Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Publicanus

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rich, Anthony (1849). The illustrated companion to the Latin dictionary, and Greek lexicon. p. vi. OCLC 894670115. https://archive.org/details/illustratedcompa00rich. 

PUBLICA'NUS (τελώνης. N. T.). A publican, in the sense which that term bears in our version of the New Testament, meaning thereby a person who took a contract of the public taxes from the state at a stipulated amount, he employing and paying the underlings who collected them, and reserving to himself for his own profit all that remained beyond the sum at which he had taken the contract. The Roman publican was in general a person of equestrian rank. The taxes he collected were the land tax, levied upon pastures; the tithe of corn, from arable lands; and the customs dues on imports; and as he stood in the place of a middleman, and had the onus of direct collection, which would be rigorously enforced, to make a good profit of the contract, the reputation he bore was, in general, far from being flattering or popular; though his wealth made him an important and influential personage. Plin. H. N. xxxviii. 8. Cic. Planc. 9. Liv. xliii. 16.