Page:History of Greece Vol X.djvu/139

 SYMMORIES. 1]7 Along with this new schedule of taxable capital, a new distribtt tion of the citizens now took place into certain bodies called Sym- mories. As far as we can make out, on a very obscure subject, it seems that these Symmories were twenty in number, two to each tribe ; that each contained sixty citizens, thus making one thousand two hundred in all ; that these one thousand two hundred were the wealthiest citizens of the schedule, containing, perhaps, the two first out of the four classes enrolled. Among these one thou- sand two hundred, however, the three hundred wealthiest stood out as a separate body ; thirty from each tribe. These three hundred were the wealthiest men in the city, and were called " the leaders or chiefs of the Symmories." The three hundred and the twelve hundred corresponded, speaking roughly, to the old Solonian classes of Pentakosiomedimni and Hippeis ; of which drotion. (p. 606. c. 14). 'Y[uv TT a p a rug elafyopiic. rue. and N av aiviKov, Trap' lauf ru^avra rpiaKoaia fj ptKp& irXeio, e^Jieififia rerrapa Kal delta tarl TuAavra- uv inru wrof (Androtion) elai-Kpa^ev. Now these words imply, not that a property-tax of about three hundred talents had been levied or called for during the archonship of Nausinikus, but that a total sum of three hundred talents, or thereabouts, had been levied (or call- ed for) by all the various property-taxes imposed from the archonship of Nau- sinikus down to the date of the speech. The oration was spoken about 355 B. c. ; the archonsliip of Nausinikus was in 378 B. c. What the speaker affirms, therefore, is, that a sum of three hundred talents had been levied or called for by all the various property-taxes imposed between these two dates ; and that the aggregate sum of arrears due upon all of them, at the time when Androtion entered upon his office, was fourteen talents. Taylor, indeed, in his note, thinking that the sum of three hundred tal- ents is very small, as the aggregate of all property-taxes imposed for twen- ty-three years, suggests that it might be proper to read TT I NavaivtKov instead of UTT b Navaiviicov ; and I presume that M. Boeckh adopts that reading. But it would be unsafe to found an historical assertion upon such a change of text, even if the existing text were more indefensible than it actually is. And surely the plural number rtif datpopag proves that the ora- tor has in view, not the single property-tax imposed in the archonship of Nausinikus, but two or more property-taxes, imposed at different times. Besides, Androtion devoted himself to the collection of outstanding arrears generally, in whatever year they might have accrued. He would have no motive to single out those which had accrued in the year 378 B. c. ; more- over, those arrears would probably have become confounded with others, long before 355 B. c. Demosthenes selects the year of Nausinikus as his initial period, because it was then that the new schedule and a new reck- oning, begaa