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.