SLAVBBT IN LEGENDARY GREECE,



07



3. The society of legendary Greece includes, besides
the chiefs, the general mass of freemen (Xao(), q^^j^^j^j^jj
among whom stand out by special names certain occupa. *
professional men, such as the carpenter, the ***5,°e'gg*'^^
smith, the leather-dresser, the leech, the prophet, Sf^th" °'^'
the bard, and the fisherman, i We have no f°^^2^°
means of appreciating their condition. Though
lots of arable land were assigned in special property to
individuals, with boundaries both carefully marked and
jealously watched, ^ yet the larger proportion of surface
was devoted to pasture. Cattle formed both the chief item
in the substance of a wealthy man, the chief means of
making payments, and the common ground of quarrels —
bread and meat, in lasge quantities, being the constant food
of every one. 3 The estates of the owners were tilled, and
their cattle tended, mostly by bought slaves, but to a
certain degree also by poor freemen called Thetes, working
for hire and for stated periods. The principal slaves, who
were entrusted with the care of large herds of oxen, swine,
or goats, were of necessity men worthy of confidence, their



The case of the Spartan Dra«
kontiuB (one of the Ten Thousand
Greeks who serred with Cyrus the
younger, and permanently exiled
from his country in consequence
of an inyoluntary murder com-
mitted during his boyhood) pre-
sents a pretty exact parallel to
the fatal quarrel of Patroklus at
dice, when a boy, with the son of
Amphidamas, in consequence of
which he was forced to seek
shelter under the roof of Pdleus
(compare Iliad, xxiii. 86, with
Xenoph. Anabas. iy. 8, 25).
