[84] The Greek name τύραννος cannot be properly rendered tyrant; for many of the τύραννοι by no means deserved to be so called, nor is it consistent with the use of language to speak of a mild and well-intentioned tyrant. The word despot is the nearest approach which we can make to it, since it is understood to imply that a man has got more power than he ought to have, while it does not exclude a beneficent use of such power by some individuals. It is, however, very inadequate to express the full strength of Grecian feeling which the original word called forth.
[85] The Phæakian king Alkinous (Odyss. vii. 55-65): there are twelve other Phæakian Βασιλῆες, he is himself the thirteenth (viii. 391).
The chief men in the Iliad, and the suitors of Penelopê in the Odyssey, are called usually and indiscriminately both Βασιλῆες and Ἄνακτες; the latter word, however, designates them as men of property and masters of slaves, (analogous to the subsequent word δεσπότης, which word does not occur in Homer, though δέσποινα is found in the Odyssey,) while the former word marks them as persons of conspicuous station in the tribe (see Odyss. i. 393-401; xiv. 63). A chief could only be Βασιλεὺς of freemen; but he might be Ἄναξ either of freemen or of slaves.
Agamemnôn and Menelaus belong to the most kingly race (γένος βασιλεύτερον: compare Tyrtæus, Fragm. ix. v. 8, p. 9, ed. Schneidewin) of the Pelopids, to whom the sceptre originally made for Zeus has been given by Hermês (Iliad, ii. 101; ix. 160; x. 239); compare Odyss. xv. 539. The race of Dardanus are the favorite offspring of Zeus, βασιλεύτατον among the Trojans (Iliad, xx. 304). These races are the parallels of the kingly prosapiæ called Amali, Asdingi, Gungingi, and Lithingi, among the Goths, Vandals, and Lombards (Jornandes, De Rebus Geticis, c. 14-22; Paul Warnefrid, Gest. Langob. c. 14-21); and the ἀρχικὸν γένος among the Chaonian Epirots (Thucyd. ii. 80).
[86] Odyss. i. 392; xi. 184; xiii. 14; xix. 109.—
Οὐ μὲν γάρ τι κακὸν βασιλεύεμεν· αἶψά τέ οἱ δῶ
Ἄφνειον πέλεται, καὶ τιμηέστερος αὐτός.
Iliad, ix. 154-297 (when Agamemnôn is promising seven townships to Achilles, as a means of appeasing his wrath):—
Ἐν δ᾽ ἄνδρες ναίουσι πολυῤῥῆνες, πολυβοῦται,
Οἵ κέ σε δωτίνῃσι θεὸν ὣς, τιμήσουσι,