The most noted ruler of Argos in historic times was Pheidon (_c._ 750 B.C.), whose dominion extended over Sicyon, Phlius, Trœzen, Epidaurus, and Ægina. He left his mark on the Peloponnesus by introducing coinage in electrum and silver, and a new system of weights and measures, apparently borrowed from the Phœnicians, which received the name of _Æginetan_ from its chief commercial centre, in the same way as the system in vogue among the Ionian Greeks received the name of _Eubœic_. According to Herodotus the Argolic territory at one time included all the eastern coast, down to Cape Malea. But the Spartans gradually encroached upon it, till their country became the premier state of Greece, of which we have one of the earliest indications in the fact that it was to Sparta Crœsus made his appeal for support in 547 B.C. [Illustration: ARGOS AND LARISSA To the left the principal church of the modern town of Argos. Behind the town rises the splendid mass of Larissa, the Acropolis of the ancient city, with mediæval fortifications on its summit. Half-way up lies the romantically situated convent of the Panagia.] Argos played an ignoble part at the time of the Persian invasion. It refused to make common cause with Sparta, unless a thirty years’ truce were concluded between the two states, and the honour of commanding the allied forces were shared equally between them--a demand to which Sparta could not accede, though willing to admit the king of Argos to an equality with her own two kings. In spite of the abstention of Argos the two neighbouring cities of Mycenæ and Tiryns each sent a contingent to Thermopylæ and Platæa, and it was partly in revenge for this that Argos in 468 B.C. took possession of these cities and deprived them of their liberties. The comparative insignificance of Mycenæ from this time forward accounts for Argos being so often substituted for it by the friendly dramatists of Athens, as the scene of the great tragedies in the family of Agamemnon. With all its pride in its mythical glory, Argos never produced any great man after Pheidon--unless we give it credit for its remote connection with Alexander the Great, who claimed to be descended from an Argive exile who settled in Macedonia. Argos had the opportunity more than once of becoming the head of a league against Sparta, and at one time it had a strong military force in its “Thousand,” a highly trained and well-equipped regiment composed of young men belonging to its best families; but it was weakened by internal dissensions between the oligarchic and democratic parties, and never enjoyed more than a very brief ascendency. At one time its citizens made an attempt, with the help of Alcibiades and the Athenians, to connect the city with the sea by means of long walls like those of Athens, but the Spartans interfered and soon put a stop to the work.