Chapter V.
§ 1. Three tribes of citizens in the Doric states. § 2. Additional tribes, of inferior rank, in some Doric states. § 3. Each tribe in Sparta was divided into ten obæ. § 4. Political importance of the Spartan obæ. § 5. Πάτραι, in other Doric states, corresponding to the Spartan obæ. § 6. Number of Spartan γένη. § 7. Distinction between Equals and Inferiors in Sparta. § 8. Powers of the assembly of citizens at Sparta. § 9. Names of the assembly of the citizens in the Doric states. § 10. Proceedings of the Spartan assembly. § 11. Public assembly of Crete.
1. Having considered the subject classes in the several Doric states, we come to the free citizens properly so called, who, according to an old Grecian principle,[292] which was actually put in practice in Sparta, were entirely exempted from all care for providing themselves with the necessaries of life. The exact distinction between these ranks, and the advantageous position of the latter class, increased the value of the rights of citizenship; hence Sparta showed peculiar reluctance to admitting foreigners to share in them.[293] Before, then, we consider the body politic of free citizens in its active dealings, it will be proper first to direct our attention to its component members, to its division into smaller societies, such as tribes, phratriæ, houses, &c.
In every Doric state there were three tribes, Hylleis, Dymanes (or Dymanatæ), and Pamphyli. This threefold division belonged so peculiarly to the nation that even Homer called it “the thrice-divided” τριχάϊκες, which ancient epithet is correctly explained in a verse of Hesiod, as implying the division of the territory among the people.[294] Hence in the ancient fable which this poet has expressed in an epic poem, three sons of the ancient Doric king Ægimius were mentioned, namely, Dyman, Pamphylus, and the adopted Hyllus; and the same is confirmed by the direct testimony of Herodotus, who states that the Doric nation was divided into these three tribes.[295] Hence also Pindar comprehends the whole Doric nation under the name of the sons of Ægimius and Hyllus.[296] Thus we should be warranted in putting forth the proposition stated above in these general terms, even if in the several Doric states there had been no particular mention of all these tribes. The fact, however, is, that there are sufficient accounts of them. Pindar[297] bears testimony to their existence in Sparta; and from an expression of a grammarian, it may be conjectured that they were also divisions of the city.[298] Herodotus states that these tribes existed at Sicyon and Argos.[299] In Argos, the city was doubtless [pg 077] divided according to them; and Παμφυλιακὸν is mentioned as a district of the town.[300] The Doric tribes were transmitted from Argos to Epidaurus and Ægina.[301] Hylleis occur also in the Æginetan colony of Cydonia.[302] The same name is found in an inscription of Corcyra:[303] consequently they also existed in the mother-country, Corinth. It occurs likewise in another inscription of Agrigentum;[304] they must therefore have also been in existence at Rhodes, as indeed is declared by Homer.[305] The Pamphylians occur at Megara as late as at the time of Hadrian.[306] These tribes existed also at Trœzen;[307] but the Trœzenian colony Halicarnassus seems to have been almost exclusively founded by Dymanes.[308] On the whole it appears that wherever there were Dorians there were also Hylleans, Pamphylians, and Dymanes.
2. Wherever the Dorians alone had the full rights of citizenship, no other tribes of the highest ranks could exist; but if other persons were admitted in any considerable number to a share in the government, there were necessarily either one or more tribes in addition to these three. Thus a fourth, named Hyrnathia,[309] is [pg 078] known to us in the states of Argos and Epidaurus; in Ægina also an additional tribe of this kind must have existed, for in this island there were distinguished families not of Doric origin.[310] In Sicyon the fourth tribe was called the Ægialean. In Corinth also it appears that there were altogether eight tribes.[311] But in Sparta, the city of pure Doric customs, we cannot suppose the existence of any other than the three genuine Doric tribes. At first sight, indeed, it might appear that the great and distinguished house of the Ægidæ, of Cadmean descent, was without the pale of these tribes; but it must have been adopted into one of the three at its admission to the rights of citizenship.[312] For the number of the Spartan obæ, the gerontes, the knights, the landed estates, viz., 30, 300, 9000, &c., manifestly allow of division by the number 3, while they have no reference to the number 4.
3. The tribes of Sparta were again divided into obæ, which are also called phratriæ.[313] The term phratria (φρατριὰ) signified among the Greeks an union of houses, whether founded upon the ties of [pg 079] actual relationship, or formed for political purposes, and according to some fixed rule, for the convenience of public regulations. Thus the word oba comprehends houses (γένη, gentes), which were either really founded on descent from the same stock, or had united themselves in ancient times for civil and religious purposes, and afterwards continued to exist as political bodies under certain regulations.[314] The Spartan obæ appear to have likewise been local divisions, since the name ὠβὰ, i.e., οἴα, signifies single hamlets or districts of a town; although in the case of Sparta it is not evident what relation they bore to the five divisions of the city, of which we have spoken above.[315] It should be, moreover, observed, that this does not prevent us from supposing that, as in the parallel case of the phratriæ, the obæ contained the houses; since we may be allowed to infer with great probability, from the simple and coherent regularity of the Spartan institutions, that the tribes had taken possession of particular districts of the town, and that these were again divided into smaller partitions, according to the obæ; a conjecture which, perhaps, will be confirmed by the statement, that a place in Sparta was called Agiadæ:[316] now this was the name of one of the royal families, which, as being an oba, appears to have given its name to one district of the town.
The obæ were thirty in number;[317] that is, there were ten of the Hyllean, ten of the Dymanatan, ten of the Pamphylian tribe. Of the Hyllean, two must have belonged to the royal families of the Heraclidæ. For since the councillors, together with the kings, amounted to thirty, and as this number doubtless depended upon and proceeded from that of the obæ, it follows that the two royal families, although springing from one stock, must nevertheless have been separated into two different obæ, of which they were in a manner the representatives. And if we proceed to conclude in this manner, we shall be obliged, since there were Heraclidæ, exclusive of the kings, in the gerusia,[318] to suppose that there were, besides these, other Heraclide obæ in Sparta; although I am not of opinion that all the Hyllean houses derived themselves from Hercules, and were considered as Heraclidæ.
4. With respect to the influence and importance of the obæ in a political view, it was equal to, or even greater than, that of the phratriæ in ancient Athens. For, in the first place, the assembly of the people, in obedience to a rhetra of Lycurgus, was held according to tribes and obæ; afterwards the high council was constituted, and probably the 300 knights were chosen, upon the same principle. At the same time, all public situations and offices were not filled in this manner, but only where distinguished dignity and honour were required: this mode of election, as will be shown below, had always an aristocratic tendency. Magistrates, on the contrary, of a more democratical character, particularly the ephors, were nominated without regard to the division of tribes, as [pg 081] their number alone shows: it is probable that this had some relation to the number of the divisions of the city, of which, as was shown above, there were five. A striking analogy, with regard to this numerary regulation, is afforded by Athens, while yet under an aristocratic government. The tribe of the nobles and knights was in this state divided into three phratriæ, which may be compared with the three tribes of the Doric Spartans. Now, when the nobility (like a chamber of peers) constituted a court of justice over the Alcmæonidæ, 300 eupatridæse, 100 out of each phratria, composed the court.[319] And when Cleisthenes the Alcmæonid had been expelled by the aristocratic party, and the democratic senate (βουλὴ) overthrown, Isagoras established a high council of 300.[320] Whereas the senate, to which Cleisthenes gave existence and stability, consisted of 500 citizens, and was chosen, without any regard to the ancient division into phratriæ, according to the new local tribes.
5. No Doric state, with the exception of Sparta, appears to have given the name of oba to a division of the people. But neither can the name phratria, so common in other places, be proved to have been used by any Doric people. On the other hand, phratriæ occur at Athens, in the Asiatic colonies,[321] and in the Chalcidean colony of Neapolis, that is, chiefly in Ionic states; and Neapolis affords a solitary instance of their being distinguished by certain proper names, such [pg 082] as Eumelidæ, Eunostidæ, Cymæans, Aristæans, &c.[322] Pindar however mentions patræ (πάτραι) in the Doric states of Corinth and Ægina; an expression which, according to the precise definition of Dicæarchus, is equivalent to houses or γένη, signifying persons descended from the same ancestor (πατήρ). It was indeed, although not at Athens, in use among the Ionians of Asia Minor and the islands, who appear however to have also employed the terms πάτρα or πατρία for the more extensive word phratria.[323] In Ægina and Corinth it will be safest to consider the patræ as houses, since they are always denoted by patronymic names, going back to fabulous progenitors; and by Pindar himself they are also called “houses.” Since however, as being not only a natural, but also a political division, the patræ may sometimes have comprised several houses, and as there was probably in these states no intermediate division (like the phratria at Athens and the oba at Sparta) between them and the tribes, the ancient commentators have neglected their more restricted and original sense, and have compared and identified them with phratriæ.[324]
6. The name which the houses or γένεα bore at Sparta, and the number of them which was contained in an oba, may be perhaps ascertained from a passage of Herodotus,[325] in which he mentions the Enomoties, Triacades, and Syssitia, as military institutions established by Lycurgus. Other inferences from this passage we shall not anticipate, remarking only that the Syssitia appear to have answered to the obæ, from which it is probable that the Triacades were contained in these latter divisions. Now in Attica, at an early period, a triacas was the thirtieth part of a phratria, and contained thirty men, the same number as a γένος.[326] Following then the argument from analogy (by which we are so often surprised and guided in our inquiries into the early political institutions), triacas was in Sparta also the name of a house, which was so called, either as being the thirtieth part of an oba, or, as appears to me more probable, because it contained thirty houses. The relation of the triacas to the enomoty,—a small division of warriors, which originally contained twenty-four men,—is quite uncertain. The basis of the whole calculation, and in this case a sufficiently fixed standard, was found in Sparta in the families (οἶκοι) connected with the landed estates; indifferently whether these contained several citizens, [pg 084] or whether they had become extinct and been united with other families.[327]
7. We now proceed to mention another division of the citizens of Sparta, which concerns the difference of rank. In a certain sense indeed all Dorians were equal in rights and dignity; but there were yet manifold gradations, which, when once formed, were retained by the aristocratic feelings of the people. In the first place, there was the dignity of the Heraclide families, which had a precedence throughout the whole nation;[328] and, connected with this, a certain pre-eminence of the Hyllean tribe; which is also expressed in Pindar. Then again, in the times of the Peloponnesian war, “men of the first rank” are often mentioned in Sparta, who, without being magistrates, had a considerable influence upon the government.[329]
Here also the difference between the Equals (ὅμοιοι) and Inferiors (ὑπομείονες) must be taken into consideration; which, if we judge only from the terms, would not appear to have been considerable, yet, though it is never mentioned in connexion with the constitution of Lycurgus, it had in later times a certain degree of influence upon the government. According to Demosthenes,[330] the prize of virtue in Sparta was to become a master of the state, together with the Equals. [pg 085] Whoever neglected a civil duty, lost, according to Xenophon,[331] his rank among the Equals. Cinadon wished to overthrow the government, because, although of a powerful and enterprising mind, he did not belong to the Equals.[332] About the king's person in the field there were always three of the Equals, who provided for all his wants.[333] It also appears that there were many peculiarities in the education of an Equal.[334] Whoever, during his boyhood and youth, omitted to make the exertions and endure the fatigues of the Spartan discipline, lost his rank of an Equal.[335] In like manner, exclusion from the public tables was followed by a sort of diminutio capitis, or civil degradation.[336] This exclusion was either adjudged by the other members of the table, or it was the consequence of inability to defray the due share of the common expense. To them the Inferiors are most naturally opposed; and if the latter were distinct from the Spartans, by the Spartans, in a more limited sense of the word, Equals are sometimes probably understood.[337] From these scanty accounts the unprejudiced reader can only infer that a distinction of rank is implied, [pg 086] which depended not upon any charge or office, but continued through life, without however excluding the possibility of passing from one rank into the other, any Equal being liable to be degraded for improper conduct, and an Inferior, under certain circumstances, being enabled to procure promotion by bravery and submission to the authorities; but if this degradation did not take place, the rank then remained in the family, and was transmitted to the children, as otherwise it could not have had any effect upon education.[338]
8. After these preliminary inquiries concerning the divisions and classes of the citizens, we have now to examine the manner in which the political power was distributed and held in Sparta and the other Doric states.
As the foundation of these inquiries, we may premise a rhetra of Lycurgus, which, given in the form of an oracle of the Pythian Apollo,[339] contains the main features of the whole constitution of Sparta.[340] [pg 087] “Build a temple to Zeus Hellanius and Athene Hellania; divide the tribes, and institute thirty obas; appoint a council, with its princes; convene the assembly between Babyca and Cnacion; propose this, and then depart; and let there be a right of decision and power to the people.” Here then there is an unlimited authority given to the people to approve or to reject what the kings proposed. This full power was, however, more nearly defined and limited by a subsequent clause, the addition of which was ascribed to kings Theopompus and Polydorus: “but if the people should follow a crooked opinion, the elders and the princes shall dissent.”[341] Plutarch interprets these words thus; “That in case the people does not either approve or reject the measure in toto, but alters or vitiates it in any manner, the kings and councillors should dissolve the assembly, and declare the decree to be invalid.” According to this construction, indeed, the public assembly had so far the supreme power, that nothing could become a law without its consent. But it probably could not originate any legislative measure; inasmuch as such a power would have directly contravened the aristocratical spirit of the constitution, which feared nothing so much as the passionate and turbulent haste of the populace in decreeing and deciding. The sense of the rhetra of Lycurgus is also given in some verses from the Eunomia of Tyrtæus, which, on account of their antiquity and importance, we will quote in their original language:—
Φοίβου ἀκούσαντες, Πυθωνόθεν οἴκαδ᾽ ἔνεικαν
μαντείας τε θεοῦ καὶ τελέεντ᾽ ἔπεα.
ἄρχειν μὲν βουλῆς θεοτιμήτους βασιλῆας,
οἷσι μέλει Σπάρτης ἱμερόεσσα πόλις,
πρεσβυγενεῖς δὲ γέροντας, ἔπειτα δὲ δημότας ἄνδρας
εὐθείαις ῥήτραις ἀνταπαμειβομένους.[342]
δήμου τε πλήθει νίκην καὶ κάρτος ἕπεσθαι.[343]
By the sixth line Tyrtæus means to say that the popular assembly could give a direct answer to a law proposed by the authorities, but not depart from or alter it.
9. The usual name of a public assembly in the Doric states was ἁλία. This is the name by which the Spartan assembly is called in Herodotus;[344] and it is used also in official documents for those of Byzantium,[345] of Gela, Agrigentum,[346] Corcyra,[347] and Heraclea;[348] ἁλιαῖα was the term employed by the Tarentines[349] and Epidamnians;[350] the place of assembly among the Sicilian [pg 089] Dorians was called ἁλιακτήρ.[351] In Crete it was known by the ancient Homeric expression of ἀγορά.[352] In Sparta the ancient name of an assembly of the people was ἀπέλλα, whence the word ἀπελλάζειν in the rhetra quoted above. In later times the names ἐκκλησία and οἱ ἔκκλητοι appear to have been chiefly in use, which do not, more than at Athens, signify a select body, or a committee of the citizens;[353] although in other Doric states select assemblies sometimes occur under similar names.[354] There was also an assembly of this last kind at Sparta, but it is expressly called the small ecclesia;[355] and, according to a passage in which it was mentioned, was chiefly occupied concerning the state of the constitution, and perhaps consisted only of Equals; for it can hardly be supposed that an assembly was convened of magistrates alone.[356] To the regular assembly, however, all citizens [pg 090] above the age of thirty were doubtless admitted, who had not been deprived of their rights by law.[357] The place of meeting was in Sparta, between the brook Cnacion[358] and the bridge Babyca, where afterwards was a place called Œnus, near to Pitana, and therefore situated to the west of the city;[359] but, whatever might have been the precise spot, it was in the open air.[360] The time for the regular assembly was each full moon;[361] yet, for business of emergency, extraordinary meetings were held, often succeeding one another at short intervals.[362]
Our chief object now is to ascertain what were the subjects which, according to the customs of Sparta, required the immediate decision of the people. In the first place, with regard to the external relations of the state, we know that the whole people alone could proclaim war, conclude a peace, enter into an armistice for any length of time, &c.;[363] and that all negociations [pg 091] with foreign states, although conducted by the kings and ephors, could alone be ratified by the same authority. With regard to internal affairs, the highest offices, particularly the councillors, were filled by the votes of the people;[364] a disputed succession to the throne was decided by the same tribunal;[365] changes in the constitution were proposed and explained, and all new laws (as often as this rare event took place), after previous examination in the council, were confirmed in the assembly.[366] Legally also it required the authority of the assembled people to liberate any considerable number of Helots, as being their collective owner.[367] In short, the popular assembly possessed the supreme legislative authority; but it was so hampered and restrained by the spirit of the constitution, that it could only exert its authority within certain prescribed limits.
10. This circumstance was shown in an especial manner in the method of its proceedings. None but public magistrates, chiefly the ephors and kings, together with the sons of the latter,[368] addressed the people without being called upon, and put the question to the vote;[369] foreign ambassadors also being permitted to enter and speak concerning war and peace;[370] but that citizens ever came forward upon their own impulse to speak on public affairs, is neither probable, nor do any examples of such a practice occur. A privilege of this kind could, according to Spartan [pg 092] principles, only be obtained by holding a public office.[371] As therefore the magistrates alone, (τέλη, ἀρχαὶ) were the leaders and speakers of the assembly, so we often find that stated as a decree of the authorities (especially in foreign affairs),[372] which had been discussed before the whole community, and approved by it.[373] The occasional speeches were short, and spoken extempore; Lysander first delivered before the people a prepared speech, which he procured from Cleon of Halicarnassus.[374] The method of voting by acclamation has indeed something rude and barbarous; but it has the advantage of expressing not only the number of approving and negative voices, but also the eagerness of the voters, accurately enough, according to the ancient simplicity of manners.
11. The public assembly of Crete was, if we may judge from some imperfect accounts, similar to the Lacedæmonian. It included all the citizens, strictly so called; and likewise had only power to answer the decree of the chief officers (cosmi or gerontes) in the negative or affirmative.[375] In the [pg 093] other Doric states the influence of the assembly is too closely connected with the historical epoch to allow the collection of the scattered accounts in this place to form an uniform whole. There were everywhere popular assemblies, as long as they were not suppressed by tyrants; nor indeed did every tyrant suppress them; in every state also they represented the supreme power and sovereignty of the people; its will was the only law. That this will, however, should be properly directed, and that the supreme decision should not be intrusted to the blind impulse of an ignorant or excited populace, was the problem which the founders of the Doric governments undertook to solve.