PROCURATOR (

See also:

• LAT

Lat. procurare, to take care of)  , generally one who acts for another . With the Romans it was applied to a person who maintained or defended an action on behalf of another, thus performing the functions of a modern attorney . Roman families of importance employed an official corresponding to the modern steward and frequently called the procurator . Later the name was applied especially to certain imperial officials in the provinces of the Roman Empire . With the establishment of the imperial power under Augustus, the emperor took under his direct government those of which the condition or situation rendered a large military force necessary . Here certain officials, known as the procuratores Caesaris, took the place occupied by the quaestor in the senatorial provinces . They were either equites or freedmen of the Caesar and their office was concerned with the interests of the fiscus (the public property of the Caesar) . They looked after the taxes and paid the troops . There were also officials bearing this title of procuratores Caesaris in the senatorial provinces . They collected certain dues of the fiscus which were independent of those paid to the aerarium (the property of the senate) . This organization lasted with some modifications until the 3rd century . The procurator was an important official in the reorganized empire of Diocletian .

The title remained all through the

middle ages to describe very various officials . Thus it was sometimes applied to a regent acting for a king during his minority or absence; sometimes it appears as an alternative title to seneschal or dapifer . It preserved its legal significance in the title of procurator animarum, who acted as solicitor or proxy in the ecclesiastical courts, and was so called because these courts dealt with matters affecting the spiritual interests of the persons concerned . The economical significance remained in such titles as procurator anniversariorum, the exactor of dues for the celebration of anniversaries; this office was assigned to laymen . The procurator draperii was entrusted with the administration of matters pertaining to the art of cloth-making . The procurator duplarum was the collector of fines in certain churches from absent canons, &c .