Dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

AIKIAS DIKE. ALA. 73
the number of oxen could not be procured, they the judges determined on the justice of the claim.
substituted an equal number of goats. [L. S.] It was thus an assessed action, and resembled the
AGYRMUS (&ayvp/Ads). [ELEUSINIA.] procedure in public causes. The orations of DeAGYRTAE (&ypras), mendicant priests, who mosthenes against Conon, and of Isocrates against
were accustomed to travel through the different Lochites, were spoken in an action of this kind, and
towns of Greece, soliciting alms for the gods whom both of these have come down to us; and there
they served. These priests carried, either on their were two orations of Lysias, which are lost, relating
shoulders or on beasts of burthen, images of their to the same action, namely, against Theopompus
respective deities. They appear to have been of and Hippccrates. (Harpocrat. s. v. arncas; Meier,
Oriental origin, and were chiefly connected with Att. Process, p. 547, &c.; Bdckh, Publ. Econ. of
the worship of Isis, Opis and Arge (Herod. iv. 35), Atlbens, pp. 352, 364, 372, 374, 2nd ed.)
and especially of the great mother of the gods; AITHOUSA (a'efovoa), a word only used by
whence they were called y7rpayprma. They were Homer, is probably for ai'Oovoma arod, a portico exgenerally speaking, persons of the lowest and most posed to the sun. From the passages in which it
abandoned character. They undertook to inflict occurs, it seems to denote a covered portico, opening
some grievous bodily injury on the enemy of any on to the court of the house, aebXi, in front of the
individual who paid them for such services, and vestibule, 7rpdOvpov. Thus a chariot, leaving the
also promised, for a small sum of money, to obtain house, is described as passing out of the 7rpodOvpov
forgiveness from the gods whom they served, for and the aieovua. (II. xxiv. 323; Od. iii. 493, xv.
any sins which either the individual himself or 146, 191.). The word is used also in the plural,
his ancestors had committed. (Plat. Rep. ii, p. to describe apparently the porticoes which sur364, b.; Plut. Superst. c. 3; Zosim. i. 11; Max. rounded the ab-x. (II. vi. 243; Od. viii. 57.)
Tyr. xix. 3; Athen. vi. p. 266, d; Origen, c. Cels. It was in such a portico that guests were lodged
i. p. 8; Phil. Leg. ii. p. 792; Ruhnken, ad Timaei for the night. (Od. iii. 399, vii. 345). It was
Lex. s. vv. &yelpovaoav and 4erawycoyat; K. F. Her- also the place of reception for people flocking to the
mann, Lehrbuch d. gottesdienstlichen Alterthiimer d. palace on a public occasion (II. xxiv. 239; Od.
Gbriec/he, ~ 42, n. 13.) viii. 57); and hence perhaps the epithet epl3oviros,
These mendicant priests came into Italy, but at which Homer usually connects with it. [P. S.]
what time is uncertain, together with the worship ALA, a part of a Roman house. [DoMus.]
of the gods whom they served. (Cic. De Leg. ii. ALA, ALARES, ALA'RII. These words,
16; Heindorff, ad Iior. Sero-. i. 2. 2.) like all other terms connected with Roman warAHE'NUM. [AENUM.] fare, were used in different or at least modified
AIKIAS DIKE (aelcias aiuca), an action brought acceptations at different periods.
at Athens, before the court of the Forty (of Fre- Ala, which literally means a wing, was from the
TapdKCoYs-a), against any individual, who had struck earliest epochs employed to denote the wing of an
a citizen of the state. Any citizen, who had been army, and this signification it always retained, but
thus insulted, might proceed in two ways against in process of time was frequently used in a re
the offending party, either by the aKias aiK?7, stricted sense.
which was a private action, or by the @pewOs ~ypaWps, 1. When a Roman army was composed of
which was looked upon in the light of a public Roman citizens exclusively, the flanks of the inprosecution, since the state was considered to be fantry when drawn up in battle array were covered'
wronged in an injury done to any citizen. It ap- on the right and left by the cavalry; and hence
pears to have been a principle of the Athenian Ala denoted the body of horse which was attached
law, to give an individual, who had been injured, to and served along with the foot-soldiers of the
more than one mode of obtaining redress. If the legion. (See Cincius, de Re lIilitari, who, alplaintiff brought it as a private suit, the defendant though he flourished B.C. 200, is evidently exwould only be condemned to pay a fine, which the plaining in the passage quoted by Aulus Gellius,
plaintiff received; but if the cause was brought xvi. 4, the original acceptation of the term.)
as a public suit, the accused might be punished 2. When, at a later date, the Roman armies
even with death, and if condemned to pay a fine, were composed partly of Roman citizens and partly
the latter went to the state. of Socii, either Latini or Italici, it became the
It was necessary to prove two facts in bringing practice to marshall the Roman troops in the centre
the arldas ari before the Forty. First, That the of the battle line and the Socii upon the wings.
defendant had struck the plaintiff, who must have Hence ala and alarii denoted the contingent furbeen a free man, with the intention of insulting nished by the allies, both horse and foot, and the
him (q?(' UGPE), which, however, was always pre- two divisions were distinguished as dextera ala and
sumed to have been the intention, unless the de- sinistra ala. (Liv. xxvii. 2, xxx. 21, xxxi. 21;
fendant could prove that he only struck the plain- Lips. de Alilit. Rom. ii. dial. 7. We find in Liv.
tiff in joke. Thus Ariston, after proving that he x. 40, the expression CUss cohorlibas alariis, and in
had been struck by Conon, tells the judges that x. 43, D. Brutum Scaeram lecatumnz cum legiona
Conon will attempt to show that he had only prima et decem coh/ortibus alariis equitatuque ire
struck him in play. (Dem. c. eonon. p. 1261.).... jssit.)
Secondly, It was necessary to prove that the de- 3. When the whole of the inhabitants of Italy
fendant struck the plaintiff first, and did not merely had been admitted to the privileges of Roman
return the blows which had been given by the citizens the terms alarii, cohortes alariae were transplaintiff (&ipXeY XEL EpV aireKWV, or merely a3m'KaoV ferred to the foreign troops serving along with the
dpXeiv, Dem. c. Euerg. pp. 1141, 1151.) Roman armies. In Cesar (B. G. i. 51) we see the
In this action, the sum of money to be paid by Alarii expressly distinguished from the legionarsi,
the defendant as damages was not fixed by the laws; and we find the phrase (B. C. i. 73) cohortes alariae
but the plaintiff assessed the amount according to et legionariae, while Cicero (ad Fam. ii. 17) speaks
the injury, which he thought he had received, and of the Alarii Transpadani.