Page:History of Greece Vol III.djvu/425

 APOLLOMIA AND EPIDAMXUS. 409 assemblies, in place of the permanent phylarchs, oi chiefs of tribes, and thus introduced a form more or less democratical, yet still retaining the original single-headed archon. The Epidam- nian government was liberal in the admission of metics, or resi- dent aliens, a fact which renders it probable that the alleged public slavery of artisans in that town was a status carrying with it none of the hardships of actual slavery. It was through nn authorized selling agent, or poletes, that all traffic between Epidamnus and the neighboring Illyrians was carried on, indi- vidual dealing with them being interdicted. 1 Apollonia was in one respect pointedly distinguished from Epidamnus, since she excluded metics, or resident strangers, with a degree of rigor hardly inferior to Sparta. These few facts are all that we are permitted to hear respecting colonies both important in them- selves and interesting as they brought the Greeks into connection with distant people and regions. The six colonies just named, Korkyra, Ambrakia, Anakto- rium, Leukas, Apollonia, and Epidamnus, form an aggregate lying apart from the rest of the Hellenic name, and connected with each other, though not always maintained in harmony, by analogy of race and position, as well as by their common origi- nal from Corinth. That the commerce which the Corinthian merchants carried on with them, and through them with the tribes in the interior, was lucrative, we can have no doubt ; and Leukas and Ambrakia continued for a long time (o be not merely faithful allies, but servile imitators, of their mother-city. The commerce of Korkyra is also represented as very extensive, and carried even to the northern extremity of the Ionic gulf. It would seem that they were the first Greeks to open a trade and to establish various settlements on the Illyrian and Dalmatian coasts, as the Phokasans were the first to carry their traffic along the Adriatic coast of Italy : the jars and pottery of Korkyra en- joyed great reputation throughout all parts of the gulf. 2 The 1 Plutarch, Quast. Grrcc. p. 297, c. 29; ./Elian, V. II. xiii, 16. 9 W. C. Miiller. DC Corcyraor. Rcpub. eh. 3, pp. GO-63 : Aristot. Mirab. Ausc. c. 104; Ilcsychius, v, Kef-icvpaioi aptiopeif, Hcnxlot. i, 145. Tlie story given in the above passage of the Pseudo-Aristotle is to lie taken ill connection with the succeeding chapter of the same work (105), wherein ihe statement, largely credited in antiquity, is given, that the river VOL. III. 18