Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/336

 320 HISTORY OF GREECE. Argeian confederacy, that the Greeks owe the first introduction of the Babylonian scale of weight, and the first employment of coined and stamped money. If we maturely weigh the few, hut striking acts of Pheidon which have been preserved to us, and which there is no reason to discredit, we shall find ourselves introduced to an early historical state of Peloponnesus very different from that to which another century will bring us. That Argos, with the federative cities attached to her, was at this early time decidedly the commanding power in that peninsula, is sufficiently shown by the establishment and reception of the Pheidonian weights, measures, and monetary system, while the other incidents mentioned completely har- monizo with the same idea. Against the oppressions of Elis, the Pisatans invoked Pheidon, partly as exercising a primacy in Peloponnesus, just as the inhabitants of Lepreum in Triphylia, 1 three centuries afterwards, called in the aid of Sparta for the same object, at a time when Sparta possessed the headship, and partly as the lineal representative of Herakles, who had founded those games from the management of which they had been unjustly extruded. On the other hand, Sparta appears as a second-rate power. The ^Eginaejai scale of weight and measure was adopted there as elsewhere, 2 the Messenian Dorians were still equal and independent, and we find Sparta interfering to assist Elis by virtue of an obligation growing (so the legend represents it) out of the common JEtolo-Dorian emigration ; not at all from any acknowledged primacy, such as we shall see her enjoying hereafter. The first coinage of copper and silver money is a capital event in Grecian history, and must be held to imply con- siderable commerce as well as those extensive views which belong only to a conspicuous and leading position. The ambition of Pheidon to resume all the acquisitions made by his ancestor Herakles, suggests the same large estimate of his actual power. He is characterized as a despot, and even as the most insolent 1 Thucyd. v. 31. p. 141. The JEginaean mina, drachma, and obolus were the denominations em ployed in stipulations among the Peloponnesian states (Thncyd. v. 47).
 * Plutarch, Apophthegm. Laconic, p. 226 ; Dikseardms ap. Athcnae. if.