Page:Thucydides, translated into English Vol 1.djvu/39

 INSCRIPTIONS XXXV I. i. The Tci^ts cfiopov (C. I. A. 37 and Suppl. iii) is a vast inscription broken into about thirty fragments. Not more than a sixth part of the whole is preserved ; and the posi- tion of several of the smaller fragments cannot be certainly ascertained. It is an estimate of the tribute to be paid by the allies, preceded by two decrees, out of which it is diffi- cult to gather a connected meaning, though they evidently relate to the appointment of officers for the regulation of the tribute ('two for the Chalcidian cities, two for Ionia, two for the islands, and two for the Hellespont ; ' 1. 5 ; p. xxi, supra), and contain penalties to be inflicted on the Prytanes if they fail in despatching the business before the assembly. The most interesting passages of these decrees which can be restored with any approach to certainty are the following. Line 22 flf. : — 'Let the Prytany Aegeis be required to bring these matters before the people as soon as it enters upon office, on the third day when the sacrifices are over, before any- thing else; and, if they be not completed on that day, let them be proceeded with on the following day before any- thing else ; and so on until the business is finished within the term of the aforesaid Prytany : and if the Prytanes fail to bring it before the people, or do not finish the matter within their own term of office, let every one of them pay a fine of 10,000 drachmae.' Another passage fixes the year of the inscription (1. 44 ff.) : 'Thudippus proposed : That the cities for which the senate fixed the tribute, in the year of which Pleistias was the first Registrar {i-n-l Trj<; j3ovXrj<; rj ITAeto-rta? TTpwTO? iypafx- /AaT€ve^),in the Archonship of Stratocles, shall all bring an ox to the great Panathenaea.' The Archonship of Stratocles falls in 01. 88. 4, and fixes the date of the inscription, or at any rate of the decree, to this year ; it probably belongs to the first half of it (the last half of B.C. 425). Once more, ' A -fpaufxards, or registrar to the fiovXrj, was appointed by lot in every Prytany. The registrar of the first Prytany is often named, as here, to mark the year.