=64.= In the Heroic Age Athens was governed by kings. Theseus subdued the country towns of Attica, and made the city the capital of a centralized monarchy. Codrus, the last of the kings, fell in resisting the Dorian invaders, who had conquered the Peloponnesus and designed to subjugate Attica. The invasion was repelled, but the kingdom was not reëstablished. The eupatridæ, or nobles, secured the election of an archon for life, who was in a certain degree responsible to them for his actions. Though of the royal race of Codrus, he had neither the name nor the dignity of a king. This succession of archons continued about 300 years. [Sidenote: B. C. 684.] =65.= An important change was then made by limiting the term of office to ten years. At the expiration of his service, the archon could be tried and punished if his conduct was proved to have been unjust. At first the election was made, as before, from the descendants of Codrus; but one of these being deposed for his cruelty, the office was thrown open to all nobles. A third change appointed, instead of a single magistrate, a board of nine, who were chosen yearly from among the eupatrids. Nobles alone had the right to vote, and for sixty years the government of Athens was a pure aristocracy. [Sidenote: B. C. 621.] =66.= But the people of Athens, afterward to fill so important a part in history, now made themselves heard in a demand for _written laws_, which should stand between them and the arbitrary will of their rulers. The nobles acceded to the demand, but avenged their injured dignity by appointing Draco to prepare the code. This first Athenian law-giver made a collection of statutes so severe that they were said to be indeed the work of a dragon, and to be written not with ink, but with blood. The smallest theft, not less than murder and sacrilege, was punished by death, and the life of every citizen was left absolutely at the mercy of the ruling order. [Sidenote: B. C. 620.] [Sidenote: B. C. 596.]