however, mutually united by a league, at the head of which stood Thebes, who gradually converted her right of precedence into a right of power, although her ambitious attempts were resisted to the last extremity by the separate cities, and by Plataeae in particular: hence sprung many wars. The general affairs were decided upon in four assemblies, ([Greek: boulai],) held in the four districts into which Boeotia was divided; these assemblies in conjunction elected eleven Boeotarchs, who stood at the head of the federation as supreme magistrates and field marshals. The great extent and population of their territory might have enabled the Boeotians to act the first part on the theatre of Greece, had they not been impeded by their pernicious form of government, by the envy felt against Thebes, and by the want of union which naturally ensued. Yet in subsequent times the example of Epaminondas and Pelopidas gave proof that the genius of two men was sufficient to surmount all these obstacles. _c._ Phocis was originally ruled by kings descended, it is said, from Phocus, the leader of a colony from Corinth. The sovereign power was abolished about the time of the Dorian migration; but the form of the republican constitution which succeeded remains undetermined; and of the undertakings of the Phocians previous to the Persian invasion, we know nothing more than that they waged war with the Thessalians, and were successful. As history never mentions the Phocians but in the aggregate, the whole territory must have formed but one independent state. To that state, however, the city of Delphi, which had its own constitution, did not belong: the city of Crissa with its fertile district, and the harbour of Cirrha, constituted a separate state, which became opulent by practising extortions upon the pilgrims to Delphi: this state lasted till 600, when, in consequence of the insults of the Crissaeans to the Delphian oracle, a war was proclaimed against them by the Amphictyons, which ended in 590 with the rasing of Crissa; the land of which was thenceforward added to the sacred glebe of Delphi. _d._ Locris. Although we learn from early history that the Locrians also had their kings,--among whom Ajax, the son of Oileus, is renowned in the Trojan war,--and that they likewise in subsequent times adopted a republican form of government; yet the date of that revolution, and the manner in which it was brought about, are not known. The three tribes of Locrians remained politically distinct. The Locri Ozolae, west of Phocis, possessed the most extensive territory; each city of which stood independent, though Amphissa is mentioned as the capital. The country of the Locri Opuntii, eastward, consisted of the district appertaining to the city of Opus; of their domestic organization, as well as that of their neighbours, the Locri Epicnemidii, we know nothing.