A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

LYCURGUS.:LYCURGOU.
mention the king Theopompus as the author of feeling of his countrymen. Now it is evident that
this magistracy. (Plut. Lye. 7; Arist. Pol. v. 9.) the power of any individual lawgiver must in this
But neither of the two statements is correct. The point be very limited, since these things are only
office of ephors was common to several Doric states. the outward appearance of a nation's character,
They were originally officers of police, exercised a which it would be just as easy to alter by legal
civil jurisdiction in minor cases (Mull. Dor. iii. 7), enactments as a negro lawgiver might by the same
and were doubtlessly coeval with the first origin of means change the black colour of his countrymen
the Spartan state.: or their woolly hair. No power on earth could
Such considerations have induced modern critics induce the population of any town or village in
to examine more carefully the truth of every se- modern Europe to adopt the manner of life of the
parate statement, in order thus to arrive at a more ancient Spartans, granting that this were otherwise
correct notion of the influence of the individual possible; and we are equally positive in asserting
mind of a lawgiver on the spirit of the Spartan that the influence of Lycurgus on the character of
constitution. Some critics have gone quite to the his countrymen, however great it may have been,
extreme, and, placing Lycurgus in the same category could never materially alter their peculiar mode of
with Theseus or Romulus, have entirely denied his life.
historical existence, alleging the authority of Hel- 3. The difficulty of influencing a political comlanicus, the most ancient writer on Sparta, who munity in almost every concern of public and
ascribes the Spartan institutions to- Procles and private life by legal enactments is still further in-Eurysthenes, without even mentioning the name of creased, if we consider the means at the disposal of
Lycurgus. (Strab. viii. p. 366.) Other reasons a lawgiver in the time of Lycurgus. We know
alleged for this view are contained in the divine well the difficulty there is in putting in force a
honours paid to -Lycurgus at Sparta, and the sig- single new law. What could Lycurgus have
nificant name of Eunomus, his father, nephew, or done without all the means of modern times, withbrother, according to different accounts. We are out a nicely arranged administration, without even
not inclined to go all the length of this argument; the art of writing? This art, although existing at
we allow with the soberest modern historians the that time, was not used for fixing and preserving the
reality of Lycurgus, but in order -to limit the ex- laws of Lycurgus. A particular rhetra forbade the
aggerations of the ancients, we adduce the follow- use of it. (Plut. Lye. 13.) The laws were transing considerations, which tend to show that by far mitted by word of mouth, and existed only in the
the greater part of the regulations which are cor- memory and hearts of the citizens. Is it possible
monly ascribed to Lycurgus arose, independently that a great number of them could originate at
of him, by the spontaneous development of the once? We know a few of the rhetrae ascribed to
commonwealth of Sparta. Lycurgus. They lay down simply the broad fun1. It is a general and obvious remark, that damental features of the constitution. All the
people have a propensity to ascribe to prominent detail, it appears, was left to be regulated by the
individuals the sayings and doings of a great many prevailing sentiment among the Spartans.
less celebrated persons, and to make these indi- 4. What we have said with regard to the tendviduals the representatives of whole ages. This ency of all the institutions of Sparta, viz. that
propensity is more especially peculiar to an age of their object was to keep down a large subject
primitive simplicity, ignorance. and poetry., A population, and that they were necessary for this
prosaical, analysing, scientific research,' dispels such purpose, is at the same time an argument for
delusions. We.no longer imagine that Romulus doubting the influence of Lycurgus. Sparta asselected out of his motley crowd of fugitives:some sumed from the time of the invasion of Peloponnesus
few whom he made patricians, nor that he devised the attitude of a conqueror. The Helots existed
the division of the people into tribes and curiae, before the, time of Lycurgus, and consequently also
nor that -Numa invented religious rites wholly the contrivances of the Spaxtan state to keep them
anomalous with the existing institutions; we know in subjection. The only thing that we can allow
now that the twelve tables of the decemvirs con- is, that before the time of Lycurgus these institained little, if anything, that was new, and only tutions were in a state of development, and varying
reduced to a concise, fixed form the laws which at various times and occasions; and that they
were formerly only partially and imperfectly written were finally settled in the reform which the whole
down. If we lived in an age similar to the early state underwent through: Lycurgus. We hear of
period of Grecian history, there can be no doubt disorders that prevailed at Sparta, of quarrels bethat the Code Napoleon would soon be regarded in tween the community (people) and the king (Plut.
the same light in which the ancients regarded:the Lye. 2), of the tyranny of king Charilaus (Arist.
legislation of Lycurgus. It would be considered Pol. v. 10. ~ 3), which was put an end to by the
to have entirely emanated from one individual establishment of an aristocracy; at the same time
mind, without having any connection with previous we read of an equal division of land, so opposed to
institutions. Such being the case, we naturally the spirit of aristocracy. The easiest explanation
hesitate before we admit all that we hear about the of these traditions is that given by bishop Thirlwall
-legislation of Lycurgus. (Hist.. of Gr. vol. i. p. 297), that the quarrels were
2. Our doubts will be reasonably confirmed by not among the Spartans themselves, but between
the observation, that the chief part of that reform them and the Laconian provincials, many of whom
which is ascribed to Lycurgus consists not in de- were only recently subjected, or still independent.
finite regulations concerning the functions of the " It seems not improbable that it was reserved for
various magistrates, the administration, criminal or Lycurgus finally to settle the relative position of
civil law, in short, the purely political organisation the several classes " (p. 300). This theory appears
of the state i but in the peculiar direction he is the more correct, as it is evident from the comsaid to have given to the nature of private life, to parison of other Dorian states in Peloponnesus and
the manners and customs, modes of thinking and Crete, that the peculiar character of the Dorian