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 On the abolition of the single decennial archon in 683, his duties were distributed over several officials holding office for one year only. The judicial duties thenceforth discharged by the chief archon (the archon), in the case of citizens, were discharged by the polemarch in the case of foreign settlers or metics ( ); while the king-archon, who succeeded to the religious functions of the ancient kings, decided cases connected with religious observances (see

). He also presided over the primitive council of the state, which was identical with the council of the Areopagus. It was possibly with a view to the recognition of the rights of the lower classes that, about the middle of the 7th century, the three archons were raised to the number of nine by the institution of the joint board of the six thesmothetae, who superintended the judicial system in general, kept a record of all legal decisions, and drew attention to any defects in the laws. It is probable that in their title we have the earliest example in Attic Greek of the use of thesmos in the sense of “law.”

The constitution was at this time thoroughly oligarchical. With a view, however, to providing a remedy for the conflict between the several orders of the state, the first code of Athenian law was drawn up and published by Draco (strictly Dracon), who is definitely described as a thesmothetēs

(621). His laws were known as thesmoi. The distinctive part of his legislation was the law of homicide, which was held in such high esteem that it was left unaltered in the legislation of Solon and in the democratic restoration of 411 It is partly preserved in an inscription of 409, which has been restored with the aid of quotations from the orators (C.I.A. i. 61; Inscr. jurid. grecques, ii. 1. 1-24; and Hicks, Gk. Hist. Inscr. No. 59). It drew a careful distinction between different kinds of homicide. Of the rest of Draco’s legislation we only know that Aristotle (Politics, ii. 12, 13) was struck by the severity of the penalties, and that the creditor was permitted to seize the person of the debtor as security for his debt.

The conflict of the orders was not allayed until both parties agreed in choosing Solon as mediator and as archon (594 ). Solon cancelled all mortgages and debts secured on the person of the debtor, set free all who had become slaves for debt, and forbade such slavery for the future (see

). Thenceforth every citizen had also “the right of appeal to the law-courts,” and the privilege of claiming legal satisfaction on behalf of any one who was wronged. Cases of constitutional law (inter alia) came before large law-courts numbering hundreds of jurors, and the power of voting in these law-courts made the people masters of the constitution (Aristotle’s Constitution of Athens, c. 9). Solon’s legislation also had an important effect on the law of property. In primitive times, on a man’s death, his money or lands remained in the family, and, even in the absence of direct descendants, the owner could not dispose of his property by will. Permission to execute a will was first given to Athenian citizens by the laws of Solon. But “the Athenian Will was only an inchoate Testament” (Maine’s Ancient Law, c. vi.); for this permission was expressly limited to those citizens who had no direct male descendants (Dem. Lept. 102; Plutarch, Solon, 21; cf. Wyse on Isaeus, p. 325).

The law of intestate succession is imperfectly preserved in [Dem.] 43, § 51 (cf. Wyse, ib. p. 562 f.). In the absence of direct male descendants, a daughter who survived her father was known as an , not an “heiress,” but a “person who went with the estate”; and, in the absence of a will, the right or duty of marrying the daughter followed (with certain obvious exceptions) the same rules as the right of succession to the estate (cf. Wyse, ib. p. 348 f.).

Among the reforms of Cleisthenes (508) was the law of (q.v.). The privileges of the Areopagus were curtailed (while its right to try certain cases of homicide was left untouched) by the reforms of Ephialtes (462), and of Pericles, who also restored the thirty “local justices” (453), limited the franchise to those of citizen-blood by both parents (451), and was the first to assign to jurors a fee for their services in the law-courts, which was raised to three obols by Cleon (425).

In contrast to legislative reforms brought about by lawgivers entrusted with special authority, such as Draco, Solon and Cleisthenes, there was the regular and normal course of public legislation. The legislative power was not exercised directly by the popular assembly (see

), but the preliminary consent of that body was necessary for the appointment of a legislative commission.

In the 5th century (e.g. in 450 and 446 ) certain commissioners called  were appointed to draw up laws which, after approval by the council, were submitted to the assembly. The same term was still in use in March 411 (Thuc. viii. 61). But in October, on

the overthrow of the Four Hundred, the commissioners are for the first time called nomothetae (ib. 97).

The procedure in ordinary legislation was as follows. At the first meeting of the assembly in the year, the people was asked whether it would permit motions to be made for altering or supplementing the existing laws. A debate ensued, and, if such permission were granted, any citizen who wished to make a motion to the above effect was required to publish his proposals in the market-place, and to hand them to the secretary of the council (Boulē) to be read aloud at more than one meeting of the assembly. At the third regular meeting the people appointed the legislative commissioners, who were drawn by lot from the whole number of those then qualified to act as jurors. The number, and the duration of the commission, were determined in each case by the people. The proceedings before the commission were conducted exactly in the manner of a lawsuit. Those who desired to see old laws repealed, altered or replaced by new laws came forward as accusers of those laws; those of the contrary opinion, as defenders; and the defence was formally entrusted to public advocates specially appointed for the purpose ( ). The number of the commissioners varied with the number or importance of the laws in question; there is evidence for the number 1001 (Dem. xxiv. 27). If a law approved by the commission was deemed to be unconstitutional, the proposer was liable to be prosecuted (by a  ), just as in the case of the proposer of an unconstitutional decree in the public assembly. Formal proceedings might also be instituted against laws on the sole ground of their inexpediency (see note on Aristotle’s Constitution of Athens, p. 219, ed. Sandys). A prosecutor who (like Aeschines in his indictment of Ctesiphon) failed to obtain one-fifth of the votes was fined 1000 drachmae (£40), and lost the right to adopt this procedure in future. When a year had elapsed, the proposer of a law or a decree was free from personal responsibility. This was the case with Leptines, but the law itself could still be attacked, and, in this event, five advocates were appointed to defend it ( ), cf. Dem. Lept. 144, 146.

Limits of space make it impossible to include in the present article any survey of the purport of the extant remains of the laws of Athens. Such a survey would begin with the laws of the family, including laws of marriage, adoption and inheritance, followed by the law of property

and contracts, and the laws for the protection of life, the protection of the person, and the protection of the constitution. The texts have been collected and classified in Télfy’s Corpus juris Attici (1867), a work which can be supplemented or corrected with the aid of Aristotle’s Constitution of Athens; while some of the recent expositions of the subject are mentioned in the bibliography at the end of this article. We now proceed to notice the law of homicide, but solely in connexion with jurisdiction.

The general term for a tribunal is  (from  ), Anglicized “dicastery.” Of all the tribunals of Athens those for the trial of homicide were at once the most primitive and the least liable to suffer change through lapse of time. In the old Germanic law all trials whatsoever

were held in the open air (Grimm 793 f.). At Athens this custom was characteristic of all the five primitive courts of homicide, the object being to prevent the prosecutor and the judges from coming under the same roof as one who was charged with the shedding of blood (Antiphon, De caede Herodis, 11). The place where the trial was held depended on the nature of the charge.