Page:Herodotus (Swayne).djvu/110



original constitution of most of the Greek States was a limited monarchy, though the king was emphatically "hedged by divinity," since the founder of his family was generally supposed to he a god. In time, as the royal prestige wore out, this constitution was generally superseded by an oligarchy, which lasted until some ambitious individual, by courting the unprivileged classes, managed to raise himself to the supremacy.

In the fifth century before Christ there were so many of these usurpers at the same time in Greece, that it has been called the Age of Tyrants. Mr Grote prefers to call them "despots;" but the name matters little if no sinister meaning is necessarily attached to the word Tyrant. Their number at one time was a fact in support of those who believe in social and