commanded ten decanice. In the judicial organization under the emperors, there were decani or petty judges in each hamlet or country district, which also bore the name of decania : decani .... minores judices qui per decanias jus dicebant. In the imperial court of Constantinople, the decani (deKafiapxoi, deicapxoi, Senavoi) were inferior officers or ush- ers. The name passed into the church with similar functions. In the East, especially in the churches of Constantinople, the dinavog was a lay officer or beadle, having care of the church decoration and ceremonial ; he as- signed each clergyman his place in the public functions, and distributed to each his stipend. In ancient monasteries the monks were dis- tributed into decanice, over each of which a decanus or dean presided, who superintended the manual labors and devotional exercises of his ten, and rendered an account thereof to the abbot. In some at least of the ancient fe- male monasteries, officers with a correspond- ing denomination existed. It was retained in western Europe by the church, the great schools, the guilds of trades, the learned pro- fessions, scientific and literary academies, and by municipal bodies. In the church, the word dean was more especially applied either to the heads of chapters in collegiate churches, or to archpriests in the country who had the super- intendence of the parishes and clergy of the deaneries or districts into which each diocese was divided, and who thence were called " rural deans," in contradistinction from " deans of cathedral churches" or "deans of peculiars," i. e., of collegiates that were not cathedrals, both of which classes were generally confined to cities. In France and other continental countries the same ecclesiastical division and office existed under different names. In some French dioceses the rural dean is called archi- pretre, and his deanery archipretre ; in others he is called cure-doyen, or simply doyen. In cities and large towns there are also archi- pretres and cures-doyens. In Italy rural deans were unknown before the 15th century, prob- ably on account of the great multiplicity of episcopal sees and the consequent narrow lim- its of each diocese. In Ireland rural deans are to be found everywhere among the Roman Catholic clergy. The denomination "dean" in the English church is exclusively applied to deans of collegiate churches, whether these churches actually have chapters, or had them before the reformation. In universities a dean is sometimes head of a house or college, and sometimes only charged with the maintenance of religious discipline. The various faculties in universities, such as theology, medicine, and law, have their deans, who are generally so by seniority or priority of admission. Such is the case also in the college of cardinals, whose dean is the oldest cardinal bishop by promo- tion. Thus too the French have their doyen de Vacademie franfaise, doyen des avocats, and doyen des marecJiaux de France. In every country the resident diplomatic body has its dean. In all Christian countries during the middle ages the various trades' corporations or guilds had their deans. In the old French parlements, the oldest maitre des requetes was called doyen des doyens. Toward the end of the 8th century we find the first authentic mention made of female chapters or canoness- es, who were either regular canonesses, follow- ing the rule of St. Augustine, or secular, and bound by no permanent religious vows. Such bodies became quite numerous in course of time both in France and Germany, and were composed almost exclusively of ladies of royal, princely, or noble birth. The most famous in France was the house of Remiremont. In France the appellation of doyenne was in many instances given to the heads of such chapters ; and the phrase elire la doyenne is frequently met with in old historians. DEANE, James, an American physician, born in Coleraine, Mass., Feb. 14, 1801, died in Greenfield, June 8, 1858. He removed to Greenfield in 1822, where, after writing in a public office four years, he studied medicine, and practised as a physician and surgeon from 1831 until his death. In the spring of 1835 he discovered the fossil footprints in the red sand- stone of the Connecticut valley. He called the attention of scientific men to the subject, and his investigations were afterward extended by Prof. Edward Hitchcock and others. American geologists were early convinced of the genuine- ness of the footprints; but great skepticism existed in England until, in 1842, Dr. Deane sent a box of the impressions with a commu- nication to Dr. G. A. Mantell, by whom they were placed before the geological society of London. He was a contributor to the Boston " Medical and Surgical Journal " and the "American Journal of Science and Art," wrote papers for medical and scientific socie- ties, and at the time of his death was engaged in the preparation of an elaborate memoir upon fossil footprints for the Smithsonian institution, with lithographic plates made by himself, by which the color of the rock and the actual appearance of the footprints were exactly re- produced. These plates were all completed. DEANE, Silas, an American diplomatist, born at Groton, Conn., Dec. 24, 1737, died at Deal, England, Aug. 23, 1789. He graduated at Yale college in 1758, and was a member of the first continental congress in 1774. He was sent by congress to France as a political and financial agent, and arrived at Paris in June, 1776, with instructions to ascertain the temper of the French government concerning the rupture with Great Britain, and to obtain military sup- plies. When in September it was determined