Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/105

Rh association was called an amphictyony, that is, a league of neighbours. The most important of such leagues was the Delphic amphictyony, of which the object was to conserve the worship of Apollo at Delphi. This league arose in Thessaly, where the conquerors who had come in from Epirus sought to establish themselves more iirmly by embracing the cult of Apollo. It was afterwards extended through the southern districts until it included most of the tribes dwelling about (Eta and Parnassus. The members of the Delphic amphictyony gave a new meaning and value to the federal compact by applying it to enforce certain obligations of humanity in war. They took an oath that they would not raze each other s towns, nor, during a siege, cut off the supply of water. It was in con nexion with the Delphic amphictyony that the name Hellene appears to have been first distinctly recognized as the national name. The earliest collective name of the race, in Greek tradition, had been Graikoi. The members of the Delphic amphictyony chose as their federal name that of Hellenes, a name of sacred associations, if we may connect it with that of the Selloi or Ilelloi, the priests of the Pelasgian Zeus at Doclona, in the region which, according to Aristotle, was the most ancient Hellas. The circumstances which gave currency to Hellene as a common appellative have left a reminiscence in the myth that Hellen was nearly related to Amphictyon.

The Homeric poems may be regarded by the student of history as great pictures of political and social life, illustrating the whole variety of Greek experience down to the close of that age which saw the tides of /Eolic, Ionic, and Doric migration flow from the west to the east of the ./Egean. It is a distinct question how far recoverable his torical fact is embedded in their text, or how far trustworthy inferences may be drawn from them in regard to a supposed series of events. But at least the legends of the Achaean princes and warriors are there, as they came through ^Eolic minstrels to the poets of lonh ; and, various as may be the ages and sources of the interwoven materials, the total result may be taken as a portraiture, true in its main lines, of the age from which these legends had come down. In the political life described by the Homeric poems the king rules by divine and hereditary right. But he is not, like an Eastern monarch, even practically despotic ; he is bound, first, by tJiemistes, the traditional customs of his people ; next, he must consult the bottle, the council of nobles and elders ; and, lastly, his proposals require to be ratified by the agora, or popular assembly. The social life is the counterpart of this. It is a patriarchal life, in which the head of the family stands to his dependants in a relation like that of the king to his subjects. It is, within the family pale, eminently humane ; and the absence of a charity which should include all mankind is in some measure compensated by the principle and practice of hos pitality. The position of free-born women is high, higher than in the historical ages and polygamy is unknown among Greeks. Many of the pictures of manners, especially in the Odyssey, have the refinement of a noble simplicity in thought and feeling, and of a genuine courtesy which is peculiarly Hellenic. The useful arts are still in an early stage. The use of the principal metals is known, but not, apparently, the art of smelting or soldering them. Money is not mentioned, oxen being the usual measure of value ; anil there is no certain allusion to the art of writing.

II. The Early History of the leading States down to about 500 B.C.

iie Pelo- In the history of the Peloponnesus after the Dorian im- mnesus. migration we begin to be on firmer ground. There may still b-j hrge room f &amp;gt;r doubt as to particular dates or, but trio a 53 left permanent iv-cords in the institu tions which survived it. The first thing which should be borne in mind with regard to the Dorian immigration is that its dirtct influence was confined to three districts of ResuH the Peloponnesus. Argolis, Lajonia, and Messenia were fthe thoroughly Dorianized. Of the other three districts, Arcadia remained almost wholly unaffected, Elis and Achaia were affected only indirectly, through the influx of the populations which the Dorians had displaced. The first rank in the Peloponnesus was long retained by Argos. Argos The ancient primacy of its Achaean princes was inherited by its Dorian rulers ; and now, under the dynasty of the Temenidiv, Argos acquired a new prestige as the head of a federative Dorian hexapolis, of which the other members were Phlius, Sicyon, Troezene, Epidaurus, and Corinth. It was only by slow degrees that the power arose which was destined to eclipse Argos. "When the Dorians entered the Sparti valley of Eurotas, they found " hollow Lacedaemon " already shared among people of other tribes. Leleges, Minyans, and Achaeans had been there before them. Both yEolian and Achaean elements remained in the land. The settle ment of the Dorians was made in a strong position under Mount Taygetus, on the right or western bank of the Eurotas ; and the fact that, unlike most Greek cities, it was not founded on a rocky base, but on arable soil, was expressed by the name tiparte (sown land). It was indeed less a city than a group of rude hamlets, the camp of a military occupation. And, as a natural stronghold, defended by an alert garrison, it dispensed with walls. Sparta was at first only one member of a Laconian hexa polis. It was at a later stage that Sparta became the head-town of the country, and the seat of a central govern ment. The origin of the dual kingship may probably be traced to this period. Such a dualism has no parallel else where among Dorians : and, as regards one at least of the two royal lines, we know that the Agiade Cleotnenes proclaimed himself an Achaean. The two royal lines of the Agiadae and Eurypontid&amp;lt;e may have taken their beginning from a coalition or compromise between Doriun and Achaean houses. Afterwards, when it was desired to ex plain the dualism and to refer both lines to a common source, Agis and Eurypon were represented aa descended from the twin sons of Aristodsmus, Eurystheus and Procles.

The spread of Spartan power in the Peloponnesus was preceded by the building up of that political and social system which made the Spartan citizens a compact aristocracy, exclusively devoted to the exercises of war. The personality of Lycurgus is shadowy. He has even been classed with those beings who, like Prometheus, Hermes, and Phoroneus, bestow on men that gift of fire without which they could not have attained to a high civilization. But the charge of excessive credulity can scarcely be brought against those who hold, with E. Curtius, that " there really lived and worked in the first half of the 9th century B.C. a legislator of the name of Lyc urgus, a man win, as a born Heraclide, was called to take part in public affairs." It is another question whether he was the author of all the institutions which were afterwards ascribed to him. The example of another legislator who stands in a far clearer light of history, the Athenian Solon, whom the orators sometimes credit with the work of Clisthenes in addition to his own, may serve to show how loose such ascriptions often were. But at least the work of Lycurgus may be assumed to have marked an epoch in the history of the Spartan system. This system rested, first, on a distinction of three orders. Dorians alone were Spartiatai, citizens of Sparta, ns opposed to mere Lacedajmonii, and to them belonged all political power. Lycurgus, said the tradition, assigned nine thousand lots of land to as many Spartiatae ; the land descended from father to eldest son, and, failing isviie, reverted to the state. The older or non- 