7. In Laconia itself, according to the Rhetra of Agis (which in all probability merely confirmed existing institutions), the territory belonging to Sparta consisted of the inland tract, which was bounded by part of mount Taygetus to the west, by the river Pellene, and by Sellasia to the north, and extended eastward towards Malea,[178] and this was therefore at that time cultivated by Helots. Here it may be asked, who were the inhabitants of the towns situated in this district, for example Amyclæ, Therapne, and Pharis? Certainly not Helots alone, for there were a considerable number of Hoplitæ from Amyclæ in the Lacedæmonian army,[179] who must therefore have been either Spartans or Periœci. But whether the Periœci inhabited small districts in the midst of the territory immediately occupied by the Spartans, or whether some Spartans lived out of the city in country-towns, cannot be completely determined. The former is, however, the more probable, since some Periœci lived in the vicinity of the city,[180] and Amyclæ is reckoned among the towns of Laconia;[181] the Spartans also are mentioned to have had dwellings in the country,[182] but never to have possessed houses in any other town except Sparta, and a few villages in the neighbourhood.
This induces us to attempt the solution of the difficult problem, of what is the proper signification [pg 048] of the Phylæ (as the grammarians sometimes call them),[183] of Pitana, Limnæ or Limnæum, Mesoa and Cynosura, which Pausanias also mentions together as divisions of the people.[184] Now Pausanias calls them divisions of the Spartans, and it appears that we must follow his statement. For in an Amyclæan inscription,[185] Damatrius, an overseer of the foreigners at Amyclæ, is called a Mesoatan; and in another inscription, a Gymnasiarch of the Roman time is designated as belonging to the Phyle of the Cynosurans;[186] and we cannot suppose these persons to have been Periœci.[187] And if Alcman, according to a credible account, was a Mesoatan,[188] we may understand by this term a citizen of Sparta (although of an inferior grade), without contradicting the authority of Herodotus, who only denies that any stranger besides Tisamenus and Hegias was ever made a Spartan.[189] Further, it is clear from ancient writers that Pitana, Limnæ, Mesoa, and Cynosura, were names of places. We are best informed with respect to Pitana, an ancient town, and without doubt anterior to the Dorians,[190] which was of sufficient importance to have [pg 049] its own gymnastic contests,[191] and to furnish a battalion of its own, called Pitanates.[192] Herodotus, who was there himself, calls it a demus;[193] and we know that it was near the temple and stronghold of Issorium,[194] which, according to Pausanias' topography of Sparta, must have been situated at the western extremity of the town.[195] This author also mentions, in the same district of the city, the porch of the Crotanes, who were a division of the Pitanatæ. We therefore know that Pitana lay to the west of Sparta, outside the town according to Herodotus,[196] inside (as it appears) according to Pausanias. So Limnæ likewise, as we learn from Strabo, was a suburb of Sparta,[197] and at the same time a part of the town, as also was Mesoa,[198] whither however Pausanias relates that Preugenes the Achæan brought the statue of Artemis, rescued from the Dorians at Sparta.[199] It follows from these apparently contradictory accounts, some including these places in Sparta, and some not, that they were nothing else than the hamlets (κῶμαι), of which, according to [pg 050] Thucydides,[200] the town of Sparta consisted, and which lay on all sides around the city (πόλις) properly so called, but were divided from one another by intervals, until at a late period (probably when Sparta, during the time of the Macedonian power, was enclosed with walls) they were united and incorporated together.
Chapter IV.
§ 1. Subject classes in Crete. § 2. In Argos and Epidaurus. § 3. In Corinth and Sicyon. § 4. In Syracuse. § 5. In Byzantium, Heraclea on the Pontus, and Cyrene. § 6. The bond-slaves of Thessaly. § 7. Cities and villages of Arcadia. § 8. The political opposition of city and country.
1. After having thus separately considered the two dependent classes in Sparta, the pattern state of the Dorians, we will now point out the traces of the analogous ranks in several other states of Doric origin.
The Doric customs were first established in Crete, whose fortunate circumstances had given to that race a fertile country, and an undisturbed dominion. Accordingly, the relative rights of the Dorians and natives must at an early period have been fixed on a settled basis in this island; and we may suppose that this settlement was made on equitable terms, since Aristotle was not aware of any insurrection of the slaves in Crete against their masters.[201] The Doric customs required here, as elsewhere, exemption from all agricultural [pg 051] or commercial industry; which is expressed in a lively manner in the song of Hybrias the Cretan, that “with lance and sword and shield he reaped and dressed his vines, and hence was called lord of the Mnoia.”[202] In this island, however, different classes of dependents must have existed. Sosicrates and Dosiadas, both credible authors on the affairs of Crete, speak of three classes, the public bondsmen (κοινὴ δουλεία), called by the Cretans μνοΐα, the slaves of individual citizens, ἀφαμιῶται, and the Periœci, ὑπήκοοι. Now we know that the Aphamiotæ received their name from the cultivation of the lands of private individuals (in Cretan ἀφαμίαι) and accordingly they were agricultural bondsmen.[203] These latter are identical with the Clarotæ, who, for this reason, were not separately mentioned by the writers just quoted: for although they are generally supposed to have taken their name from the lot cast for prisoners of war, the more natural derivation doubtless is from the lots or lands of the citizens, which were called κλῆροι. But whichever explanation we adopt, they were bondsmen belonging to the individual citizens. Both the Clarotæ and Aphamiotæ have therefore been correctly compared with the Helots;[204] and as the latter were entirely distinct from the Laconian Periœci, so were the former from the Cretan, although Aristotle neglects the distinction accurately observed by the Cretan [pg 052] writers.[205] In the second place, the μνοία (or μνῴα) was by more precise historians distinguished as well from the condition of Periœci as from that of private bondage, and it was explained to mean a state of public villenage; whence we may infer that every state in Crete was possessed of public lands, which the Mnotæ cultivated in the same relative situation to the community in which the Aphamiotæ, who cultivated the allotted estates, stood to the several proprietors. This name, however, is sometimes extended to all forced labourers, as in the song of Hybrias noticed above.[206] Finally, the Periœci formed in Crete, as in Laconia, dependent and tributary communities: their tribute was, like the produce of the national lands, partly applied to the public banquets;[207] to which also, according to Dosiadas,[208] every slave in Lyctus contributed in addition one Æginetan stater. Now in this passage we cannot suppose that the Periœci are meant, because the exact author would not have called them [pg 053] slaves: nor yet the slaves purchased in foreign parts (called ἀργυρώνητοι in Crete), since it would have been impossible to reckon with any certainty that persons in this situation possessed anything of their own; nor, lastly, can the Mnotæ be meant, since these were public slaves, having no connexion with individuals, nor consequently with their eating clubs.[209] It remains, therefore, that it was the Clarotæ (or Aphamiotæ), who, in addition to the tax in kind, were also liable to this payment in money, with which utensils for the use of the public table were probably purchased. It may be, moreover, observed that we have no reason to suppose that the bondsmen were admitted to the daily banquets.[210]
Perhaps, however, there was no Grecian state in which the dependent classes were so little oppressed as in Crete. In general, every employment and profession, with the exception of the gymnasia and military service, was permitted to them.[211] Hence also the Periœci held so firmly to the ancient legislation of Minos, that they even then observed it, when it had been neglected by the Dorians of the town of Lyctus;[212] and thus, as was frequently the case elsewhere, in the decline of public manners the ancient customs were retained among the lower classes of society longer than amongst the higher. Upon the whole, Crete was the most fortunate of all the Doric states in this circumstance, that it could follow up its own institutions with [pg 054] energy and in quiet, without any powerful obstacle; although its very tranquillity and far-extended commerce at length occasioned a gradual decline of ancient customs. The reverse took place at Argos, whose Doric inhabitants, pressed on all sides, were at length compelled to renounce the institutions of their race, and adopt those of the natives. In the early history of this state, therefore, the two classes of dependents and bondsmen should be distinguished: this division was, however, very early laid aside, and an entirely different arrangement introduced.
2. There was at Argos a class of bond-slaves, who are compared with the Helots, and were called Gymnesii.[213] The name alone sufficiently proves the correctness of the comparison; these slaves having evidently been the light-armed attendants on their masters (γύμνητες). Hence also the same class of slaves were in Sicyon called κορυνηφύροι; because they only carried a club or staff, and not, like the heavy-armed Dorians, a sword and lance. It is to these Gymnesii that the account of Herodotus refers,[214] that 6000 of the citizens of Argos having been slain in battle by Cleomenes king of Sparta,[215] the slaves got the government [pg 055] into their own hands, and retained possession of it until the sons of those who had fallen were grown to manhood. From this narrative it is plain that the number of Dorians at Argos was nearly exhausted by the death of 6000 of their body; and that none but bondsmen dwelt in the immediate neighbourhood of the city, since otherwise the sovereign power would not have fallen into their hands. It would be absurd to suppose that slaves bought in foreign countries can be here intended, since these could have had no more notion of governing a Grecian state than the bear in the fable of managing the ship.[216] Afterwards, when the young citizens had grown up, the slaves were compelled by them to withdraw to Tiryns; and then, after a long war, as it appears, were either driven from the territory, or again subdued.[217]
The Argives, however, also had Periœci,[218] who were known by the name of Orneatæ. This appellation was properly applied to the inhabitants of Orneæ, a town on the frontiers towards Mantinea, which, having been long independent, was at last, about the year 580 B.C.,[219] reduced by the Argives; and afterwards the whole class of Periœci was so called from that place. These Orneatæ, or Periœci, therefore, like those of Laconia, formed separate communities of their own, which indeed was the case so late as the Persian war. [pg 056] For (as we have shown above) the Argives about this time incorporated the surrounding towns belonging to the Periœci,[220] for the purpose of replenishing and increasing their own numbers, and gave them the rights of citizens. With this period an entirely new era in the history of the constitution of Argos commences, although this state of things has from its greater notoriety often been improperly applied also to earlier times. Thus Isocrates[221] says that the Dorians of Argos, like those of Messene, admitted the native inhabitants into the city (as σύνοικοι), and gave them equal rights of citizenship, with the exception of offices of honour; contrasting with it the conduct of the Spartans, in a manner which every one now perceives to have been entirely groundless. The change in the constitution of Argos then introduced was no less than if the whole body of Periœci in Laconia had declared themselves the sovereign community. For the newly-adopted citizens appear to have soon demanded and obtained the full rights of the old; and hence, ever after the above epoch, democracy seems to have had the upper hand in Argos. And this could never be the case without the disappearance of the Doric character, which showed itself in the diminution of their military skill. For this reason the Argives in after-times were reduced to form a standing army of a thousand citizens, of noble extraction, under the command of generals who possessed great civil power.[222] [pg 057] This body of men, however, immediately endeavoured to set up an oppressive oligarchy, until they at length yielded to the preponderating power of the democracy. But of this more hereafter.[223]