either of them can attain their greatest efficiency without
arms.

CLEINIAS: How can they?

ATHENIAN: Then our herald, in accordance with the prevailing practice,
will first summon the runner--he will appear armed, for to an unarmed
competitor we will not give a prize. And he shall enter first who is to
run the single course bearing arms; next, he who is to run the double
course; third, he who is to run the horse-course; and fourthly, he who
is to run the long course; the fifth whom we start, shall be the first
sent forth in heavy armour, and shall run a course of sixty stadia to
some temple of Ares--and we will send forth another, whom we will style
the more heavily armed, to run over smoother ground. There remains the
archer; and he shall run in the full equipments of an archer a distance
of 100 stadia over mountains, and across every sort of country, to a
temple of Apollo and Artemis; this shall be the order of the contest,
and we will wait for them until they return, and will give a prize to
the conqueror in each.

CLEINIAS: Very good.

ATHENIAN: Let us suppose that there are three kinds of contests--one of
boys, another of beardless youths, and a third of men. For the youths
we will fix the length of the contest at two-thirds, and for the boys
at half of the entire course, whether they contend as archers or as
heavy-armed. Touching the women, let the girls who are not grown up
compete naked in the stadium and the double course, and the horse-course
and the long course, and let them run on the race-ground itself; those
who are thirteen years of age and upwards until their marriage shall
continue to share in contests if they are not more than twenty, and
shall be compelled to run up to eighteen; and they shall descend into
the arena in suitable dresses. Let these be the regulations about
contests in running both for men and women.

Respecting contests of strength, instead of wrestling and similar
contests of the heavier sort, we will institute conflicts in armour of
one against one, and two against two, and so on up to ten against ten.
As to what a man ought not to suffer or do, and to what extent, in order
to gain the victory--as in wrestling, the masters of the art have laid
down what is fair and what is not fair, so in fighting in armour--we
ought to call in skilful persons, who shall judge for us and be our
assessors in the work of legislation; they shall say who deserves to be
victor in combats of this sor