For Gaius, people acted primarily on things, and indeed most of their actions were focused on taking or maintaining possession of things. The resulting disputes over things were what led most directly to the need for regulation. The individual as a citizen was first concerned with the posses- sion of things and second with legal actions taken with respect to things— authorization, conveyance, litigation, and so on. In this view, the world of things became the reality, the medium through which human beings lived their lives and, indeed, defined their lives. Citizenship then became a legal status, one associated perhaps with certain “rights,” especially property rights, but not a moral or political one.