The obligation of the individual toward the state was determined by one fundamental fact, viz., domicile, or right of residence. Before the Constitutio Antonina there was only one class of inhabitants that possessed an almost unlimited right of residence, the _cives Romani_. But even these could not live indiscriminately in Egypt, for example, which was at all times an exceptional province, and was considered a sort of imperial appanage. As a matter of fact, it is in Egypt that we see the first development of the _colonatus_, destined to be of so fundamental importance in the creation of the feudal system. It may be that the _colonatus_ was found practically everywhere in the Hellenistic states, but its growth in Egypt goes back to Pharaonic times, and its fullest expansion was found there. The principle of the _colonatus_ was the permanent obligation of the agricultural free laborer to remain on the soil he tilled. Originally it applied only to the state lands, but in the third century these state lands became largely private property, and the serf-like _coloni_ went with them. All over the empire there were still, in spite of the _latifundia_, or agriculture on a big scale, a large number of peasant proprietors; but with the impossibility of competing with the production of the _latifundia_, these peasant proprietorships were soon converted into holdings resembling the _colonatus_, or actually that. Now, as long as the _civis Romanus_, as a prerogative of his position, paid no tax, his right of residence was unqualified. When he too had to submit to a direct tax, the place where he resided became a matter of prime importance. The tax that was imposed upon any given locality could be met only if all those subject to tax, living there, paid their dues. Consequently those who by birth were domiciled there could not remove themselves without lessening to that extent the power of that district to meet its state obligations. At first, to be sure, this cannot have been a matter of first-rate importance. Changes of domicile after all were rare, and took place principally among the wealthier classes, a fact that made it easy to insure that no loss would accrue to the community abandoned. But as conditions of ordinary living deteriorated, the practice of deserting one’s legal residence became more frequent, and needed the intervention of the central authorities, since the local magistrate had no jurisdiction whatever beyond the strictly circumscribed limits of his commune. As soon as it was possible for a commune to claim from its members, wherever they happened to be, their contribution to the communal tax, there arose the corollary that for all practical purposes the tax-paying member might not leave the place where his tax was due. The _colonatus_ had been applied to the urban laborer.