es over the common crowd of freemen.
They were able to buy the best weapons which were to be found on the
market of the eastern Mediterranean. They had much spare time in which
they could practise the art of fighting. They lived in strongly
built houses and they could hire soldiers to fight for them. They were
constantly quarrelling among each other to decide who should rule the
city. The victorious nobleman then assumed a sort of Kingship over all
his neighbours and governed the town until he in turn was killed or
driven away by still another ambitious nobleman.

Such a King, by the grace of his soldiers, was called a "Tyrant" and
during the seventh and sixth centuries before our era every Greek city
was for a time ruled by such Tyrants, many of whom, by the way, happened
to be exceedingly capa-ble men. But in the long run, this state of
affairs became unbearable. Then attempts were made to bring about
reforms and out of these reforms grew the first democratic government of
which the world has a record.

It was early in the seventh century that the people of Athens decided to
do some housecleaning and give the large number of freemen once more a
voice in the government as they were supposed to have had in the days
of their Achaean ancestors. They asked a man by the name of Draco to
provide them with a set of laws that would protect the poor against
the aggressions of the rich. Draco set to work. Unfortunately he was a
professional lawyer and very much out of touch with ordinary life. In
his eyes a crime was a crime and when he had finished his code, the
people of Athens discovered that these Draconian laws were so severe
that they could not possibly be put into effect. There would not have
been rope enough to hang all the criminals under their new system of
jurisprudence which made the stealing of an apple a capital offence.

The Athenians looked about for a more humane reformer. At last they
found some one who could do that sort of thing better than anybody else.
His name was Solon. He belonged to a noble family and he had travelled
all over the world and had studied the forms of government of many other
countries. After a careful study of the subject, Solon gave Athens a set
of laws which bore testimony to that wonderful principle of moderation
which was part of the Greek character. He tried to improve the condition
of the peasant without however destroying the prosperity of the nobles
who were (or rather who could